I wanted to provide an update on some conversations recently with Digital Services who are working with a company called Purple Shirt (user experience consultants).  They are surveying groups of staff and students about their experience using the Library digital “ecosystem”.

This wasn’t on our radar (hence the lack of warning) however Digital Services had some spare project money and would like to use this to understand things like:

• User experience interacting with the library digital “ecosystem”
• Any pain points
• Gleanings that might inform functional requirements for the Modern Library Management system (Horizon replacement) project.

My understanding is they have some student groups lined up to interview next week and some library staff from different teams will also be meeting with Purple Shirt (thank you to all involved in that).

Early next year (like the first couple of weeks of January), Purple Shirt would like to do some observational research observing staff interacting with (for example) Horizon as part of their work which again will inform things like the MLM project.

I have pointed out to them there won’t be many people around however they are keen to box on and complete this work by end of January.  So I wanted to give you a heads up in case you are approached by Purple Shirt and asked if they could observe some of the tasks you do as well as some background as to what this is about.

Tim Stedman