The Experience Gap (UX Camp Edmonton Presentation) by Gene Smith
I wanted to share the slides from my UX Camp Edmonton talk this weekend. The presentation is called "The Experience Gap," and its core idea is that there's a growing gap between the best experiences people have with technology and... | May 13, 2013
User Experience Debt by Andrew Wright
UX debt is real and every digital product has some to repay. Some of this debt is incurred intentionally because tough decisions have to be made. Some of this debt is incurred unintentionally because assumptions about end-users go unchecked. It's time to start paying attention to the I.O.U.'s we're writing to our users. | May 7, 2013
Training vs. Design by Gene Smith
Some thoughts on when to invest in design versus training. | April 10, 2013
Event: Content Strategy for the Public Sector (April 11) by Gene Smith
Before I started consulting 10 years ago I worked in the public sector in a variety of communications and web management roles. Talking with clients over the past year I've realized that many of them still suffer from the same... | April 2, 2013
When to apply UX effort in agile by Andrew Wright
When should you apply UX effort on an agile project to get the most out of it? Well, UX design skills are most valuable to agile processes at three key points: during modeling, during evaluation, and for facilitating day-to-day design activities. | February 21, 2013
Experience Maps: A Case Study by Gene Smith
Last summer I received an email from Kent Grayson, a marketing professor at the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University. Kent had seen the experience maps we created for Comcast and was interested in writing a case study about... | February 12, 2013
nForm at the 2013 IA Summit by Gene Smith
We're very excited to have two of our own speaking at this year's IA Summit in Baltimore. | January 29, 2013
Visual Business Analysis by Dennis Breen
In recent years we’ve worked on a number of projects in which one of our designers has partnered with a client’s business analyst. Going into these projects, our rough approach has been for the BA to document requirements while we... | January 7, 2013
Event: Making Sense of Web Analytics (Edmonton, Nov 27) by Gene Smith
We're running a short-but-informative workshop in Edmonton on November 27. This one is on web analytics, and we'll have two speakers sharing their insights on using analytics to make better design and business decisions. Details and a registration form are... | November 14, 2012
In Praise of Difficult Questions by Dennis Breen
You know the moment. You're discussing the work you've poured your soul into for the past few weeks and someone asks a question. Normally, that's no problem because you know your stuff and you have rationale for all of the... | November 14, 2012
Drop by Our Open House on October 24 by Gene Smith
This summer, after much searching and renovating, we moved our team in Edmonton to a new studio on 104 Street. We're having an open house on Wednesday, October 24, to celebrate. We'd love it if you'd drop by, see our... | October 15, 2012
Event: Transforming Government Web Strategy (Toronto - September 20) by Gene Smith
Earlier this year we ran a sold-out seminar on public sector web strategy in Edmonton. We had fantastic feedback from attendees, so we decided to bring this event to Toronto on September 20. If you work on the web in... | August 29, 2012
A Touch of the Extraordinary by Dennis Breen
Most of us would agree that the quality of our boss has a big impact on the quality of our job. A good boss supports us in ways that make us better at what we do, and a bad boss... | August 10, 2012
We're Moving July 31 by Gene Smith
If you have trouble reaching us on Tuesday, July 31, it's because we're relocating to our new studio. Our telephones will be out that day but the team will still be available by email and on their cell phones. This... | July 27, 2012
Emotional response cards: a simple user research tool by Ammneh Azeim
Being emotional is often frowned upon in a business environment. But on a recent research project we decided to test out a new tool to help people express their feelings and provide us with better interview results. We call the... | May 28, 2012
UX Lisbon 2012: User Research Hacks Presentation by Gene Smith
I was at UX Lisbon a couple of weeks ago to deliver a short presentation called "User Research Hacks." It's all about how we do interesting user research on small budgets, short timelines, and sometimes without the buy-in for more... | May 25, 2012
The Two-Click Rule by Gene Smith
Over the past few years we've noticed a pattern on the corporate websites we've worked on: Most of the visitors enter through search or referrals. By most I mean 80% to 90%. Most visitors will see three or fewer pages.... | April 23, 2012
Google Analytics: Ammneh gets certified! by Andrew Wright
Web Analytics is not just about capturing statistics on the number of "hits" your homepage got last month, or how many people saw your latest campaign. Web Analytics is about knowing who your audience is, understanding how and why they... | April 11, 2012
Event: Transforming Government Web Strategy (April 19) by Gene Smith
We're running an event in a few weeks for our friends in the public sector, as well as anyone who's interested in web strategy and user experience. All of the details and a registration form are below. We've capped attendance... | April 5, 2012
Designers! by Gene Smith
Last year I set out to strengthen our design team. Demand for our user experience design services has been growing and our small-but-mighty two-person team was getting stretched. I'd planned to add one designer in January, but I found two... | March 15, 2012
Event: Information Architecture for SharePoint, January 24, 2012 by Gene Smith
Are you struggling to make your SharePoint website or Intranet easy to search and navigate? We're holding an event on Tuesday, January 24 in Edmonton that will help you plan effective and intuitive information architectures for SharePoint. I've posted a... | January 18, 2012
We're Hiring a UX Designer by Gene Smith
We're hiring a user experience designer to work out of our Edmonton office. If you're interested and you meet the requirements, please get in touch--we'd love to talk with you! Job Duties Collaborate with clients, analysts and other designers to... | December 18, 2011
We're Hiring a Project Manager by Gene Smith
nForm is a busy design/consulting firm with clients in Alberta, B.C. and Ontario. We're looking for a project manager to help keep our projects on track, our budgets under control and our clients happy. Job Duties: Manage schedules and workflow... | October 28, 2011
