Finally read Just Enough Research by Erika Hall during the holiday, which has been on my reading list for a while. Wow! I feel bad after reading this book: why didn’t I read it when I started my UX design career!? I would avoid so many pitfalls and have many better outcomes if I followed some suggestions from this book!

I’ll review the book from a personal point of view later (if you are interested, Erika summarised her book in this awesome video ), and just attach my book notes for now. Five things that blew my design mind from this book:

1️⃣ Surveys are the most difficult research method of all.

2️⃣ Test a competitor’s product before you even put pencil to paper. Then test some sketches. And then test at every stage as much as you can.

3️⃣ When blue-sky thinking meets reality, reality always wins.

4️⃣ The first rule of user research: never ask anyone what they want.(You risk the scope of your ideas being limited by the imaginations of others. )

5️⃣ Quotes that represent the perspectives of research participants are often the most powerful, portable output of user research.

Thanks, Erika, for writing this great book!