I was honored to be invited to the conference to conduct a spin-off of my UX Show and Tell workshops. The audience participation proved once again what I’ve been seeing across the country and into Toronto and London: that there really is a pent-up demand for user experience designers, interaction designers, information architects, and others to pull back the curtain from their work and share the goods or ask for help.

But as my session didn’t occur until Sunday, I had plenty of time to catch up with old friends from DC, my recent colleagues in Philadelphia and New York, and to finally meet a number of people with whom I had either communicated but never met or simply didn’t know until our time together.

Though I took away a lot of important insight in the sessions and keynotes, my real appreciation of the time lies in the moments spent forging new relationships or re-galvanizing existing ones.

My personal highlight of the conference occurred Saturday morning, when my friend Jeff Parks asked if I could sit in on a low-key discussion about design research with a few other folks. It wasn’t until a few moments before the UX Workshop’s video cameras went live did I realize I’d be having such a discussion sitting next to Indi Young, Eric Reiss, Daniel Szuc, Steve Baty, and of course Jeff himself.

Our conversation (which will be posted to www.theuxworkshop.tv thanks to sponsorship by New Hampshire-based Mad*Pow) spanned numerous topics involving design research, such as knowing what to investigate and how to dig deep enough, convincing clients when you need more research or perhaps even less, and much more.

Not only was the discussion itself valuable, it also granted me the opportunity to finally meet some of that Mad*Pow team, including Amy Cueva and Megan Grocki. I had been aware of their stellar work for some time but had never crossed paths with any of their team in person.

My workshop was a success despite a curveball at the last second: though we were planning on a discussion-style format, we couldn’t get the room converted from a presentation-model layout to round-table in time, and because lunch required the round-tables we’d have about 45 minutes for Show and Tell (usually the workshops are about 2 hours or more).

Will Evans quickly volunteered to kick off the Show and Tell by discussing some of the deliverables originally appearing in his “Right Way to Wireframe” workshop held on Thursday of that week. Will’s work process quickly captivated the audience and also showed the crowd that discussing your work doesn’t have to be all that painful.

Other presentations followed, ranging from people looking for help with their design approach, to other folks who wanted to walk through prototypes of their work to get feedback.

I’ll be the first to admit there were some unique challenges to the Show and Tell, but fortunately with a bit of adjustments I’m convinced such a workshop has an important role in an international conference attended by practitioners of varying levels of experience and expertise.

Looking ahead, I want to continue to build the UX Show and Tell brand with more of the connections I established in Savannah, and I’m sure the natural partnership with the IxDA will provide such a fertile foundation for growth.

Professionally, I can’t wait to engage with this crew in the immediate future and beyond, in any capacity, be it on project work, over a few drinks socially, or again on the conference circuit.

From a professional perspective, I’m beginning a long-term consulting position as a UX Strategist with a major pharmaceutical company to help design a socially-rich enterprise intranet application.

The personal perspective is equally beneficial: I’m really excited to move my baby girl closer to my wife’s parents (my Mom lives in Indiana and my Dad is in Hilton Head, South Carolina) . In addition to my in-laws are numerous cousins, aunts, uncles, and my wife’s two brothers who I’m closer to than some of my friends. If it takes a village to raise a child, then I’ll trust this village of family moreso than the alternative.

So between the great work environment, both for this current gig and whatever comes next, not one but three rich UX communities, and the opportunity for my own family to be closer to more family, the decision really wasn’t that tough.

I’m also looking forward to expanding my network of user experience professionals to include New York City, Philadelphia, and New Jersey, and rest assured I’ll continue rebel rousing the UX community to share their work at UX Show and Tell workshops throughout the region.

But that doesn’t mean UX Show and Tell is leaving the Washington DC area. My friend and fellow UX designer John Douglass will pick up the flag and facilitate workshops in the area. He’s already accepting reservations for our next event on January 12, 2010.

I’ll certainly be back in DC soon, but I also can’t wait to see more of you in Philadelphia and New York for UX Show and Tell, and I encourage you to join me for for lunch on Sunday at Interaction 10 in Savannah, Georgia.

