On 10 November, Intercom Editor Liz Pohland attended a usability workshop at the National Press Club in Washington, DC, for World Usability Day. The workshop was hosted by the Center for Plain Language (whose most recent coup has been the passage just last month of the Plain Writing Act of 2010, which requires that government documents be written in “plain language,” or “writing that is clear, concise, well-organized, and follows other best practices appropriate to the subject or field and intended audience”).
Wednesday’s workshop featured three usability experts—Ginny Redish, Whitney Quesenbery, and Kate Walser—and a special guest speaker—Nicole Burton, Usability Specialist on the USA.gov Web Best Practices Team at General Service Administration (GSA). Burton is the organizer of GSA’s “First Fridays,” a monthly session of streamlined usability testing that is geared toward finding and fixing usability problems.
“The workshop was practical and hands-on,” said Pohland. “I met several STC members and left with three clear ways to help users better understand information. During the workshop, we reviewed documents from the perspective of different readers (i.e., persona-based review), conducted ‘hallway evaluations,’ and ran informal usability tests. These methods proved to be inexpensive and straightforward solutions, especially for conducting small-scale usability tests, such as with the staff of an organization.”
To learn more about the workshop and see the presentation slides and usability example cases, visit the Center for Plain Language website.