If you are in the Boston area, check out some of these UX events:

• 9/14: UXPA Sketching Workshop - There are only 6 student tickets left!
• 9/20 - 9/22: HACKFit Startup Weekend Hackathon
• 9/24: Monthly UXPA Meeting

Feel free to comment and share other events!

Are you interested in being an HFID mentor or mentee? Read the following and contact Roland Hübscher to be part of the HFID Mentoring Program!

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UPDATE: Thank you to all who attended and, especially, to our wonderful presenters from Perkins. If you weren’t able to make it, you can view the recording in your browser (it runs about 90 minutes).

“Accessibility in a Not-So-Accessible World” - Wed., 10/10 at 7:30 PM in Smith 122 or online

Presented by Perkins School for the Blind representatives - Kim Charlson, Director of the Braille and Talking Book Library, and Jim Denham, Director of the Assistive Technology Program - information and experiences will be shared to inform participants of the challenges and potential solutions for consumers with visual impairment. Current technology and real life anecdotes will both be reviewed.

The New England Chapter of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society (HFES) is sponsoring an open house and discussion with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) HFES Chapter on Thursday, 6/28 from 6:30 to 9:00 PM. While the event is free to MIT students and HFES members (student membership is $10 annually), non-members are requested to make a small donation (online or at the door) to cover the cost of dinner and desert.

The event includes talks by members of the Humans and Automation Lab (HAL), International Center for Air Transportation (ICAT), Man Vehicle Lab (MVL), and AgeLab. Tours of each lab follow, and the night will round out with a social hour where participants can meet the presenters as well as employers from New England businesses looking to hire professionals from the human factors industry. If interested, please RSVP for complete location details.

Join more than 500 UX professionals, on Monday, May 7 for the eleventh Usability Professionals’ Association (UPA) Boston annual conference at the Sheraton Boston Hotel!

This is a great conference for HFID students to attend – it’s local and registration is only $95 for fulltime students, or $195 for working professionals. It’s also the biggest UX event of the year in Boston, and a great place to network!

It’s a packed day of 32 talks, ranging from mobile design and testing to reporting research findings to ethnography to evangelizing UX and more. Come see current HFID students Amanda Davis and Vignesh Krubai present “Designing for Education: An iPad Case Study”!

Also see HFID alumni including Kris Engdahl, Eva Kaniasty, Michael Ledoux, Jen McGinn, Dharmesh Mistry, Susan Rice, Bob Thomas, and many others share their experience and acquired wisdom.

See the full schedule for yourself and register today!

“Survey Design DOs & DON’Ts” – Miriam Gerver Donath, 3/6 @ 7:30-9:00 pm in Smith 122

Survey design is important because it affects response rate (item and unit) and data quality (introduce bias), which, in turn, affects survey results. As someone who might work directly or tangentially with a market research, or embark on your own research, this presentation will help you think about survey design issues and improve surveys you encounter, as well as give some guidelines and resources. These will be set within the cognitive response model of question comprehension, information retrieval, judgment in responding to a question, and providing a response. About Miriam Gerver Donath. This event will be recorded and can be attended remotely via Centra at https://online.bentley.edu:443/GA/main/00000142949800000135a79111a58106 or you can view the PDF.

“Maximizing Your Moderating Workshop” – Susan Mercer, 3/20 @ 7:30-9:30 pm in Smith 122

A central tenet of user-centered design is getting good usability feedback to iteratively improve the design. Unbiased moderation is critical in usability studies to ensure accurate, unbiased feedback. Yet in the heat of the moment, even experienced moderators can struggle to avoid asking leading questions, accidentally skewing findings, and stressing participants. This interactive session will teach advanced moderation skills, such as refocusing a participant, that can make the difference between successful and less-than-successful outcomes. The workshop will also provide time to critique videos of moderated sessions as well as providing the opportunity for volunteers to practice moderating and receive feedback from the presenter and attendees. About Susan Mercer.

“Brainstorm It Right” – Alyssa Boehm & Mike Kennedy, 3/29 @ 6:30-7:30 pm in Smith 122

We all endure a terrible brainstorming session at some point in our careers. You sit in a small room, people yell and at the end, hastily scribbled pages are produced that quickly disappear into a closet. It isn’t a productive experience and everyone knows it. Well, kiss those terrible sessions good-bye! We’ll explore best practices on how to facilitate brainstorming, support different types of participants, and create an action plan to follow-up on ideas. We’ll role-play and problem-solve together. Plus, delicious light snacks will be served! About Alyssa Boehm. About Mike Kennedy.

“Academic Research” – David Hoberman in early September. About David Hoberman.

“How UCD Works” & Happy Hour – hFIDO in mid-September. About Scott Furlong.

“UX: It’s Our Research” – Tomer Sharon in late-September. About Tomer Sharon.

