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Criterion
Paper illustration for Contextual Inquiry.
UX Research
Contextual Inquiry
Paper board with the four ROAM fields Resolved, Owned, Accepted, and Mitigated.
Agile
ROAM Board
Paper illustration for Diary Study.
UX Research
Diary Study
Paper illustration for Alignment Mapping.
Facilitation
Alignment Mapping
Purposedifferent
When work processes are known only from accounts and the real context stays hidden, Contextual Inquiry makes behavior at the workplace visible. Observation and follow-up questions together show how people actually work, get interrupted, and improvise.When work needs to move between different states or columns, it makes that movement and its handoffs legible. It sorts work by value, risk, and delivery ability. The result is captured as a ROAM Board and an Owner List.When experiences build up over days or weeks and a single session cannot capture them, Diary Study records the course of everyday life. Recurring triggers, moods, and habits become visible this way, beyond the sharpness of memory.When several people work toward one goal but hold different mental maps, Alignment Mapping makes the discrepancies visible. It arranges goals, assumptions, and priorities so shared direction becomes verifiable.
Complexitydifferent
MediumLowMediumMedium
Timedifferent
1-3 Wochen20-40 min initial, dann laufend1-4 Wochen1-2 h
Participantsdifferent
4-12 Beobachtungen3-155-204-12
Formatdifferent
Workshop + asyncWorkshop + asyncAsyncWorkshop
Outputdifferent
Field Notes, Workflow Insights, Pain PointsROAM Board, Owner ListDiary Entries, Longitudinal Patterns, Experience TimelineAlignment Map, Open Issues, Decision Questions
Tagsno overlap
UX researchObservationContext
RiskAgileTrackingAlignment
UX researchTrackingBehavior
AlignmentStakeholdersStrategyFacilitation
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