WES ©
WES ©: Wendy Experience Scale*
What is this?
This is a tool for assessing product and services experiences. The tool uses a questionnaire developed with the help of Excel and 84 pots of tea. The WES © can be administered to any Wendy that uses a product or service that you want to assess. The WES © will tell you whether that product or service meets the stringent, to be published, Wendy International Standard of Experiences (WISE). Unlike assessment tools such as the SUS which focuses merely on usability with Likert scales**, the WES © focusses on product and service relevant experiences including usability with 9 semantic differential scales*** . The scales tap into the following experiences:
-
Fabulousness
-
Aesthetics – Visuals
-
Fitness for purpose
-
Financial value
-
Aesthetics – Tactility
-
Usability
-
Complexity
- Engagement
- Predictability****
Also known as ‘ FAFFAUCEP’ (pronounced faff-Oh-sep)
The WES © is currently in a Beta release stage and is available for use* by product and service developers on condition that they ask advance permission and provide me with a full report of the product, service, assessment conducted including the results which will be used to build the WISE standards.
Administering the WES ©
Let a common all garden Wendy use your product or service to complete a common task that it was designed to enable. Provide a unbroken supply of tea during use. Observe the Wendy complete the task collecting usability style observational data. When the Wendy has completed the task, or given up provide her with a copy of the WES © and ask her to mark an X on the line between each pair of experience descriptors that indicates her experience on this continuum. There is a practice item that you should encourage the Wendy to complete then discuss her answer to make sure that she understands how to use the scale. As the Wendy completes the scale ask her to describe examples that have lead to her reporting this experience. This information will be extremely useful for either developing marketting materials or deciding what to change to improve the experience.
Below is an example of a WES © completed by my marking X’s on each scale item describing my experience of my wireless radio. You can make your own practice scale that covers some dimension of the Wendys or the product being assessed. In the example below the practice item asks about whether the Wendy considers the product a worthy conversation piece.
Practice by identifying where you are on this scale:
never talk about it |
————-X—— |
tell the whole world about it |
Where is the Wireless Radio on these scales?:
Absolutely Fabulous |
–X—————– |
Crappy |
Cover-it-with-a-brown-bag ugly |
———–X——– |
purrrrrrr-rity |
Just what I need |
——X————- |
Don’t see why I’d want to use it |
You’d have to pay ME to use it |
———–X——– |
Take all my cash, and credit, NOW! |
Squeeze, stroke, and lickable |
——–X———– |
Cooties, don’t touch IT! |
Did I brake it or what? |
—————-X— |
Works a treat |
I can use it first time |
—-X————— |
training-required nightmare |
Snore, Snore, Snore |
————-X—— |
Fun, Fun, Fun |
Its obvious what it was going to do |
—–X————– |
it was full of surprises |
Analysing WES © Results:
Allocate the location maked on the line with a weighting number between 1 and 10.
For even number questions the weightings increase towards the left, for odd number questions the weightings increase towards the right. Sum all the weightings. The total possible score is 90. Higher scores indicate better Experiences.
Coding the example provided above looks like this
Fabulousness
|
–X—————– |
9 from right |
Aesthetics – Visuals |
———–X——– |
6 from left |
Fitness for purpose |
——X————- |
6 from right |
Financial value
|
———–X——– |
6 from left |
Aesthetics – Tactility |
——–X———– |
5 from right |
Usability
|
—————-X— |
8 from left |
Complexity |
—-X————— |
7 from right |
Engagement |
————-X—— |
7 from left |
Predictability |
—–X————– |
8 from right |
Total score = 62/90 = 69%
The average of multiple WES © scores can be used to provide overall Experience score for the product.
The normalisation data to enable comparision across different products and services and indicate the value of the score relative to a benchmark will be published as part of WISE. Note that without the normalisation data it is possible that all procucts receive scores in the 80’s (a roof effect) or below 20 (a floor effect). Our expert, on-site, Wendy (me) recommends that prior to the publication of WISE we should assume that any score under 60 is at best a mediocre product or service and any score under 45 is an experience that should be avoided.
For in depth analysis each item should be verified with the observational measures taking during the use phase and the comments made by the Wendy’s when completing the questionnaire.
In this example we can clearly see that the tactile aesthetics (score = 5) provided the biggest opportunity for improving Wendy’s experience. Wendy talked about the radio being a bit too big to put in her pocket, she liked the bouncy rubber bits but all the little buttons were a bit too small and pointy to enjoy pressing them, she prefers rubber-buttons (who doesn’t?!) and the industrial-safety feel for portable.
Next Steps
The WES © development team haven’t decided whether to gather normalisation data on the vo version, refine the item labels before collecting normalisation data or just chuck the semantic differential format and develop WES © (v1) based on a creatively cunning perverison of Kelly’s Repertory Grid technique.
* Use is permitted by prior agreement with the inventor (me, Wendy!)
** the linguistically pedantic should note that Likert scales tend to use split infinitives such as ‘strongly agree’ which can irritate those completing the scale undermining its efficacy in cases where people choose not to select any options that include split infinitives for purely curmudgeonly reasons. This makes the scale unreliable for responses from educated people from Yorskhire.
*** The semantic differential is based on the assumption that everyone interprests the scales in the same way. Unfortunately, this assumption is not true rendering the WES © useless to anyone other than Wendy.
**** For some products or services predicatability is not a positive experience quality (e.g. games). Administrators are advised to either scope the item to refer to the service or product controls.
March 24th, 2009
Are there health warnings required for products that score under 40?
My boiler is quite disturbing (38 on the WES, completed by me)
I wondered if I’m entitled to compensation from the manufacturer for emotional distress?
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March 24th, 2009
Smeg fridge freezer scored 120? I was never good at maths…
Sx
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