Event: Designing Better Applications, Websites and Intranets by Gene Smith
Update: This is now sold out. If you're a designer, communications or marketing manager, IT manager or just a closet UXer, we're holding an event for you next Tuesday in Edmonton. It's called "Designing Better Applications, Websites and Intranets" and... | October 18, 2011
Three problems with your search-based website design by Gene Smith
The City of Calgary launched a new website yesterday, billing it as "the first search-based website in Canada." Most web managers and user experience professionals have now seen Utah.gov, the search-focused website launched by the Utah state government a few... | August 16, 2011
Magic Mobile Dust by Dennis Breen
I recently introduced one of our clients to responsive web design as a way to address mobile. In doing so I realized that I needed to help them think about web design in a new way. People usually see desktop... | August 12, 2011
Recent Sketches (14 photos) by Gene Smith
Recent sketches from projects we've been working on. | July 26, 2011
The Problem With Your Website by Gene Smith
A few weeks ago we posted an illustration on Flickr called "The Problem With Your Website." It describes an issue we've seen over the past few years with our own clients and throughout the industry. In a nutshell, the problem... | March 29, 2011
Our Sketching Table by Gene Smith
We spend a lot of time at our computers, but we usually find that sketching and collaborating together is much more productive than sending email or chat. So a couple of months ago we built a sketching table to give... | February 18, 2011
Running a large business origami exercise by Gene Smith
Late last year we organized a large business origami exercise for a client. Business origami is a tool to help people design and describe systems and processes. It's kind of like low-fidelity prototyping for systems (here's a quick introduction). This... | February 2, 2011
Kiiro is now open-source by Gene Smith
We've decided to open-source Kiiro, the SharePoint-based project management and collaboration application we released in 2009. Here's a short description of Kiiro from my original post announcing the product: Kiiro is a simple collaboration and project management app for SharePoint.... | January 20, 2011
We're now at nform.com! by Gene Smith
Starting today our domain name is nform.com. This means our email addresses will now end in @nform.com and our website is http://nform.com. (You might not have noticed, but your browser was just redirected from nform.ca to nform.com.) Last week we... | January 19, 2011
nForm - 2010 Year in Review by Ammneh Azeim
Like every company, we had our share of experiences in 2010. Of course, no one at nForm made the headlines about eating a cookie, which is a disappointment; however, we did have many stories in 2010 that we would like... | January 12, 2011
Mind Your Inward Paths by Gene Smith
My trip to San Francisco last weekend was delayed by an annoying business practice of United Airlines: overselling a flight so that economy passengers must check-in early to claim a seat--or risk getting bumped to a later flight. United... | October 19, 2010
We're Hiring a User Experience Designer by Gene Smith
We hiring a User Experience Designer to work out of our Edmonton office. If you're interested and you meet the requirements, please get in touch--we'd love to talk with you! Our ideal candidate will come from a web design or... | October 14, 2010
Seven Habits of Highly Effective Websites! by Ammneh Azeim
Recently I read Stephen R. Covey’s book “7 Habits of Highly Effective people”. As I read his book, it occurred to me that a lot of these habits can be applied to website management using the user experience efforts and... | September 13, 2010
Google Instant: What Will You Do With the Seconds You Save? by Gene Smith
There's a spurious argument that some usability experts make to justify their work that goes like this: If we redesign an application and save every employee 5 minutes a day, that means we've saved 250 hours of time a day... | September 9, 2010
Some Recent Work by Gene Smith
It's been a busy year so far here at nForm. We've been lucky to work with some great clients on exciting projects, and we've just published short case studies on two of those projects. Have a look and let us... | August 31, 2010
Work Processes and Habits Part Three: Teng Chong and Natalie Kruch from Panache Ceramics by Heather McGaw
I went to visit Designers Teng Chong and Natalie Kruch from Panache Ceramics at their studio last week. We sat down to talk about what they are doing at their new roles at Panache Ceramics and their design process. Can... | August 9, 2010
Work Processes and Habits Part Two: Chelsea Boos from Vue Weekly by Heather McGaw
I had the pleasure of visiting the offices of Vue Weekly last week and interviewing the very charming and talented Chelsea Boos. Can you tell me a little bit about what you do as a Graphic Designer at Vue? I... | July 20, 2010
Design Lessons from my Bathroom by Dennis Breen
I’m a fairly dedicated DIY-er. I enjoy learning new skills and the sense of accomplishment it brings. I’m also really cheap, but that’s a topic for a different blog.I recently renovated a bathroom–a project that did not go entirely smoothly,... | July 20, 2010
Visualizing Information Structures: Some Examples by Gene Smith
A couple of months ago I asked our staff to share examples of interesting ways of visualizing information structure. They promptly sent me a bunch of interesting stuff, then I got busy and put it aside for a while (sorry... | July 12, 2010
A short saying oft contains much wisdom by Dennis Breen
Steve Martin once said "Some people have a way with words....some people....um....not have way, I guess." So true. Here are a few of our favourite design-related quotes from people who have a way with words. “I have no vision at... | May 31, 2010
Don't Be So Sure About That by Dennis Breen
One of the subjects I’m most interested in is how the human mind works. What makes us do what we do? How do we make choices? How do we make sense of the world? Fueling my interest have been... | May 5, 2010
Recent Launches by Yvonne Shek
We've had two recent launches that I would like to share with you. Information Services Corporation of Saskatchewan URL: http://isc.ca Timing: Launched in January 2010. This project took exactly a year from start to end. Goal: The project goal was... | May 4, 2010
Apple iPad - Our first impressions by Ammneh Azeim
