Insight

When conducting any form of user research, make time to share your findings and recommendations with the participants who helped generate them.

A workshop, presentation, or short report can all be very effective in showing participants how their data has been used and the value their contributions have added to your digital project.

There are many benefits to this feedback process, including:

• The opportunity to validate your interpretation of the research data. We all do our best to interpret interview transcripts, screen recordings etc. accurately but mistakes do happen. Presenting your interpretation to participants creates the opportunity for them to correct, or nuance, your understanding of their contributions. “That’s not exactly what I meant” is a recurring issue in user research that can be quickly resolved through this feedback process.
• Increased confidence in your recommendations. Generating actionable recommendations from user research requires a further level of translation and interpretation. Presenting your recommendations to participants is an excellent way of testing if your proposed solutions meet their expectations. During this feedback process, participants often contribute additional considerations and opportunities that would not have occurred to them at earlier stages in the research.
• Establishing a culture of ethical research practice. User research should not just be about harvesting the required data form participants. Where possible, participants should be situated as collaborators and co-creators in your digital project. Implementing this feedback process is a valuable step towards establishing a mutually respectful relationship with participants.
• Increased likelihood of participants working with you again. Finding ideal participants for user research can be challenging. Taking the time to share your findings with participants will make them feel valued and leave them with a much more positive experience of the research process, improving your chance of working with them again in the future.
• Greater advocacy amongst your participants. The people who are willing to dedicate their time to your digital project may well be passionate users of the product or service you are researching and an active member of relevant communities. Making time to illustrate the value of their contributions can encourage participants to become advocates for change and to reinforce the legitimacy of your findings. Their buy-in can achieving greater visibility of your work and improving satisfaction amongst other invested parties.

Of course, taking part in this feedback process must be entirely optional. Your participants might have already contributed as much of their valuable time as they can spare.