Test ideas in the marketplace. You learn from hearing a range of perspectives. Consultation helps engender the support decisions need to be successfully implemented.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
I'm not being evasive but I am saying I'm not a scientist and I'm not directly involved in the consultation however the science must be sound, it must be agreed and the consultation must be of a high quality or no one will have any confidence in the process.
My greatest strength as a consultant is to be ignorant and ask a few questions.
It's so important to experience what your customers are experiencing and listen to their suggestions.
If you want to help somebody, make sure you're coming from a place of clarity and complete non-judgment; that way, you can begin to understand their journey, too.
If you need to take a step back from day-to-day operations and plot out the long-term direction of your user experience strategy, consultants can give you a perspective you can't get on your own.
You should always look for opportunities to test innovations on a subset of users if you can.
One of the main focuses of my training sessions is to help individuals find their unique voices in the learning process. We all have our strengths, our weaknesses, our styles of learning, our personalities. Developing introspective sensitivity to these issues is critical to long-term success.
You have to experience life, make observations, and ask questions.
When you spend time with potential customers, you get to hear about their struggles firsthand. You see their eyes light up with excitement or darken with confusion. You learn things you would never find in a survey, database, or questionnaire. You learn why people buy.
Testing leads to failure, and failure leads to understanding.