Apple has just released iPad and lucky for us Gene has bought one for each of our locations (Edmonton, Saskatoon and Toronto). After using the iPad for a week or so, here is a short summary of our first... | April 28, 2010
Micro Interactions and Cheesy Comestibles by Dennis Breen
In the classic Monty Python Cheese Shop sketch John Cleese goes through a litany of cheeses in search of one that might be in stock. At first he is undaunted as he discovers that type after type is unavailable. If... | April 21, 2010
Our favourite multi-channel design tools by Heather McGaw
This week we thought we would share with you a roundup of our favourite multi-channel design tools. Here are our favourite: Experience Maps Gene says - "An experience map combines a user persona with a story about that user's journey... | April 16, 2010
Introducing Parachute: Backup your Basecamp files in minutes by Gene Smith
Today we’re releasing a new product called Parachute. Parachute is a simple Windows XP/Vista/7 application with one purpose: to back up your Basecamp files. As long-time Basecamp users we realized there was no easy way to get the files... | April 14, 2010
Our Favourite Concept Videos by Matthew Nish-Lapidus
Earlier this week we asked each person on the nForm team to send us their favourite concept video. Here are five of the best ones. Microsoft Courier Interface Demo Dennis says: "I have to say, this thing looks amazing. That... | April 9, 2010
A Thought About Web Analytics: Events are the Real Story by Gene Smith
Sometime recently (in the last couple of months I'm guessing, but I just noticed it) YouTube changed the way they display video statistics. You can now easily access trend data about the number of views, favourites and comments right under... | April 1, 2010
Olympics 2010 and User Experience by Ammneh Azeim
Canada just hosted a great Olympics in Vancouver! Not just the whole Canadian nation but most of the world was also hooked to their TVs watching the 2010 Winter Olympics. As I watched the Games, I began wondering about... | March 11, 2010
Moving the Cow Path by Dennis Breen
On my morning walk to the gym I cut across a large open field to get to get to the Rec. Centre. A few weeks ago, after a huge snowfall, I found a very crooked, inefficient path recently broken through... | March 4, 2010
My Top Interaction'10 Videos by Matthew Nish-Lapidus
In my previous post about the Interaction'10 conference I talked about some of the themes and the experience I had while there. Well, now you can have a little of that experience yourself! Along with the launch of the new... | March 2, 2010
Content Strategy for Web - Edmonton UX Book club's meeting with Kristina Halvorson by Ammneh Azeim
Edmonton UX book club started its new year with one of the hottest topics in the user experience community: content strategy. We did so by having Kristina Halvorson come and discuss her book, Content Strategy for Web. Kristina is... | March 1, 2010
Edmonton UX Book Club - Tagging: People-Powered Metadata for the Social Web (A discussion with the author Gene Smith) by Ammneh Azeim
Remember the days when every piece of paper, music or photo you had, was organized in folders tucked into a drawer? How do you organize that material now? In our November meeting, we were really excited to have our... | February 21, 2010
Our Favourite Explain IA Entries by Gene Smith
Over the past month the IA Institute ran an amazing contest called Explain IA. Entrants were asked to use words, pictures, diagrams or video to explain information architecture. There were more than 100 high-quality entires. But some of the entries... | February 19, 2010
Work Processes and Habits Part One: Bridget Smanten of Fridget Apparel by Heather McGaw
This is the first post for a series I will be doing about people working in various creative and research based professions. I will be exploring the different work processes, routines and tools that are used across various fields. Along... | February 11, 2010
Some thoughts on Interaction'10 by Matthew Nish-Lapidus
I just got back from Interaction'10 in Savannah and am in the midst of a nasty conference hangover. After three full days of conference sessions, a day of workshops, and two more days of amazing conversations my brain is beyond... | February 10, 2010
Experience Maps: Understanding Cross-Channel Experiences For Gamers by Gene Smith
One of the most satisfying aspects of our work is helping our clients deepen their understanding of their customers. A couple of years ago we worked on just such a project for Comcast--where we were able research how gamers gather... | February 9, 2010
Explain IA by Heather McGaw
This is our submission for the ExplainIA competition put on by the IA Institute. It was a really fun project to work on - you should go check out the other submissions as well, if you haven’t yet. Lots of... | February 5, 2010
IA is a Lens by Dennis Breen
People who know me know that I love metaphors and analogies (annoyingly so). So when I decided to make a poster for the Explain IA contest it was only natural that I’d choose a metaphor. For me, IA is a... | January 27, 2010
Doing a content audit or inventory by Scott Baldwin
This past couple weeks I've been doing a large content audit and inventory. With the increased attention on content strategy the audit/inventory seems to be making a comeback. In this post I'm going to share my recent approach and talk... | January 26, 2010
With the release of its new tablet, will Apple finally fix the App Store? by Gene Smith
If the rumours are true, tomorrow Apple will release a tablet device that runs the iPhone operating system. Like millions of other geeks, I'll be following Steve Jobs's keynote to see the big reveal. But I'll also be watching... | January 26, 2010
Farewells by Gene Smith
This month Jess McMullin and Toby Spendiff, two friends and long-time employees of nForm, are leaving to pursue new adventures. | January 21, 2010
Building Trust - Edmonton UX Book Club November Meeting (Part 1) by Ammneh Azeim
Trust means making an exchange with someone when you do not have full knowledge about them, their intent or the things they are offering you. In our November UX Book Club meeting, we had a full agenda in which the... | January 17, 2010
Five User Experience Trends I'll be Watching in 2010 by Gene Smith
Predictions. They're invariably wrong, but we still love to make them. (Remember the Kitchen of Tomorrow?) Today I'm sharing five trends I'll be watching over the coming year (and beyond) along with some thoughts about how they might change our... | January 12, 2010
Swimlane diagram now in EightShapes Unify by Yvonne Shek