This workshop was unique from its predecessors in format, attendance, and dialogue. Specifically, as Show and Tell has previously consisted of about 10 people around one table, the Baltimore Parlay event attracted around 20 people in an open-air studio setting, with presenters showing their work at the front of the room.  And due to time constraints, two people shared work as the accompanying dialogue expanded from exclusively discussing the work to also why the work was valuable, how it could be sold to skeptical or budget and time sensitive clients.

Ren Pope preceded the Show and Tell with his working draft of his proposal for the IA Summit in April.  He shared strategies and processes for understanding information architecture’s role in an enterprise environment, and in the nature of Show and Tell, asked for and received feedback of the presentation’s flow, content, and his delivery.

Following Ren’s presentation, Jim Jarret presented a K-J diagram, an affinity diagram useful for identifying important data among ancillary information often discovered during brainstorming exercises. Jim discussed when to deploy the diagram and a step by step summary of the process.  Attendees’ questions ranged from how to get senior management on board to support the effort to whether the diagram itself could be understood by business analysts, product managers or other audiences.

Elizabeth Randolph of Better Experience shared paper wireframes and prototypes she tested earlier in the day. While some folks were familiar with using low fidelity paper wireframes to generate early feedback, others were curious how to replicate online interactions that may not map well to paper, such as toggling the visibility of panels on the screen or excessive scrolling.  Others were curious to hear how printing and testing computer-based wireframes compared to using the same wireframes in a clickable prototype on screen, whereas others were also curious how to get client sign-off on low fidelity wireframes when they’ve been conditioned to accept high fidelity mockups.

The responses following Show and Tell have been tremendously positive, ranging from people asking when the next event will be to telling me they’re already identifying what work they should bring next time.

The next two UX Show and Tell workshops are November 17 at Viget Labs in Falls Church, Virginia, and at P’unk Ave in Philadelphia on November 18.

If your organization would like to host a UX Show and Tell, contact Chris Avore at (202) 281-4573 or email him at avore@erova.com to learn more.

UX Show and Tell is an informal workshop that’s all about the work, where designers can share feedback and ideas on strategies, outcomes, and deliverables, and meet other practitioners in a focused but relaxed environment.

Show and Tell participants brought a number of unique deliverables, such as concept maps and task models of complex web sites,  a process chart detailing how, where and when to integrate UX in an Agile software development lifecycle, and interface design mockups of a scheduling application.

I started the workshop sharing a deck of documents I used to provide visual conclusions from a number of user interviews and observations I conducted for the Library of Congress.  As user research continues to grow in recognition and importance, I thought there could be some value to *showing* how users behave rather than simply describing behavior in a Word or Powerpoint report.

…participants should be able to share specific solutions if they’re aware of the problems in advance…

I was hoping that the group would bear with me since it was the first workshop.  And not surprisingly, there were bumps in the road, from logistical issues such as starting on time to ordering food, to procedural hiccups such as how and when questions should be asked so as not to derail or sidetrack a presentation.

Fortunately, I’ve already begun incorporating participant feedback into future Show and Tell workshops.

For instance,  I’ll ask participants to identify what they’d like to share or problems they need to address during the RSVP process so other participants may be able to help. While I don’t want to see the workshop be so targeted that one session will only be dedicated to wireframes or another exclusively committed to persona documentation, participants should be able to share specific solutions if they’re aware of the problems in advance.

By identifying an issue first, the group can provide more direct, concise feedback.

Moving forward, the workshop will also run more smoothly if each participant quickly says what they’re sharing and what issue they’re having or where they’re looking for feedback.  During the first session, a few conversations began to wander off course when feedback that was meant to be helpful wasn’t entirely appropriate to the project or the project’s audience. By identifying an issue first, the group can provide more direct, concise feedback.

I also see the benefit to posting what was presented on a wall or whiteboard so the group can take a closer look at the documents. The photograph above shows how a number of deliverables were spread out on a conference table which certainly worked, but won’t scale well or support electronic presentations without a projector.

If your organization would like to host a UX Show and Tell, it’s really easy.

At the suggestion of one of the participants, I created a Google spreadsheet to list who attended with contact information to help expand each other’s network of practitioners in the area, many of whom had never met before.

I’m already discussing new locations to host workshops, both in the immediate DC area and beyond. If your organization would like to host a UX Show and Tell, it’s really easy.  Just have space for about 8 to 10 people, a table and chairs, and now a whiteboard, and we’ll set up a date.