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The user research technique that can help you in a time crunch

How to avoid bad design decisions due to time pressure

Kai Wong
UX Collective
A hourglass is shown with most of the sand on the bottom. Only a little bit of sand is at the top with it flowing into the bottom.
Photo by Wilhelm Gunkel on Unsplash

I never thought I’d address one of my most dreaded phrases by trying to organize my user research findings. But that’s what happened when I took a proactive approach in organizing my user research notes.

Creating a high-level summary in my spreadsheet allowed me to not only quickly revisit user research and understand the context: it also allowed me to compare design alternatives across different design iterations. And that was a crucial factor in reconsidering design alternatives in a time crunch.

Avoiding poor design decisions due to time pressure

I was forced to examine other possible design alternatives for a feature when it turned out that our design solution wouldn’t work due to certain legal and organizational policies.

This was part of a large-scale re-design of a project: we interviewed over 25 subject matter experts (SMEs) and gone through 4 rounds of iterative user testing. In addition, I was in charge of compiling notes and data analysis.

But this policy issue had occurred just 1 month before our expected due date. As a result, there was huge pressure to quickly find a design…

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