Challenge

In comparison to UX's popularity in the States, UX is still not well recognized in most prominent industries/universities in Taiwan.
There are no HCI degrees, nor UX courses. Thus, I have a strong motivation to raise UX conscious: both schools and industries.

Role

Founder/Organizer/Facilitator/UX Designer

Results

The 1st UX Workshop at NTHU
Ran 3 workshops in 2 years (2 for students and 1 for industries)
Tickets sold out in one week
Over 100 participants, including 80 students across 10 departments and 35 people from 10 industries
Created 18 prototypes in 3 hours
90% Customer Satisfaction
Increased 10 % Customer Satisfaction by applying UX to workshop organization
Over 1,000 article views

I. Planning THE WORKSHOP

Define the Goal & Create Workshop Agenda

First of all, I had to understand my goal for this workshop. Because it would the first UX workshop at NTHU, the main purpose was to generate an awareness of what UX is and spark people’ interests.

Then, I drafted the agenda, workshop flow and design challenges. We should pay lots of attentions on design challenges. It should be simple, and related to audience's personal experience. Since it's a 3-hour workshop, the challenge should be easy to understand, visualized so that the participants can conduct user research smoothly. (user interview & customer journey map)

So far, I have originated 3 design challenges:

2015/12 – College Students have difficulties to book movie tickets online
2016/12 – It's hard to use NTHU course registration system
2017/01 – Redesign Knock Know Website

Create an Effective Agenda for Staffs and Yourself

To run effective workshops, we must control both the length of the workshop and the workshop itself. Most people will forget to create an agenda for staffs in advance. It's perfect to them to help you keep track of the time and understand the context before.

Write down all the tasks
Estimate the amount of time for each
Write down every things (notes, supplies) you will need in the workshop.
Send the agenda to your assistants in advance

Design the questionnaires to understand participants' needs

It's important to understand what my audience needs and expects. Therefore, I designed the questionnaires and sent it to them before a week. Besides, different audiences have different needs. Based on their feedbacks, I adapted my teaching and course contents accordingly. It will greatly enhance my chances of communicating successfully.

view Survey Example

Prepare the Supplies & Build a positive environment

Each team would need:

Sticky Notes * 3 packs
Sharpies * 3
Voting dots * 1 piece (for each person)
A2 Paper * 4 (customer journey*1 and prototype*3)
A4 Paper * 3 (for each person)
Tape*1

II. during the workshop

Introduction

Self Introduction (Educations, Work Experiences and Motivations)
Mentors
What is UX? (Definition)
Example: Julie Zhou – Facebook Reactions
How I apply to my works

UX Process

Design Challenge
User Research: User Interview, Customer Journey Map
Define People-Centric Problems: Summarize the learnings, User Stories
Idea Generation: Crazy Eights, 1 Big Ideas, Zen Voting
Prototyping

For each stages, I explained the terms first, then they would discuss with team members.

Pitch & Conclusion

After going through the UX process, finally we came to the most exciting part: Pitch. It was inspiring to see students’ excellent execution and amazing creativity. To align my goal of this workshop: ignite interests, providing positive feedback was essential for a meaningful learning experience. Be sincere and specific. It was about taking the opportunity to express appreciation of a job well done, in the hope of inspiring an individual for further learning.

Overall, it was an wonderful experience! Everyone enjoyed the 3-hour event and meet new friends. Wasn't it amazing? Not only did I introduce UX to Taiwan, but also I realized one of my dreams: being an UX INSPIRATOR! At last, I wanted to thanks my awesome partners/friends who were guided and encouraged students.