We were privileged to have Nathan Curtis come speak at CanUX in November 2009. After his talk, I caught up with Nathan and asked him about entering the Swimlane page pattern into the EightShapes Unify collection. It didn’t take long.... | January 7, 2010
The fine art of listening by Scott Baldwin
As UX practitioners we help create things that are better, more usable, better organized, easier to engage with, help sell more stuff or reduce costs (a non-exhaustive list). Many of our methodologies and approaches leverage a single important skill –... | December 22, 2009
Edmonton UX Book Club - A Project Guide to UX Design (A discussion with the author Russ Unger) by Ammneh Azeim
"User experience design is the discipline of creating a useful and usable website or application - one that's easily navigated and meets the needs of both the site owner and its users. But there's a lot more to successful... | November 23, 2009
Introducing Scott Baldwin by Yvonne Shek
We are thrilled and excited to announce that Scott Baldwin is joining our nForm team! We want to extend our warmest welcome and introduce Scott to our friends, colleagues, clients, and community: Scott has a passion for understanding the intersection... | October 28, 2009
CanUX Interview with Nathan Curtis by Matthew Nish-Lapidus
Our very own Jess McMullin caught up with Nathan Curtis, principal at EightShapes and author of the recently published book Modular Web Design: Creating Reusable Components for User Experience Design and Documentation. In the interview, Nathan talks a little about... | October 28, 2009
Edmonton UX Book Club - Wired to Care (A discussion with the author Peter Mortensen) by Ammneh Azeim
"This is the story of how companies, and indeed organizations of all kinds, prosper when they tap into a power that every one of us already has: the ability to reach outside ourselves and connect with other people. And... | October 19, 2009
Content Strategy at CanUX with Kristina Halvorson and Rahel Bailie by Matthew Nish-Lapidus
We have two great content strategy speakers this year at CanUX, Kristina Halvorson and Rahel Bailie. Each bring a unique perspective and plenty of experience and knowledge to the topic. Last week I sat down with each of them individually... | October 15, 2009
Edmonton UX book club – Designing for Social Web (A discussion with the author Joshua Porter) by Ammneh Azeim
We had our first author conversation at Edmonton UX Book Club at the July meeting. I would like to thank Joshua Porter,author of the book, Designing for Social Web, for agreeing to meet with us and Gene Smith for contacting... | October 7, 2009
Equity in Service Design by Yvonne Shek
As kids head back to school, it is the season for signing up for various programs around the City. My husband and I decided to enroll our 6-year old daughter in a swim program. The City of Toronto offers three... | September 28, 2009
We are hiring again: Intermediate-Snr Interaction Designer / Information Architect in our Toronto office by Yvonne Shek
As an nForm consultant, your primary responsibility will be gathering business and customer insight and translating that insight into concrete plans and prototypes, such as conceptual models, interaction flows, wireframes, and functional specs. You will work with clients, their users,... | September 4, 2009
[Press] Kiiro: SharePoint-based Collaboration That Just Works by Gene Smith
ReadWriteEnterprise published a nice piece on Kiiro a couple of days ago. In an article called "Kiiro: SharePoint-based Collaboration That Just Works", Steve Walling writes: "Kiiro is one of the best-looking and easiest-to-use SharePoint tools we've seen to date.... this... | August 28, 2009
Prototyping and Bikes by Matthew Nish-Lapidus
I'm sure that many of you have read Bill Buxton's excellent book Sketching User Experiences. In it he uses bicycle design as an example of good sketching practice, so when I stumbled upon this short video of a new Trek... | August 19, 2009
More Kiiro: Project Sync by Gene Smith
A screencast of Kiiro's simple two-way sync between SharePoint and MS Project. | August 13, 2009
On Backpacks, Rain Jackets and User Experience by Dennis Breen
A few years ago I bought a rain jacket for a cycling trip in Ireland. As people say there: "it doesn't rain all day, but it does rain every day". Although the jacket was alleged to be good quality, I... | August 6, 2009
Introducing Kiiro, Simple Project Management and Collaboration for SharePoint by Gene Smith
Long-time readers will know that we've been working on a project management and collaboration application for Microsoft SharePoint. We're ready to release the product, and we've even picked a new name: Kiiro. Kiiro is a simple collaboration and project management... | June 18, 2009
CanUX 2009 by Jess McMullin
We're excited to offer CanUX, the Canadian User Experience Workshop in Banff on November 12-14, 2009. Save the date, since we're putting together a world-class program that offers incredible value. Canada's best user experience event combines a breathtaking venue and... | June 16, 2009
2009 Web Strategy Summit - A word with Dianne Howie by Matthew Nish-Lapidus
At the upcoming Web Strategy Summit Dianne Howie and Heather Searl will speak about the role of research in their session "Going Beyond Web Analytics to Dig into the Minds of Your Users." I was lucky enough to get a... | April 1, 2009
Web Strategy Summit Early Registration Extended by Dennis Breen
Great news if you're thinking about attending the Web Strategy Summit! We've extended the early registration deadline to March 27. You can sign up for the conference and two workshops for about $1000. Speakers include Avinash Kaushik from Google and... | March 20, 2009
IA Summit 2009 by Gene Smith
Ten years. That's how long ASIST has been running the information architecture community's flagship event, the IA Summit. The first summit I attended was in 2001, and even then the practice seemed like it was just getting its legs. I've... | March 16, 2009
Web Strategy Summit Starting Line-Up by Gene Smith
Yesterday I posted the starting line-up for Web Strategy Summit speakers. (The official session descriptions are over at the Web Strategy Summit site if you want to read through them.) But I wanted to write a few words here about... | March 12, 2009
Interaction'09 Redux by Matthew Nish-Lapidus
From February 5th to 9th I attended the second annual Interaction Design Association conference, Interaction’09, in Vancouver. Over the course of the event a few major themes emerged from keynote presenters, sessions, and general conversation: Making the world better (Sustainability)... | March 12, 2009
Dulce de Leche and Discovery by Heather McGaw
