Define 10

Personas

Personas help teams have empathy for users by creating a common understanding around what motivates a user’s decisions. Created after discovery-phase activities like user interviews and immersion, personas embody what is known about the target user or users. The design team synthesizes user insights and information into characters that are both more easily referenced and more human.

When creating personas, it’s important to understand what’s important to users as well as what will resonate with the members of a varied team. A strong persona will help a business-oriented team member understand what factors a user takes into account when purchasing a product, just as it will guide a development-oriented team member to understand what makes the user prefer one feature over others. Most importantly, a persona helps guide design decisions away from a single designer’s or stakeholder’s opinion and toward user needs.

If you’re designing for yourself or tackling a more strategic project that doesn’t need to specify end users, you can safely forgo personas. If your project doesn’t have time for personas, user-validation feedback and market segments can also provide support when making decisions and rationalizing designs.