I am currently working as a User Experience Researcher at Lenovo, continuing on from the time I spent there as a Gil Intern last semester. The field of user experience research uses cognitive psychology to assess people’s perceptions of the ease of use and utility of systems or products. Lenovo, the worldwide leader in PC sales, employs user experience researchers to look into how customers feel about their various products, such as desktop computers, notebooks, tablets, and convertibles. Lenovo places a heavy emphasis on gathering feedback from the people who use their products, analyzing that feedback, and using it to improve the design of future generations of products. In addition to this, the company runs studies to directly observe how exactly people interact with their products and which components may give them trouble.
Throughout the time I have spent at Lenovo, I have already seen how large of an impact psychology has on the design of products and the direction of product lines. I have helped to generate numerous reports that have had direct and measurable consequences on the redesign of products, and in turn, customers’ perceived usability of those products. Even the ThinkPad, one of Lenovo’s most iconic product lines, has undergone changes based on data gathered from users indicating areas of improvement such as trackpad operation. Cognitive psychological research is the driving force behind these changes, which are hugely important when it comes to keeping users happy.
My duties at Lenovo have included big data analysis, sentiment analysis, development of a new large-scale text analytics tool, development of surveys and questionnaires, testing of different survey platforms, and formulation of guiding design principles. The experience has been incredibly valuable to me for a variety of reasons. I have learned a good deal of new software applications, data reporting tools, and research methods in addition to simply what working for a large corporation is really like. It has also been a huge help in seeing firsthand what cognitive psychology research looks like outside of an academic setting. I continue to greatly enjoy my work at Lenovo, and I am very thankful to have participated in the Gil Internship Program!
Also, to any new Lenovo users who may be reading this, please check out http://blog.lenovo.com/en/blog/introducing-our-new-product-ownership-assessment/ to read about and take our new Product Ownership Survey! As I described above, your feedback is crucial to the evolution of our products.