During the discovery phase of a project sometimes it can be hard to see how the pieces are going to come together. It's important for us, as designers, to have confidence in the processes we're using. I had a... | March 9, 2009
Edmonton UX Book Club! by Ammneh Azeim
We are glad to announce the start of Edmonton UX book club! The Edmonton UX book club is for local user experience practitioners who want to expand their knowledge of user experience and meet with the UX community. The... | March 7, 2009
My Web Favorites by Gene Smith
Last June I spoke at Peachpit's Voices That Matter conference in Nashville about Tagging (here's my presentation if you're interested). While I was there I recorded a video with Nikki McDonald about my book and handful of other subjects. The... | February 12, 2009
Web Strategy Summit registration Open! by Dennis Breen
Hey everyone, Web Strategy Summit registration is now open. Woot! The full WSS conference runs on May 5th, and it will cost you just $399 before March 20. Four half-day workshops run on May 4th and are priced at $299... | February 6, 2009
UX in Time of Cholera by Yvonne Shek
Things we can do or focus on during this terrible economic downturn: 1. Scenario planning through workshops/facilitation. This could be for our clients or for our own team/projects/company. 2. Collecting and interpretation of research to help companies/clients make tough decisions,... | January 29, 2009
Web Strategy Summit Submissions Due Saturday by Gene Smith
We're working hard on finalizing the workshops and registration for Web Strategy Summit this week. The program is really coming together and I'm looking forward to sharing more details in a few days. But in the meantime, one important... | January 26, 2009
An Obama quote that applies to design by Yvonne Shek
In a recent interview between Time magazine execs Richard Stengel, David Von Drehle, and John Huey, then President-elect Obama was asked what success measures would voters be looking at in 2 years time, Obama said a number of things, including... | January 21, 2009
Schauer on Strategy by Gene Smith
Over on the Adaptive Path blog our friend (and CanUX alumni) Brandon Schauer has posted the six questions he uses to discover an organization's business strategy. It's a smart and simple method for probing an organization and its approach to... | January 12, 2009
We have filled this position: Interaction Designer / Information Architect by Yvonne Shek
Full Time Permanent Position in Toronto, ON (working remotely for the Edmonton office). We have filled this position as of January 16, 2009. Thank you all for your interest. As an nForm consultant, your primary responsibility will be translating business... | December 18, 2008
Announcing the Web Strategy Summit (May 4 & 5, 2009) by Gene Smith
For the past couple of months we've been planning a unique new event and we're excited to pull back the curtain on it. The Web Strategy Summit is a two-day conference for web managers, executives, IT managers, developers and... | December 16, 2008
The Big Trading Card Give-away by Gene Smith
Over the last two years we've produced a set of UX trading cards to give away at conferences. We've got cards for ethnography, card sorting, experience maps, sketchboards, wireframes and a variety of other methods, tools and techniques. The... | November 25, 2008
iPhones @ CanUX by Dennis Breen
As one might expect at a gathering of UX types, there were a number of iPhones on display at CanUX. Oh, there were Blackberries and other mobile devices as well, but they certainly weren't as visible. I made two observations... | November 21, 2008
CanUX 2008: That's a wrap! by Gene Smith
Earlier this week we wrapped another successful CanUX workshop/conference. Around 85 people from Canada and the US (but mostly Canada) gathered in Banff to talk about user experience, design, creativity, teamwork and a multitude of other topics. (There was also... | November 21, 2008
We're Hiring: Business Development Manager by Gene Smith
Update: We've filled this position. We're looking for a Business Development Manager to help us grow our existing professional services business and our emerging product sales and licensing business. We've never had (or needed) a business development person, but we... | November 10, 2008
Luke Wroblewski on forms, visuals, and making smart decisions by Dennis Breen
When I began exploring the world of user experience one of my first online mentors was Luke Wroblewski. I've long been a fan of how he's able to merge deep design insights with compelling aesthetics. I recently interviewed Luke, who... | October 31, 2008
An Interview with Dave Gray by Dennis Breen
One of the great perks of working for a company that hosts a UX conference is that I get to talk to some of the very top people in the business. One of those people is Dave Gray of XPLANE.... | October 30, 2008
A few words with Brandon Schauer by Dennis Breen
Adaptive Path's Brandon Schauer recently shared a bit of insight with me in a short email interview. Those of you coming to CanUX will have a chance to ask him some questions of your own. Dennis: At CanUX you're going... | October 27, 2008
Swimlanes session at CanUX by Yvonne Shek
I am excited to share with you a method and fancy deliverable at CanUX this year, known as the Swimlane Document. This is the deliverable that I blogged about earlier this year, and the same one that won the IA... | October 21, 2008
Brandon Schauer will Wow us at CanUX by Dennis Breen
One of the speakers at CanUX that I'm excited about is Brandon Schauer, Experience Design Director at Adaptive Path. Brandon is co-author of "Subject to Change", the book that Don Norman calls: "...the one perfect book that summarizes the essence... | October 20, 2008
CanUX 2008: Late Registration Deadline is October 22 by Gene Smith
We've been hard at work over the last few weeks finalizing the CanUX 2008 program, pulling together materials for UX Bootcamp and brainstorming ways to make CanUX '08 the best ever. If you're thinking of registering, the prices go up... | October 16, 2008
CanUX is XPLANED by Dennis Breen
Everyone here at nForm is excited that Dave Gray, CEO and founder of XPLANE is coming to CanUX. XPLANE does very cool work, making complicated information understandable by creating visualizations. If you want to get a sense of what that... | October 14, 2008
Who wants an iPod shuffle? by Gene Smith
I have a green 1GB iPod shuffle on my desk that's leftover from one of our earlier promotions. This Friday (October 10) I'm going to give it away to one of our newsletter subscribers. If you're not already subscribed, consider... | October 7, 2008
CanUX 2008: Meet the Microsoft Surface UX team by Gene Smith
