Usertesting/research: Editor POC 05/23

This page talks about the findings of some usertesting/research done around a new version of the editor in May 2023.

Goal

The goal of these sessions is to find out whether a new version of the editor, which highlights block-thinking, could help the users annotate their documents more correctly, without hindering their experience.

The POC

The development team created a POC according to previously designed mock-ups. This POC doesn't have extra features which are currently available in the GN-editor. It only allows the creation of simple chapters and articles, the deletion of articles, and export to HTML.

In these sessions, we were only interested in the user experience during the creation of simple documents, without variables or other extra features.

The Sessions

We held [insert number] sessions with [insert numberer] users over the course of May. To be as inclusive as possible, we held sessions with an array of different GN users:

• [Daily] tasks users perform with GN:

  • Traffic consultant [Verkeerstechnisch adviseur]

  • Contact person with IRG

  • Team leader [teamleader van bestuursadministratie]

  • Support

  • Legal + GN expert

• Intern - ABB

  • Digital Loket Helpdesk

  • LSVP

  • HR

  • Content-related

    • Supervising regulations

    • Coordinator

    • Legal part of taxation [juridisch luik van fiscaliteit]

The session lasted 45minutes, and consisted of 2 parts:

1. The user showed us how they currently use the editor and highlighted the pain-points.

2. The user tried the POC for the new editor and talked about how they felt about the difference compared to the current version.

Usertests

The sessions have been recorded and transcribed but are not made public. The findings are generalised and can be found in the Findings part of this document.

We conducted user tests with different types of people:

• users (3/5)

  • GN-user:1

  • LB365 users: 2

• Stakeholders (internal ABB members) (2/5)

As the internal ABB members won't be using GN, we need to focus more on the findings from the user sessions. The findings form the 2 sessions with internal members are still extremely useful to decide on next steps and will also be discussed further down.

If there is interest in a specific part of a specific user sessions, please contact Saska Pallayova.

Findings

Current use of GN

Editor

GN-core

• Gets used almost daily

• Only for drafts

  • Because GN offers variables with addresses and roadsigns which are really helpful for them

  • We only use GN for the variables and to get the sentence structure correct

• they export the Gn-draft in HTML then copy-paste everything in their own template in word, to use this in e-besluitvorming

LB365

• Neither of the 2 users have the newest version of this

  • No variables available, it is just an empty editor where they can add free text

    • --> they need to manually write "Artikel 1"

• Currently they create the docoumnet in blocks in LB365 using the GN-editor, then export is as PDFs, sign it manually, and then upload it again

  • is aware this gets rid of all and any annotations and would love for this to change

  • don't want to use PDFs but don't have another option

• Users check whether other departments fill the information correctly

  • the Departments create their documents using word, and then copy paste the full document (sometimes from a PDF) into LB365

Features

• Move article up/down gets used a lot

• Variables address + roadsigns really important (sole reason for using GN)

• Delete article structure vs delete: "I realised what the difference was by trying it out"

• LB365: Would love to be able to send this to ABB digitally, without having to export to PDF

• LB365: would love to be able to refer to previous decisions

• LB365: need for good working tables

• styling and bullet points important

Annotations

• 1/3 users knew what annotations were and really wants to do this well, but doesn't have the tools for this currently.

• dotted lines in document has no meaning to them

• No idea what "annotating" means

POC

First Impressions

• "I don't know"

• "Do I have to type everything in text?"

• "Looks the same at the top" [toolbox]

• Article vs. Chapter --> "how are we going to use this?"

• "I feel like it's already harder to see what I need to do here"

• "I don't use the editor very often but to it it's much clearer this way"

Second impressions

[After the first impressions the users tried stuff out, and I also explains some things that where unclear -- Mostly because this is a POC (no variables, not all features work, simple structure,...)]

• 'It just needs to work (features) for us'

• titel/chapters are not important for us and are distracting

• Some users want to add a traffic measure as a normal article but that doensn't work --> if we worked in this way, users could add the article like they want to and then select a type [traffic measure] -- this is a user suggestion

• 1/3 doesn't feel the need for indenting (this is because they don't use titels/chapters and only write articles)

• 3/3 deleting is clear

• 3/3 would be open/are enthusiastic to try this new system out if it has all the features they need

• 'I think it would need explaining for some people, but it is clear and intuitive'

• 2/3 don't feel the need for titels/chapters (they don't write regulations, but agendapoints)

• "We have a couple of colleagues that prepare their documents in different ways and I can already tell they won't be happy that they can't just copy-paste everything in one go"

• "for me this is a major improvement and I wish everyone would work with this"

• /!\ the articles keep counting up even when you create a chapter which is not how 1/3 work --> they create their regulations within the same document, so they want the articles for the regulations to start at 1 again.

Internal feedback

• Need to be careful with regulations that are 2 vs 20pages, as moving articles up and down can be tricky and less clear

• Chapters don't often exist (fiscality)

• Careful with using the correct terms (e.g. opschrift is only the titel of a document, not the title of an article)

• Could this be reused for follow-up tables [?]

• "reglementaire bijlage" is really not a correct name legally

Conclusions

1. GN is currently used for 2 reasons:

   1. to create drafts because they like the features/variables - but export away and don't publish through GN

   2. to import drafts created in word to publish, but not to create

2. Annotations and the value of it is unclear/unknown

3. The first impressions were a bit "scared", which is fine, because change is always "scary"

4. After a while 3/3 warmed up to the idea of changing it to a system with blocks and input fields

   1. all of them were enthusiastic for the change as long as it had all the features they needed

I believe we can continue working on this upgrade, but we need to bare in mind:

1. Not showing all buttons all the time to allow flexibility and not overwhelm the user

2. We need to take a look at the article count system [next step?]

3. Made sure we talk with legal regularly to make sure the terms we use are correct

4. Make sure we think about vendors and how to make this work for integrations in other places and not just GN-core

5. Make sure it's flexible enough to use for agenda points/decisions as well as regulatory attachments in the same way

6. List all the features and their importance/relevance to see which to focus on next [one of the next steps?]

Next steps

Next steps should be discussed with PO/PM/DEV and documented separately in a feature passport [linked here]