Are User Personas haunting you? Does your team have trouble using personas because as they seem too intangible? In practice unbelievably unrealistic: insubstantial, unhelpful and eventually ignored? Your project maybe haunted by ghost personas! Lost, walled up behind a stack of documentation, technically now just a whisper in your conscience, a glimpse of users in a corner of your eye…irrelevant…crying for usability where no one can hear them? User Personas really help ground product teams in genuine data, freeing them to have productive user-centric conversations with stakeholders that shift away from debating personal opinions into decision-making, based on proven user research – but personas can be quite hard to assemble realistically: almost seeming like a Dark Art. In todays Lean and pressured environments they often get created too quickly on a shallow basis from vague data or stakeholder opinion, leading your product in entirely the wrong direction. Continuing an ongoing theme, Mike Rawling, a ux veteran of many apocalyptic projects, will share the latest user research techniques being used today, combined with tried and tested experience of how you can work with personas in a pragmatic way that fits into the world of digital development – without compromising either UX or your XP, Agile or Lean principles. Attendees will come away from this session with an understanding of qualitative user research and be able to revive their User Personas in your Agile/Lean/XP process so they continue to serve as a useful reference for you, your team and stakeholders throughout the life of your product. The session will end with awards including most life-like persona of the day! Cleanse your product of ghost personas!

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HOW TO BRING
YOUR PERSONAS TO LIFE
WITHOUT NEEDING AN EXORCIST
MICHAEL RAWLING
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#ghostpersonas
#agileotb

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Michael rawling

3. @hedshot
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Your title sit over itREASONABLE INTERRUPTIONS TODAY
a) A Zombie Apocalypse
b) Monkeys
c) Nothing…
*…I love tweeting #agileotb too but please do set phones to silent… 

4. @hedshot
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Your title sit over itTHIS MORNING
• What are, and how do User Personas survive in the real
world??
• Field Guide to Recognising Ghost Personas
• Learn to identify potentially sick personas
• Nurture your personas back to life

5. @hedshot
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Your title sit over itWHO’S HERE?

6. @hedshot
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Your title sit over itYOUR HOST TODAY…
MIKE RAWLING
LEAD UX AT UNRULY.CO, LONDON:
TEAM-OF-ONE & A #UXCOACH
UX RESEARCHER,
INTERACTION DESIGNER,
UI ENGINEER,
UI DESIGNER,
TEST PARTICIPANT RECRUITER,
USABILITY TESTER,
ETHNOGRAPHIC RESEARCHER, MICRO-COPY WRITER, TRAINER, UX
COACH, UX MENTOR…. AND SO ON…
UX activities dating back to ’98…
Consulted, designed, engineered, leader of, coached, trained big & small teams and initiatives in:
Konami computer games, Tesco.com, Wiley Publishing, Camelot (UK’s national lottery), ITV & Granada
Television, LoveFilm(Amazon Video), Toyota and now Unruly…
…recently started tweeting anew @theuxcoach

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ABOUT
UNRULY

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ABOUT UNRULY.CO

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WARNING – WILL EXHIBIT
UNRULY CULTURE…
...and of course, err, ‘creative’ cultural appropriation and meme’ing…;)

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5 MIN WORKSHOP INTRO: WHAT ARE PERSONAS??
Actions
• Identify with the people around you, what you think personas are.
Don’t
• Take much time
Aim
• Note down what you think

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5 MIN WORKSHOP REVIEW: WHAT ARE
PERSONAS??
Review
• What results did we get? Round the teams…

13. @hedshot
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Your title sit over itLET’S TALK GHOSTS…

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WHAT ARE THESE
GHOSTS??

15. @hedshot
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Your title sit over itWIKIPEDIA MEANS IT’S
TRUE
Ghost (ɡəʊst)
noun
1. an apparition of a dead person which is believed to appear or become manifest to the living,
typically as a nebulous image. "the building is haunted by the ghost of a monk"
synonyms: spectre, phantom, wraith, spirit, soul, shadow, presence
verb
1. act as ghostwriter of (a work). "his memoirs were smoothly ghosted by a journalist »
2. glide smoothly and effortlessly. "they ghosted up the river"

16. @hedshot
Title position here
Your title sit over it‘B-G-F’S FROM WAY BACK…
The belief in manifestations of the spirits of the dead is
widespread, dating back to animism or ancestor worship in pre-
literate cultures.
Certain religious practices—funeral rites, exorcisms, and some
practices of spiritualism and ritual magic—are specifically
designed to rest the spirits of the dead.
Ghosts are generally described as solitary, human-like essences
that haunt particular locations, objects, or people they were
associated with in life, though stories of ghostly armies and the
ghosts of animals have also been recounted.