We just got news that Lisa Anderson and Dennis Wixon of the Microsoft Surface team will be joining us at CanUX to deliver the closing keynote. Large-scale multi-touch interaction design is becoming more and more popular (anyone watching John King's... | September 29, 2008
Midori is now in Beta! by Toby Spendiff
Our project management add-on to SharePoint called Midori is now in beta. The website is up at http://www.getmidori.com. If your organization is managing projects and is considering leveraging SharePoint, Midori may well be the ideal solution. We are in beta... | September 24, 2008
We're Hiring: Senior/Intermediate SharePoint Developer by Toby Spendiff
We are looking for a Senior or Intermediate .Net SharePoint developer to join our rapidly expanding team focused on our Midori product also client engagements. If the job description below sounds like you, please drop us a line at careers@nform.ca.... | September 19, 2008
New article - Tagging: Emerging Trends by Gene Smith
A few months ago I compiled a couple of presentations plus some material from my book into an article on emerging trends in tagging for the ASIST Bulletin's special issue on information architecture. They published it a few weeks ago,... | September 9, 2008
We're Hiring: Senior Visual Designer by Gene Smith
Update: This position is now filled. Over past few months we've found that our clients and projects (in particular Midori) need the skills of an experienced interface/interactive designer. So we've decided to bring on a Senior Visual Designer to round... | August 20, 2008
CanUX Registration now Available by Jess McMullin
We're thrilled to open up registration to CanUX, the Canadian User Experience workshop in Banff, Alberta, Canada. Running November 16-18, 2008, CanUX brings together world-class experts for three days of in-depth conversation and activities. Registration begins at 1:00 pm with... | July 31, 2008
Keynoting KM Australia by Gene Smith
I'm really excited to be heading to Melbourne today to keynote KM Australia. I get to speak at a lot of conferences and this is one of the most interesting events I'll attend this year. Melbourne at Night by sobriquet.net... | July 16, 2008
Book Excerpt: Seven Business Benefits of Tagging by Gene Smith
Over on Peachpit.com you'll find an excerpt from chapter two of my book, Return on Investment: Seven Business Benefits of Tagging. Here's a taste: Let's look at one important side of the value-centered design equation: return on investment. Whether you're... | June 23, 2008
CanUX 2008 speakers and dates by Jess McMullin
We're excited to announce our lineup for CanUX 2008. Dave Gray, XPLANE; Brandon Schauer, AdaptivePath; Luke Wroblewski, Yahoo! and LukeW Interface Designs; the Banff Leadership Arts Ensemble, and the nForm team, with more to come! Join us November... | June 18, 2008
Plug: Check out EightShapes' documentation workshop on August 8th by Gene Smith
Our friends at EightShapes are putting on a one-day documentation workshop in Washington, DC, on August 8th. Dan and Nathan are the go-to guys when it comes to design documentation and this workshop is a great opportunity to learn about... | June 16, 2008
DemoCamp + Midori by Gene Smith
We'll be at Edmonton's second DemoCamp tonight showing off Midori, our SharePoint-based project management application. Midori was built by Toby and his team (they've been working on it in stealth mode for a while now). We began using it internally... | May 20, 2008
We are hiring: Business Analyst by Yvonne Shek
Full Time Permanent Position in Edmonton, AB As a business analyst, your primary responsibility will be research and discovery that drives business, customer, and technical insight. You will work closely with clients, their customers, and others using interviews, workshops, and... | May 8, 2008
Video: Dave Gray's Forms, Fields and Flows by Gene Smith
In this video, Xplane founder Dave Gray explains some of the basics of visual language. It's just seven minutes, but packed with goodness--well worth your time if you're interested in visual thinking or design. If you liked this have a... | April 30, 2008
Swimlanes: More Information and Templates by Yvonne Shek
Thanks for the post about the swimlanes document, Gene. It has actually been a long process that resulted in a set of well-targeted wireframes (done by Dennis Breen). I think that the strength of this deliverable isn't so much in... | April 21, 2008
Swimlanes for the Win! by Gene Smith
Jess, Yvonne, Dennis and I just wrapped our annual trek to the Information Architecture Summit. It was, as always, a fun and stimulating event that gives us a chance to re-connect with old friends and make some new ones. This... | April 16, 2008
Survey: Should we sell our UX Trading Cards? by Jess McMullin
The number one question I've been asked about our UX Trading Cards is where people can get more sets or last year's set. If you'd like to have us reprint and sell the cards, please let us know by taking... | April 14, 2008
We have a Winner! by Jess McMullin
Thanks to everyone who responded to our trading card suggestion contest. We've selected VML rockstar Amy Silvers' suggestion of Search Analytics as our winning entry. Amy will receive a copy of Gene Smith's book Tagging: People Powered Metadata for the... | March 14, 2008
Why Agile sucks (most of the time) by Yvonne Shek
Recently, a client of ours sent me this article on Agile development by David Longstreet (PDF), and asked me what I thought of it. Here are my thoughts: 1. This article is highly entertaining! At first, the graphics put me... | March 9, 2008
nForm's 2008 UX Trading Cards Contest by Jess McMullin
I'm finishing up the copy for our 2008 UX Trading Cards for this year's IA Summit, and thought it would be fun to involve the community in coming up with ideas for one of the cards in the deck. We'll... | February 27, 2008
Tagging 101, my Northern Voice presentation by Gene Smith
I thought I'd post the slides from my Northern Voice InternetBootCamp talk Tagging 101. If you're new to tagging this is a good place to start (Common Craft also has a great video Social Bookmarking in Plain English). | View... | February 23, 2008
nForm Kicks Off Conference Season by Jess McMullin
We're getting into conference season, and nForm will be at a few events over the next few months, from our own backyard to around the continent and all the way to Melbourne, Australia. We'll be at Northern Voice, the IA Summit, DocTrain West, WebVisions, Voices that Matter, NEOS, UPA 2008, and KM Australia - come say hi if you're there too. Dates and links after the jump. | February 14, 2008
nForm heading to Miami for 2008 IA Summit by Jess McMullin
