VISUALIZATION - PERSONA 

 Challenge & Selection 

 For my internship , me and a classmate undertook the project of developing a new line of longboards   ( skateboards ) for a local company . These products would aim for a complete new market for both us   and the company even though some collective experience could be found . The challenge was to   understand our potential users of the products and to see if there were any undiscovered potential   users from which the market could grow . Besides doing a large research on present products , brands ,   new technologies and skateboarding culture etc . we decided to develop a set of personas and to give   them a visual representaion . We chose this tool both to learn about skateboarders and   skateboarding culture and to widen the scope of ideas later generated in brainstorming . 

 Application 

 Creating personas is a great way for both understanding the customer and putting the user in focus   when creating ideas . It can diverse the ideas created in later stages and it provides insights for   evaluating those ideas . We started off doing observations in the skateboarding community and   combined that with a brainstorming for potential undiscovered users . This resulted in 6 personas :   The fall - back skateboarder , the trend - setter , the business snob , the sports fanatic , the park skater and   the environmental nerd . We then conducted a range of interviews both with representatives for each   persona and with subjects that understood the type of person typical to a persona . This resulted in a   presentation of each persona including a cartoon drawing , quotes from the interviews , a list of   psychographic characteristics and a matrix showing how sensible they were to price , sustainability ,   design , etc .   These personas were then used as a starting point in the brainstorm session where we   first interpret each persona before creating ideas . 

 Pic : example of the park skater and the trend - setter 

 Insight & Approach 

 In the beginning our idea was to use personas only during the first phases but we ended up using   them throughout the project . From research , insights to idea generation and later benchmarking   prototypes and building product identity and brand . The method helped us in some specific ways   that I would n’t have thought of beforehand . 

    During brainstorming sessions , I liked how we could use the personas to expand our ideas   and think of new concepts aimed at our stakeholder ’s behavior and interests . This effect was   planned but I later realized how important our personas were to center the creative process   around our users . 

    To have a visual representation of the stakeholders led to efficient group communication and   helped us keep track of who we were designing for . We kept them close and let them guide   us , constantly asking questions : would this appeal to say “ the trend - setter ” ? 

    It served beautifully as a guide of reference when evaluating ideas , concepts and making   decisions for our stakeholders . It helped us not to be overprotective of our own ideas and it   lowered the risk of making biased decisions . 

 If I would have done the project again I would also have tried a creative workshop before presenting   the personas . The output of that might have resulted in yet another undiscovered target group that   we did n’t specify in the research . 


EMAIL: 
ID_NUM: 
NAME_STUDENT: 
PHONE_NUM: 
STREET_ADDRESS: 
URL_PERSONAL: 
USERNAME: 

### Task: You are a PII (Personal Identity Information) Detection. Given a essays written by students, you have to identify ONLY the following:
NAME_STUDENT - The full or partial name of a student that is not necessarily the author of the essay. This excludes instructors, authors, and other person names.
EMAIL - A student’s email address.
USERNAME - A student's username on any platform.
ID_NUM - A number or sequence of characters that could be used to identify a student, such as a student ID or a social security number.
PHONE_NUM - A phone number associated with a student.
URL_PERSONAL - A URL that might be used to identify a student.
STREET_ADDRESS - A full or partial street address that is associated with the student, such as their home address.
### Input: VISUALIZATION - PERSONA 

 Challenge & Selection 

 For my internship , me and a classmate undertook the project of developing a new line of longboards   ( skateboards ) for a local company . These products would aim for a complete new market for both us   and the company even though some collective experience could be found . The challenge was to   understand our potential users of the products and to see if there were any undiscovered potential   users from which the market could grow . Besides doing a large research on present products , brands ,   new technologies and skateboarding culture etc . we decided to develop a set of personas and to give   them a visual representaion . We chose this tool both to learn about skateboarders and   skateboarding culture and to widen the scope of ideas later generated in brainstorming . 

 Application 

 Creating personas is a great way for both understanding the customer and putting the user in focus   when creating ideas . It can diverse the ideas created in later stages and it provides insights for   evaluating those ideas . We started off doing observations in the skateboarding community and   combined that with a brainstorming for potential undiscovered users . This resulted in 6 personas :   The fall - back skateboarder , the trend - setter , the business snob , the sports fanatic , the park skater and   the environmental nerd . We then conducted a range of interviews both with representatives for each   persona and with subjects that understood the type of person typical to a persona . This resulted in a   presentation of each persona including a cartoon drawing , quotes from the interviews , a list of   psychographic characteristics and a matrix showing how sensible they were to price , sustainability ,   design , etc .   These personas were then used as a starting point in the brainstorm session where we   first interpret each persona before creating ideas . 

 Pic : example of the park skater and the trend - setter 

 Insight & Approach 

 In the beginning our idea was to use personas only during the first phases but we ended up using   them throughout the project . From research , insights to idea generation and later benchmarking   prototypes and building product identity and brand . The method helped us in some specific ways   that I would n’t have thought of beforehand . 

    During brainstorming sessions , I liked how we could use the personas to expand our ideas   and think of new concepts aimed at our stakeholder ’s behavior and interests . This effect was   planned but I later realized how important our personas were to center the creative process   around our users . 

    To have a visual representation of the stakeholders led to efficient group communication and   helped us keep track of who we were designing for . We kept them close and let them guide   us , constantly asking questions : would this appeal to say “ the trend - setter ” ? 

    It served beautifully as a guide of reference when evaluating ideas , concepts and making   decisions for our stakeholders . It helped us not to be overprotective of our own ideas and it   lowered the risk of making biased decisions . 

 If I would have done the project again I would also have tried a creative workshop before presenting   the personas . The output of that might have resulted in yet another undiscovered target group that   we did n’t specify in the research .
### Output: 