The Healthcare Experience Design Conference from Monday, March 26 to Tuesday, March 27 at the Westin Boston Waterfront hotel, blends the perspectives of healthcare thought leaders, product developers, and design implementers across a broad spectrum of healthcare technologies and delivery channels to maximize healthcare UX.

Confirmed speakers include:

• Stephen Anderson, Ind. Consultant
• BJ Fogg, Stanford
• Dustin DiTommaso, Mad*Pow
• Todd Park, US Health and Human Services
• John Yesko, Walgreens
• Tim Kieschnick, Kaiser Permanente
• Jill Reed, Allscripts
• Meredith DeZutter, Mayo Clinic
• Mitch Higashi, GE Healthcare
• David Rose, MIT Media Lab
• John Weiss, WebMD

RSVP today!

Seminar on Capturing Test Data - Tue., 1/31, 1-2 pm @ online Mad*Pow event
Our very own Dan Berlin is hosting a webinar covering “Best Practices for Consistent Capture of Usability Test Data” on Tuesday, January 31 from 1-2 pm. This seminar is for experience designers seeking to improve their data collection methods and foster straightforward data solicitation, moderation techniques, and capture of usability test data. Best practices will be shared for capturing usability test data in consistent and comparable ways to ensure that your collected data leads to actionable insights.

An Experience Research Director at Mad*Pow, Dan received his BA in Psychology from Brandeis University, spent seven years supporting hard-to-use interfaces at a cable technology firm, jumped into the world of usability through the MBA and MS in Human Factors in Information Design program at Bentley University, and then spent his first two years in the field at a digital marketing agency building a usability research practice and investigating neuromarketing techniques.

View presentation!
UPA Boston, February Meeting - Wed., 2/1, 6-9 pm @ One to One in Charlestown
A multidisciplinary panel from digital marketing agency One to One, “Mobile Mantras: An Experience Design Roundtable” discusses current experience design best practices for mobile development.

Panel Participants:

• Brian Assmus, Flash Developer
• Frank Dellario, Senior Mobile Producer - Mobile Technology
• Matt DiGirolamo, User Research Consultant
• Rob Fitzgibbon, Associate Director, Experience Design
• Hannah Liberty, Senior Information Architect
• Michelle McNulty, Lead User Experience Consultant
• Ryan Travis, Web Developer

6:00 - 7:00 pm Refreshments & Networking
7:00 - 7:30 pm Announcements
7:30 - 9:00 pm Presentation and Q&A

RSVP here.
Networking, Knowledge Sharing, and UX Methods - Wed., 2/8, 5-8 pm @ MathWorks in Natick
The MathWorks Usability Group invites you to spend the evening with a lively group of UX pros for knowledge sharing and networking. We’ll have short talks and displays to share research, design methods, and practices. You’ll have the opportunity to meet MathWorks UX team members as well as other regional UX professionals. We’ll also have lots of delicious food available, so come hungry!

RSVP by Wed., 2/1.

1. People make up their minds about you in the first 30 seconds of meeting you. Here’s the kicker: it’s an unconscious decision. They’ve already decided how they feel about you, but they just don’t know it yet.
2. Most people get nervous delivering speeches. Even thinking about delivering speeches makes people sweat. Unfortunately, they unconsciously communicate that nervousness to the audience, and the audience reads it as an attack, again unconsciously.
3. Once an audience believes it’s under attack, it stops listening and prepares (unconsciously) for flight.
4. Most presentations fail because the speaker presents information to the audience in a way that unintentionally ensures it will be instantly forgotten. Here is the surprising alternative: by changing a few sentences at the beginning of your talk, you can increase audience retention by four or five-fold.
5. To increase your charisma, focus on a single emotion that you feel about your content or the person you’re meeting, for three minutes before the beginning of your meeting, speech, or presentation.
6. BONUS! People believe non-verbal communication over verbal communication every time.

Learn more communication theory from Dr. Nick Morgan via his blog and videos.

“The 2011 Usability Professionals’ Association (UPA) International Conference took place from June 21 through June 24, 2011. The conference lived up to its theme, “Designing for Social Change”, and heralded the 20th anniversary of the UPA Conference. Approximately 600 experienced and novice usability, user experience, and user interface design professionals gathered at the Hyatt Regency, in Atlanta, GA. This was my first UPA Conference, and I was fortunate to be an on-site volunteer. My expectations for this conference mirrored my experience of the many other conferences I’ve attended in the past, but this conference wildly exceeded my expectations. There were ample networking opportunities, education in usability, interaction with experienced professionals, and a glimpse of the disciplines’ future.”

UPA 2012 will be in Las Vegas, from June 5th to 8th - read the full article on UXmatters.

“Please join us from 6:30pm-8:30pm on Tuesday, July 26th for a visit to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology HFES Chapter.

