Persona & Scenario Development

Personas (personae) are narratives that describe an archetype user, created to synthesize data collected from real customers into a fictional profile as a design tool. [Developed by Cooper & Associates; more information] Scenarios are narratives that describe a user’s process through a task or system, in a story-telling format.

Providing detailed personas and scenarios also helps to bridge the gap between designers and developers, by creating a context in which to understand the designs. Setting that context helps the team extend beyond the original design when plans change or scopes expand.

What We Do

We start with what we know about a target user and her goals for a particular application. We then create narratives to describe the person accomplishing one or more tasks using the application, in a way that identifies each step in the process. The more specific we are and the more detail we put into the scenario, the more we progress toward the ideal user experience.

What You Get

A series of documents describing customer profiles (user profiles) and a collection of tasks, including the primary and secondary user roles as well as the ideal task flow.