17. @hedshot
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CLASSIFICATIONUnquiet spirits
Grumpy ex-people who don’t like change...
Often location orientated.
Poltergeists
Ghosts who like moving stuff around…the opposite of feng
shui...?
Possession
Ghost who take over stuff – cars, people…
Object orientated ghosts (OO-Ghs)
Ghosts obsessively attached to objects:
inc. videos, books, musical instruments…
Cursed people/s
Ask Aragorn.

18. @hedshot
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Your title sit over itGHOST ARE THIS TOO…

19. @hedshot
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Your title sit over itBUT MOSTLY THESE...

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Your title sit over itHAVE YOU SPOTTED
GHOSTS?

21. @hedshot
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Your title sit over itDO YOU HAVE AN UNDEAD
PERSONA INFESTATION??

22. @hedshot
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Your title sit over itZOMBIE PERSONAS ARE…
Made up at the beginning of a project then never trusted…
Discarded in a file system, alone…
Forgotten about…
Un-tended…
Un-proven…
Un-fulfilled…
Un-fed…
…Un-dead!!!!

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PERSONAS…User Personas receiving lack of attention…

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INTRODUCING MY…GHOST PERSONA KIT!

25. @hedshot
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Your title sit over itGHOST PERSONAS…HAUNTING
YOUR PROCESS…

26. @hedshot
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Your title sit over itGHOST PERSONAS…HAUNTING
YOUR PROCESS…
Fast & cheap…
Just do it…
Just test your assumptions…
...and a worryingly sizable chunk of people take
that to mean that research and associated
activities are no longer necessary...
: /

27. @hedshot
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Your title sit over itGHOST PERSONAS…HAUNTING
YOUR PROCESS…
Misunderstandings of Lean, Lean start-up and certain
Agile and XP principles so that…
‘…Go faster, cheaper…’
‘...no documentation needed...’
Trans.
We don’t need research to learn just about users
People making Proto-Personas fast…too fast...
: /

28. @hedshot
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Your title sit over itGHOST PERSONAS…HAUNTING
YOUR PROCESS…
Or just making them up…
“...I *know* my customers – I don’t need to
research...”
“...I know what they want – don’t you think I
have the customers best interests at heart??...”
Trans.: Let’s just make them up

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SPOT THOSE GHOST
PERSONAS!

30. @hedshot
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Your title sit over itSPOT GHOST PERSONAS…

31. @hedshot
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Your title sit over itSPOT GHOST PERSONAS…

32. @hedshot
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Your title sit over itSPOT GHOST PERSONAS…
No supporting evidence, no data, no substance…

33. @hedshot
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Your title sit over itBUT THAT’S NOT ALL…

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…THERE’S MORE...

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MAYBE YOU HAVE
ZOMBIES?…

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POOR, LONELY
PERSONAS…User Personas get sick…infected too…

37. @hedshot
Title position here
Your title sit over itVAMPIRE PERSONAS…
Drinking your teams life blood, afraid of evidence in the
Light of Day!

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…vital team life force draining away, wasting time and
money in the wrong direction...
VAMPIRE PERSONAS…

39. @hedshot
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Your title sit over itDR FRANKENSTEIN’S
PERSONAS…

40. @hedshot
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Your title sit over itWAIT, THERE’S STILL HOPE!
Don’t look in the yellow pages under “eee exx oh ahh…” just yet…

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Start by using intelligence from:
Data analysis, Logs, Google Analytics…
GAZUMP GHOST PERSONAS!

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Use multiple sources of intelligence too so:
f2f interviews with users & user- and usability testing…
Find the richest, ‘primary-est’ evidence!
GAZUMP GHOST PERSONAS!

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Basing your personas on sound sources of data, watching
carefully for the Evil Eye of skew or bias and allowing for it
VANQUISH
VAMPIRES!

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Watch out for fragmented personas made up of badly
integrated parts by…
DODGE DR. FRANKENSTEIN'S
MONSTERS!

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OMG, WHERE DO WE START??

46. @hedshot
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Your title sit over itAT FIRST…

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Embrace weird science: create living breathing personas!…
EXERCISE YOUR GHOST
PROBLEM!