We're excited to head to Miami this coming April for the 2008 IA Summit. We've got a workshop, 3 talks, and a panel. We're also sponsoring the conference and offering trading cards again...look for some exciting news there soon. | January 25, 2008
Jess makes the London Times by Gene Smith
A couple of months ago Jess wrote an open letter to Apple's board suggesting that Jonathan Ive be considered as a successor to Steve Jobs. The London Times just picked up on this meme in their article One step from... | December 10, 2007
Datejs: Designing for developers by Gene Smith
Our friend Geoff McGill has developed a new open-source Javascript library, Datejs, for handling dates. Normally this wouldn't be the kind of thing I'd blog about, but Geoff's done an excellent job designing the library so that it's usable. That's... | December 5, 2007
CanUX '07: The Business of Experience by Gene Smith
We wrapped up CanUX 2007 on Tuesday but I'm still catching up on posting the presentations. Our own Jess McMullin closed the first day of CanUX with a talk on the business of experience. I've seen this talk evolve over... | November 29, 2007
CanUX '07: Tagging by Gene Smith
I gave a short talk on tagging at CanUX '07 yesterday. I thought it went well, and I was pleasantly surprised by the number of people who already *got* it. At the start of my session I asked how many... | November 29, 2007
CanUX '07: Eating Your Own Dog Food by Gene Smith
Lou Rosenfeld opened CanUX '07 with a talk on building his new company on UX principles. | November 27, 2007
Client conversations are better than RFPs by Gene Smith
Like a lot of consulting companies, we respond to RFPs. We have to; many of our favourite clients are forced to follow stringent procurement procedures. Responding to their RFPs is the only way we can continue to do business with... | November 22, 2007
Four spots left for CanUX - register soon! by Gene Smith
It's been insanely busy at nForm HQ over the past couple of months. I've been writing a book, Jess has been getting ready for his European tour, the team has been working away on assorted projects, and we've been busily... | November 2, 2007
We're hiring: Business Analyst by Jess McMullin
As a business analyst, your primary responsibility will be research and discovery that drives business, customer, and technical insight. You will work closely with clients, their customers, and others using interviews, workshops, and other methods to develop understanding of both the big picture and the details. You will use this insight to develop clear vision, requirements, and functional design for client systems. Your work will create the foundation for successful projects... | September 21, 2007
Jess McMullin delivering keynote at Italian IA Summit by Jess McMullin
I've been invited to share some thoughts as a keynote speaker at the Italian IA Summit in Trento, Italy on November 16-17. It looks like a great lineup is coming together there...I'm excited to see what else is on tap.
I'll be speaking about the Business of Experience, sharing thoughts on business fluency and how user experience practitioners can increase their influence in the organizations they work with.
| September 21, 2007
Jess McMullin speaking at German IA Conference by Jess McMullin
I'm excited to announce that I'm joining some other fantastic people November 9 and 10 in Stuttgart for the German IA Conference. I'll be sharing a talk about user experience, design thinking, and innovation and offering a half-day workshop on... | September 17, 2007
UPA2007 REDUX: Becoming a Usability Coach: Proving Success One Champion at a Time by Yvonne Shek
After speaking at the UPA annual conference in June, one of the attendees asked if I could do a redux for her colleagues over lunch. I agreed and we are opening it up to anyone else who might be interested.... | August 29, 2007
Farewell to Trevor by Jess McMullin
Trevor van Gorp was nForm's first hire, and after almost 3 years he's moving on to other opportunities. We've appreciated his humor, his Ahnold Schwarzenegger imitations, and his contributions to the practice. Thanks for the last 3 years, and we wish Trevor the very best in the future. Check the full entry for a secret nForm prototyping technique ;-) | July 25, 2007
We're hiring: Interaction Designer / Information Architect by Jess McMullin
As an nForm consultant, your primary responsibility will be translating business and customer insight into concrete plans and prototypes, such as conceptual models, site architectures, interaction flows, wireframes, and functional specs. You will work with clients, their users, and nForm colleagues to understand, define, and solve problems to create business and user value through designing fantastic user experiences. | July 23, 2007
Globe and Mail on the Social Web by Gene Smith
Today's Globe and Mail has a good article on the social web (that just happens to include a photo and a couple of quotes from me). The story covers Forrester's social technographics model, Web 2.0 and how companies can engage... | July 18, 2007
The Conversational Sketching Toolkit by Jess McMullin
One of the simplest tools we use in our early stage work to align project stakeholders is sketching. I call our approach conversational sketching, because the point isn't to draw the solution, it's to give people a tool to talk about their needs and perspective. In this post, I talk about our approach, outline the materials we use in our toolkit, and provide a PDF template to print your own sketching sheets. | July 10, 2007
Becoming a Usability Coach presentation at UPA2007 by Yvonne Shek
I just came back from UPA2007, where I gave this talk: For those who attended my talk and either sent in their feedback or talked with me about it afterwards, thank you! I had a great time meeting up with... | June 21, 2007
Yvonne Shek speaking at UPA 2007 by Yvonne Shek
I'll be speaking at the UPA annual conference next week in Austin, TX. The title of the talk is: Becoming a Usability Coach: Proving Success One Champion at a Time. This talk is aimed at UX professionals who feel that... | June 5, 2007
Orienteering vs. teleporting by Gene Smith
We often use the fuzzy terms "browsing" and "searching" to describe people's information seeking behavious. A recent CHI paper suggests two better metaphors: "orienteering" and "teleporting." | May 22, 2007
A few announcements by Gene Smith
Are there better ways to spend Friday afternoon than writing up some neglected company news? Sure there are, but they all make me feel guilty. Here, then, are a few minor announcements: CanUX 2007 is on. We'll be announcing our... | May 18, 2007
