Collaboration
Definition
Collaboration in TCID is working smoothly together with clients, users, and teammates to create well-rounded products. This requires communication, adaptability, trust, and empathy with new and various types of people.
Purpose:
To improve traffic to the client’s website, a team came together to perform usability testing on the website and give their findings to the client.
Skills Used:
- Communication
- Adaptability
- Trust
- Empathy
Process:
In November 2020, I helped create the Hal Coker Memorial Buckaroo Benefit Fund (HCMBBF)’s website usability report. The team of four people had a month to do this. We started by interviewing the client to gain a better understanding of the client’s goals and expectations in order to find which method of usability test would be the best fit, then conducted usability test interviews with volunteer users, and made and delivered the results to the client.
The interview with the client took patience and empathy to understand where he was coming from and what his expectations were. I created a dialogue between the client and the team by agreeing on a common ground. We asked him what kind of people the website was for to identify the primary and secondary users and what he specifically wanted to know about the usability of the website.
When doing the usability interviews, I trusted the other member of the team to do their assigned parts of the project while I conducted my usability test with a user and recorded data from another test. I also reminded the team of deadlines, once looking out for the group by turning in an assignment when the others were busy. While others were in charge of their parts of the final document, I put together graphs and edited the final document for clarity to aid the client’s understanding of the information gathered by the team.
Reflection
From this project, I showed abilities that included keeping an eye on deadlines and goals; establishing goals among the group; adapting to others’ schedules, abilities, and aims; and being patient and empathetic with team members and clients. The abilities that were missing are better communication with people about my expectations and aims (since I tend to let others suggest/assign me work that needs to be done) and a more open/empathetic mind when it comes to expectations about other people’s schedules and use of time (just because I want something done a few days early does not mean that works with everyone else’s schedule).
In the future, I plan to be more direct and open about my goals and thinking so that the group knows my expectations for them and the project. I will keep in mind that some ideas are not possible or feasible due to other people’s workload and schedule. I intend to participate more in discussions in order to better communication in the team and improve the collaboration.
Final Result:
Below is the final usability report sent to the president of the nonprofit.
