March 2022: Designing Systems to Enable Accessible User Experiences

We’re excited to announce that our February Meetup with with Patrick Carrington has been rescheduled to March!

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Mobile and wearable technologies offer the promise of great opportunity, connection, new experiences, and natural interactions. However, what happens when these designs do not fully consider the relationship between people and the devices they use? For example, wheelchair users often use and carry multiple mobile computing devices, such as laptops, tablets, and smartphones. However, due to the assumptions many of these devices make about our abilities they remain challenging to use. My research group focuses on supporting the broad range of humans with diverse abilities as they interact with the world and people around them. Our ongoing research aims to support and empower people with disabilities as they engage in a range of activities, including mobility, social interactions, and competitive sports.

Patrick Carrington

Patrick Carrington is an Assistant Professor in the Human-Computer Interaction Institute in the School of Computer Science at Carnegie Mellon University. He received his Ph.D. at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, and his research emphasizes the design of systems to support people with diverse abilities. He studies mobile and wearable technology, builds assistive devices, and explores how to create experiences that support empowerment, independence, and improved quality of life. His current projects span topics including accessing digital content and media, transportation and mobility, and developing technologies for athletes with disabilities.

Please register for this free event

March 24, 2022
12:00pm ET
Live streamed to wherever you are!

January 2022: Thought Leadership – a conversation with Margot Bloomstein

We’re bringing back a favourite uxWaterloo and Fluxible speaker!

Some of you might wonder what it takes to share your ideas and expertise with the world. If you want your thought leadership to have more permanence, serve as a reference to colleagues in the industry, or help establish your brand with a broader audience, it might be time to think about a talk, a book, or some other vehicle to help your ideas stick.

In a discussion with Margot Bloomstein, author of Trustworthy, we’ll talk about how to determine the right platform for your ideas, approach the proposal process, traditional vs. hybrid publishing models, and working with a developmental editor to polish your ideas. Bring your questions!

You may know Margot Bloomstein from content strategy or design conferences, where she’s taught workshops and keynoted events for more than a decade. A working content strategist for more than 20 years, she’s consulted with clients in a range of industries, from software-as-a-service to sex toy retailers and footwear technology to 401(k)s. She’s the author of the industry mainstay Content Strategy at Work and the new Trustworthy: How the Smartest Brands Beat Cynicism and Bridge the Trust Gap. Margot teaches in the content strategy graduate program at FH Joanneum University in Graz, Austria, lectures around the world about brand-driven content strategy and designing for trust, and tweets prolifically at @mbloomstein.

Please register for this free event

January 19 2022
12:00pm ET
Live streamed to wherever you are!

December 2021: No Meetup this month

We are taking December off to rest and recharge.
We look forward to bringing you more great speakers and events in the new year!

November 2021: UX research and design in an age of remote work

Over the course of the COVID pandemic the way we work has changed dramatically. For many of us, collaboration, usability research, and co-design were all in-person activities pre-pandemic. At this point we’ve adjusted, at least to some extent, to the reality of working remotely for an extended period, and have found tools, new and old, that allow us to do so effectively. Join us this month as we come together to discuss the tools and methods that we are now using for design, research, communication, and beyond! We’ll be using Remo, which will let everyone sit at virtual tables to discuss in small groups. We will switch up tables a few times throughout the event, and will also come together to share our learnings across groups. Please come ready to share, learn, and have conversations with other UXers!

Please register for this free event

November 18 2021
12:00pm ET
Live streamed to wherever you are!

October 2021: Applying a UX Approach to Buildings with Erin Corcoran

Buildings are made for people. We’ve all experienced places that felt ‘right’, that we were drawn to, or spaces that anticipated our needs intuitively, just as we’ve also visited buildings that are outright unwelcoming or confusing, or places that have negative impacts on our wellbeing.

Good and great spatial experiences don’t happen by chance – the architectural profession is increasingly using a strategic approach to design: adapting tools and approaches from parallel strategy and UX fields to inform our process.  Additionally, as we’ve adapted through the COVID-19 pandemic, a thoughtful, researched approach has become more critical as user expectations change and our clients seek to make informed decisions in a changing landscape.

This talk will introduce attendees to how a strategic / UX approach is used in architectural practice: how we study users and apply it to designs and how the conversation around human impact has shifted during the past few years in response to changing user and client needs.  Facing these new challenges has driven home the intersections of people, place, technology, and policies to create successful designs.

Erin Corcoran

As a Design Strategist and an Architect, I’m obsessed with how people use, interact with, and impact space. I’m also fascinated by how humans connect with each other, how we communicate and behave, and how we come together. Lastly, I love a good workshop, one of those gems where everyone comes in ready to hate it, but leaves energized and heard, feeling that they had an impact, and excited for the space or project to come.

With Gensler’s Boston’s team, I work to develop human-centric strategies for complex space and cultural challenges, working with public and private sector workplace clients, building owners and developers, post-secondary education groups, healthcare institutions, community organizations and many others.

Please register for this free event

October 28 2021
5:30pm ET
Live streamed to wherever you are!

September 2021: Guarding against UX Theatre, with Tanya Snook

In the age of immediacy, as we’re being rushed to deliver more with less, the users sometimes get left behind in the design process. It’s not enough to think from a user perspective and role-play with post-its to generate designs. Are you performing UX theatre and just acting user-centered? Tanya Snook is going to help you learn to recognize the signs of UX theatre.

Tanya Snook is a user experience designer who builds citizen and employee experiences in the Government of Canada. Tanya is a founder and co-chair of CanUX, Canada’s longest running user experience conference. Tanya writes about user experience and design leadership at spydergrrl.com or you can find her on Twitter as @spydergrrl.