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…ok, let’s start exorcising our research skills now!
GAZUMP GHOST PERSONAS…

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THE CHALLENGE: HATCH PERSONAS FOR
WWW.AGILEONTHEBEACH.CO.UK IN 2017
And thus save AOTB from a ghost (persona) infestation!
• Imagine yourself into the shoes of the people making the AOTB 2017 site
• Treat all the conference, so far, like your UX research
• Let’s breath life into our personas with our observations of the
conference attendees! :)

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10 MIN CHALLENGE 1:
OBSERVE AND CAPTURE YOUR USERS‘ TRAITS
Actions…
• Keeping in mind those people you’ve met this week…
• Write on post-its just single bits of information (persona traits) you have observed from
the people you’ve seen and met this week.
• Demographic, Psychographic, Technical, Geographical etc. – check out the posters and
handouts!
• If you’re having trouble – just observe the AOTB attendee opposite!
Don’t… Over Think this – it’s just exactly what you can easily put your finger on.
Aim… To cover your chosen space with a valuable post-its of persona attributes

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REVIEW: RESEARCH AND CAPTURE YOUR USERS
Review
• How far did we get? Go round each group…

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Effective persona workshops include people with primary
experience of users…and the team who will use them
GAZUMP GHOST
PERSONAS!

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Get engagement and active sign off and a hierarchy from
stakeholders…and it may even help align your whole
company!
GAZUMP GHOST
PERSONAS!

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...refinement! Run your Affinity Grouping and Back Story
activities - distill down your attributes to just 3, max 5
groups
FIGHT
FRANKENSTEIN'S
PERSONAS!

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10 MIN CHALLENGE 2: DISTILL OUR
PERSONAS…
Actions
• Look at your persona attributes collected and, as a whole team, find and group those that
go together - like a believable person.
• Work your way across from one side to the other looking for affinity between your post-its
attributes and create new groups that go together in a natural, realist way
• Keep the number of groups you create from about 2 to 5 (7 at the outside) merge similar
groups if you get too many
Don’t
Don’t try too hard to find grouping where there are none or ‘project’ your own groupings on
unconnected attributes – only use the facts you have collected from your observations.
Result
Have created about 5 natural groups of persona attributes that go together: for even better
results organise them….and NAME THEM!

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OPTIONAL CHALLENGE: SKETCH OUT
THE PERSONA!

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REVIEW: AFFINITY GROUPS AND PERSONA
SKETCHES
Review
• How far did we get? Go round each group…

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A few examples…
PERSONA
EXAMPLES

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SO…

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BE ON YOUR
GUARD!
WATCH OUT FOR…

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BE ON YOUR
GUARD!
WATCH OUT FOR…

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ONCE YOU’VE GOT THEM ALIVE…

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Keep you personas alive:
Print them BIG!
Use the wall!
KEEPING THEM ALIVE!

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KEEPING THEM ALIVE!
Personas *named* in User Stories
As {your persona}
I would like to {have a feature}
so that I {get value}

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KEEPING THEM ALIVE!
Persona ‘stickers’ on story cards

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KEEPING THEM ALIVE!
Sticky engagement…with magnetic personas!

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KEEPING THEM ALIVE!
…make them your own!

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KEEPING THEM ALIVE!
They are hypotheses – keep feeding them with fresh insights and validation!

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KEEPING THEM ALIVE!
As usual, never stop refining… – find what works for you & yours!

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Best Ghost
Persona
Observation

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Most
Realistic

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HIGH FIVE!

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THANKS FOR
LISTENING!
mike@unrulygroup.com
@hedshot

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RESPECT
Other Persona Mad Scientists & ghost hunters
• About Face 3 - Alan Cooper
• Observing the User Experience - Mike Kuniasky
• The Persona Lifecycle – John Pruitt, Tamara Adlin
• LeanUX – Jeff Gothelf & Josh Seiden

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PROPS
!
Orange bus
seniorgif.com
Team unicorn
Dark parodies
Umbrella corporation
Memegenerator.net
Carter reid
Bodies in the crawlspace
Hollywood
Meme Center
destroyer.tumbler.com
Someecards
SHIELD
Star Trek
Elvis.ro
Gliphy
Gifsoup.com
The department of homeland security
Lolcats everywhere
Random Kittens
Ghosthunters
The Muppets
icanhascheeseburger.com
soundbible.com
Marvel
Anyone else I forgot!!
Sony
Playstation
The NY transit auth.
The Wachowskis
Jeff Gothelf
Jon Innes
Thoughtworks
Manalo Blahnik
Jaguar
Disney
Bentley
Ryan Gosling
Clint Eastward
Etc…

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Q & A

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THANKS FOR
LISTENING!
mike@unrulygroup.com
@hedshot