Jess McMullin invited to speak at Adaptive Path's UX Week by Jess McMullin
I'm so excited to finally be able to share that I'll be speaking at Adaptive Path's 2007 User Experience Week conference in Washington D.C. this August. I'll be talking about Smoothing the Way: the Designer as Facilitator. Thanks to Sarah Nelson and the rest of the Adaptive Path crew for inviting me to share some of the thinking and practice here at nForm about building buy-in and consensus across different project stakeholders. | April 30, 2007
Visualizing and Communicating Information by Trevor van Gorp
When it comes to communicating information in a way that resonates persuasively with people, it's important to tailor how that information is displayed. You have the data, but how do you communicate that information to your audience persuasively? | April 26, 2007
Accelerator Workshop Memory Palace by Yvonne Shek
Recently, I have been thinking about ways to make the Accelerator Workshop even more effective, enjoyable, and increase the number of attendees. One of the things I remember from Psych 100 is the idea of the Memory Palace, or... | April 11, 2007
Jess McMullin speaking in Orlando at DigitalNow by Jess McMullin
I'm off to Orlando next week to talk at the DigitalNow conference. My presentation is "Why Methods Trump Methodology, and Other Execution Secrets for User Experience Success". I'll be discussing some user experience foundations, UX implications for Web 2.0, talk about best practices for tackling web projects, and how managers can avoid common pitfalls and create teams with the right skillsets. | April 5, 2007
New article on social software by Gene Smith
I just published an article called Social Software Building Blocks that covers some of the research I did for my recent IA Summit workshop. It looks at the seven building blocks of a social software system and features a nifty... | April 4, 2007
Twitter trading by Gene Smith
I just got back from the IA Summit where our trading card game went smashingly well. A high point for me was watching people coordinate their trading over Twitter: You can find out more about the cards and the game... | March 27, 2007
IA Summit Trading Cards - Sneak Peek by Jess McMullin
Last week I announced that we're sponsoring the 2007 IA Summit with a user experience trading card game. The cards are printed, we've got some fabulous prizes, and I'm excited to see things move ahead.
Here's a snapshot of some of the proofs,,, | March 17, 2007
Transit Ethnography by Jess McMullin
A couple years ago, I was doing a web project supporting youth and addiction. Getting teens to provide insight into their motiviations for substance abuse is something that takes time, and we didn't have a large research budget. So instead of cultivating relationships with teens, arranging interviews and on-site visits, I rode the bus. | March 17, 2007
PaidPOV Update by Gene Smith
Last summer I introduced PaidPOV, a web-based research recruiting product we're developing. Here's a short description of the product from the post on my blog: [PaidPOV is] a tool for research recruiting that will make setting up usability tests, focus... | March 12, 2007
Building Web Applications Workshop Recap by Trevor van Gorp
Last weekend, I was honoured to be one of the speakers at the "Inside the Production Pipeline: Building Web Applications" workshop in Banff, Alberta, Canada. I was asked to offer a user-centered perspective on website and application development. | March 9, 2007
nForm sponsors IA Summit with UX Trading Card game by Jess McMullin
I'm excited to let people know that we're sponsoring the upcoming 2007 Information Architecture Summit in Las Vegas. And this sponsorship deal isn't just that we spend some money and get our name on the program - we're running a... | March 7, 2007
We're hiring: Junior Designer by Jess McMullin
Join an experienced, smart team that works with a range of clients, from the Fortune 500 to leading public sector institutions. As a junior interface designer, your primary responsibility will be to create production visual designs following senior creative direction, wireframe specifications, and visual style guides. | February 21, 2007
Creating a Culture of Iteration and Innovation by Gene Smith
I'm at Microsoft Canada's UX roundtable for the next couple of days (in lovely Bellevue, Washington). One of our first presentations was on the much-touted ribbon UI for Office 2007. The ribbon UI in Microsoft Word There's been a lot... | February 20, 2007
Some useful SharePoint links by Toby Spendiff
Here are some great links for Windows SharePoint Service 3 (WSS 3) and
Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 (MOSS 2007) architecture and development. | February 15, 2007
Simple site maps with MS Project by Gene Smith
Project is just an outliner grafted to a database, and that makes it a powerful tool for doing simple site maps and inventories. | February 8, 2007
Building Web Applications Workshop in Banff by Trevor van Gorp
From March 2-4, I'll be at the Building Web Applications workshop at the Banff Centre. The workshop is part of the Banff New Media Institute Accelerator program and is being put on by Digital Alberta. It sounds like it's going... | February 5, 2007
Introducing Portholes by Gene Smith
After several months of development (and occasional neglect as we tended to other work) we finally rolled out version three of our website this afternoon. I'm calling this design Portholes, because the small images on the main pages are like... | January 29, 2007
Accelerator Workshop by Yvonne Shek
Jess and I will be doing this workshop on workshops at the IA Summit pre conference this year. Although we have been using this method for quite some time now, the idea came to me during CanUX 2006, when one... | January 23, 2007
The IIBA and you by Toby Spendiff
I had the pleasure of being a guest at the International Institute of Business Analysts (IIBA) last night. Admittedly, I was hesitant about going at first. I mean wouldn't my time be better spent working on feature based development in... | January 19, 2007
IA Summit bound by Gene Smith
Jess, Yvonne and I will be headed to the IA Summit at the end of March. It's in Vegas, but it won't be a vacation (at least not until the end). Here's what we'll be up to: Social Information Architecture... | January 18, 2007
Toby Spendiff joins nForm by Gene Smith
A few months ago we welcomed Toby Spendiff to the nForm team. Toby came from Upside Software where he helped architect their product and managed dozens of developers through several major product releases. We're delighted to have him. He's a... | December 1, 2006