Please register for this free event

September 16 2021
12:00pm ET
Live streamed to wherever you are!

August 2021: How We Get Wicked Good, with Karen VanHouten

Did you ever wonder why so much of our work seems harder than it should be? Does it feel like you are constantly working at altitude, trying to do more work with less oxygen? Well, Karen’s first job in tech was in 1993. That’s almost 30 years across different roles and companies, all in technology and digital products. And no matter how much more skilled we all get, things just seem to be getting harder. How do we move from barely surviving to thriving in our work?

In this talk, we’ll discuss how we get wicked good, moving from competency and mastery to sustainability, even in environments that seem to be set up for failure and eventual burnout. We’ll explore how to make our work spaces kinder, more inclusive, and more supportive of long term engagement and growth while at the same time encouraging us to be more thoughtful and intentional about the design decisions and career choices we make.

About Karen VanHouten
Karen is a curious skeptic with a fascination for beautiful messes, fostered over 20 years working in UX for enterprise solutions. Currently working as a Principal Strategist with OST (Open Systems Technologies), she helps organizations develop holistic digital strategies that account for the varied and complex human elements required to inform successful digital initiatives. She is passionate about intentionally designed work environments that support inclusion, collaboration, and space for play and experimentation. She also swears a lot, especially on twitter.

Please register for this free event

August 19 2021
12:00pm ET
Live streamed to wherever you are!

July 2021: With Great Power Comes Great Responsibility with Ruth Kikin-Gil

How to design AI products responsibly and why it matters.

Responsible AI is a human-centred approach to developing, designing, and deploying AI and ML products. It’s principled, collaborative, proactive and contextual and it is critical that we all start practicing it now.

In her talk, Ruth will explain why it is important, and clarify when to practice it, why should designers care, and what can you do to start tomorrow.

About Ruth Kikin-Gil

Ruth is a Responsible AI + design strategist that focuses on product innovation. Her career path at Microsoft took her from an innovation lab to a strategy team, to designing future experiences in Office, and to developing, evangelizing, and implementing Responsible AI practices. She is a co-creator of the Guidelines for Human-AI interaction and teaches design at the University of Washington.

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ruthkikingil/
Twitter: @RuthKikinGil
Writings:

The rise of the Demigod designer. God created the world with a word. With… | by Ruth Kikin-Gil | UX Collective (uxdesign.cc)

Humanity-Centered Design. How ethics will change the conversation… | by Ruth Kikin-Gil | Microsoft Design | Medium

AI ❤ Design. How AI can enhance the design process. | by Ruth Kikin-Gil | Machine Learnings

Please register for this free event

July 15 2021
5:30pm ET
Live streamed to wherever you are!

June 2021: When Research Excludes – Reflecting on the research process and the black lives matter movement

The Black Lives Matter (#BLM) movement is raising awareness, conversation and reflection for many disciplines, including ours. Some organizations’ reactions have inspired serious changes and pledges, while others have made for social media fodder.

It is our collective responsibility to ask ourselves as researchers and designers where and how we can raise awareness and open conversation so that we steer away from deep-rooted biases. At twig+fish, we turned this lens inward on our own research practice and asked ourselves where we could improve. Too often as consultants, we are faced with organizations who are stringent with their research resources. In our continued reflections, we asked ourselves what has a “cost of not doing?” that directly relates to the #BLM movement?

Join Meena Kothandaraman, co-founder of twig+fish as she shares where resource-poor research processes are not only vulnerable to neglecting the Black voice, but more likely to completely exclude it.

As a woman of colour who has asked how she can support the BLM discourse, Meena incorporated learnings from this twig+fish study into the firm’s consulting work, as well as her graduate classroom at Bentley University.

Please join Meena for an open discussion!

About Meena

With over 30 years of experience, Meena has consulted to emphasize the strategic value and positioning of qualitative research in the design of product, space and service. Meena is fascinated by the complexity of human behavior, and applies a credible, structured and transparent approach to integrating human stories and anecdotes into mainstream processes. This ensures that research activities provide the best service to the organization, and that learning objectives are addressed to maximize potential.

Meena is a founding member of twig+fish, a research and strategy practice based in Boston, MA, that espouses these research beliefs, while maintaining a utopic work-life balance. She is also a key Lecturer in the Bentley University Human Factors and Information Design (HFID) graduate program. Over her 20+year tenure, her capstone qualitative research course has guided now-leading practitioners to integrating meaningful and successful research practices.

Note that this will be a live streaming event. For what I hope are obvious reasons we won’t be sitting together in a physical space!

Please register for this free event

June 17 2021
12:00pm ET
Live streamed to wherever you are!

May 2021: UX Community Shorts

Join us for the Spring Edition of uxWaterloo Community Shorts!

Our community is filled with people doing great UX work in the field and this month at uxWaterloo, we’re excited to host a range of local UXers that will share part of their practice with us. Topics will include interviewing users with hearing loss, advanced journey mapping, intersections across UX domains, remote testing, and UX in a paediatric care setting.

This is going to be a fun night!

Join us and hear from:
Olamide Olatoye: User Study for Implementation of Sepsis Best Practice Advisory in General Paediatric Care
Matt Jones: Visualizing the Sales Process
Sam Jones Faulkner: Making User Interviews Accessible for People with Hearing Loss
Lorraine Randell: The Power of 10 Revisited – Bringing together Academia, Research, Design, and Digital worlds.
Isiah Simas: Remote User Testing for Educational Simulations

Online event link will be shared closer to the date.

Note that this will be a live streaming event. For what I hope are obvious reasons we won’t be sitting together in a physical space!

Please register for this free event

May 20 2021
5:30pm ET
Live streamed to wherever you are!