The event will feature tours of the Humans and Automation Lab and the Man-Vehicle Lab. There will also be a networking reception where opportunity will be provided for employers to present their organizations and recruit hires or interns.”

http://www.nechfes.org/2011/07/18/visit-to-the-mit-hfes-chapter/

UPA Boston invites you to its July monthly meeting on July 20, 2011.

Logistics

Event: Accessibility Roundtable
Date: July 20, 2011
Location: MIT
6:00 - 7:00PM - refreshments & networking
7:00 - 8:30PM - Chapter update, presentation, Q&A, wrap-up

RSVP at Eventbright.  Continue Reading »

IxDA Boston Presents: Presentation Skills for Designers

Thursday, May 19, 2011 from 6:30 PM - 9:00 PM (ET)

Autodesk Waltham

Get all the details at Eventbrite. (sic. Will companies please please stop misspelling words just to be cute or get a domain? It’s a lost battle, I know…..)

The annual UPA Boston Conference is recruiting volunteers for the event, scheduled this year for May 25 at the Cambridge Hyatt. The volunteer responsibilities are pretty straight forward and most people who do it have a great time.

People who are accepted as volunteers will be given a schedule for their responsibilities prior to arriving at the conference. Roughly 50% of their time is taken up with volunteer tasks some of which is at the registration table and some of which is as ‘helping hands’ in sessions.

Registration fees are waived for volunteers and they are welcome to participate in all aspects of the conference when they are not performing their duties.

If you are interested, please contact Cay at [email protected] and she will get right back to you. We do accept people on a first come/first serve basis so interested students should probably take action pretty quickly

If people would like additional information on the conference itself, the can visit http://www.upaboston.org/miniconf11/index.shtml

Chris Haas has announced the speaker roster for this year’s UPA Boston event on May 25th.. There are a lot of  HFID-affiliated folks on the list! Congratulations to those current and former HFID students on the panel.

Last year’s conference was excellent. Do try to attend if you can. Note that students get a very generous discount. You can register here: http://www.upaboston.org/miniconf11/register.shtml.

Check out this tempting list of presentations:

We’ve updated the hFIDO calendar to reflect a whole lot o’ upcoming activities that may be of interest, including the following:

• Presenting Data and Information: A One-Day Course taught by Edward Tufte
• Boston CHI Professional Development Seminars
• UPA Intl, 20-24 June, Atlanta GA
• Healthcare Experience Design Conference

For the full list of events, including logistics and descriptions, check out the hFIDO Calendar.

The Boston Hack Day Challenge

Current HFIDer Susan DiManno wants to spread the word. The Boston Hack Day Challenge is coming up, and this would be a prime opportunity for HFIDers to pounce and play.

About the Challenge

Are you a software developer or designer? Are you a product manager, marketer or startup enthusiast? Come spend 48 hours to build a web site or phone app that will make life better in Boston. It’s a weekend of hacking where you can think up ideas, pitch concepts to each other, join into teams to quickly build as much as you can, and present the results.

Registration

Registration is due February 18. Don’t miss out!

Logistics

REGISTER: Boston Hack Day at Eventbrite.com

WHEN: Friday – Sunday,
February 25-27, 2011

WHERE: MassChallenge space on Fan Pier (Boston’s Innovation District), 14th Floor, One Marina Park Drive, Boston

Learn More

http://beta.boston.com/hackday

Celebrate World Usability Day Boston 2010

Join us for UX Trivia Night - aka “The Smackdown” - and celebrate the 6^th annual World Usability Day.

Whether you’re a UX novice, expert practitioner, or anywhere inbetween, this is chance to have fun, engage in good-natured competition, and learn a few things to boot. This will not be the UX SAT’s. Simply get together a team of 3-6 people, or join a pick-up team there, and give it a shot.

This year, hundreds of events will take place across the globe to raise awareness for, and celebrate, usability and user-centered design — from Australia, to Brazil, to Belarus.  More on World Usability Day.  Come participate in Boston’s festivities!   Continue Reading »

Come network, learn, and cheer on your HFID classmates when they present at the 2010 NE HFES Student Conference!

Event Details

• Date: 10/22/10
• Location: Microsoft New England R&D Center, One Memorial Drive, Cambridge, MA 02142
• Time: 8am-5pm
• Audience: Students and Professionals in the domains of human factors, ergonomics, usability and human-centered design and engineering.
• Description: The NEC HFES is hosting a one-day conference that focuses on bringing together human factors and ergonomics professionals and students in the New England area. The conference is designed to provide time for people to share ideas in a variety of formats and to socialize with other professionals in the region. The agenda will include student research presentations, professional speakers including a keynote speaker, networking and recruiting opportunities, catered lunch, and more.
• Register: http://tiny.cc/nechfes2010.