Newsletter of the East Bay Chapter of STC
September/October 2003

Networking

• Northern California STC Chapters
• Need a pat on the back
• Bumming around

Northern California STC Chapters

 

 

There are six active Northern California STC chapters. Each chapter meets on a different Wednesday or Thursday so you can attend all the meetings. Contact the respective presidents for more information or visit the chapter web site.

Need a Little Pat on the Back?

Join the Networking SIG!
Need a little encouragement during your job search? The East Bay Chapter's Networking SIG is revving up again. But we're not a support group; we're a job-hunt SUCCESS group. Until we begin our weekly meetings again, join us at our Yahoo Groups home: Subscribe at EBSTC_Networking_SIG-subscribe@yahoogroups.com.

Bumming Around: The Benefits of Party Crashing

by Marsha Howard
EBSTC Networking SIG Manager

The bad news: I have a little more time on my hands these days due, in part, to the high tech slump. The good news: I try to fill it wisely. On Wednesday, August 20, I put my time to good use by crashing the Silicon Valley Usability SIG’s meeting. And, in so doing, I learned about a very unusual career option.

Notice that I use the word “crashing,” as in “party crashing,” as in attending when one is not expressly invited. This is part of what I want to convey: Just go. If you hear of a meeting with an interesting topic, just go. Ask later. It doesn’t matter that you might not be a member of the group. No one cares and no one will comment on your party crashing. As a matter of fact, I’ll bet the speaker at the event I attended was particularly happy to see one more interested face, since the turnout was appallingly small, less than ten I think.

The speaker, Kimberly Oslob, a Usability Specialist at Macromedia, recounted her time as a usability participant recruiter. Who knew that someone actually performed that function? Didn’t you just think that those test subjects appeared as if by magic? I did.

This turns out not to be the case. Oslob spent nearly 100% of her time, during her first two years at Macromedia, as a full-time test participant recruiter. She shared with us that she initially disliked the job of recruiter. When she approached her manager with this problem, he said she would need to document the processes involved so they could bring in someone else and move her to another position.

At times when she was not actively recruiting, she put together a step-by-step recruiting guide. She also spent time updating the company’s web site, picking out and ordering gifts as incentives for participants, and conducting small studies to get experience. These small studies moved her further toward her ultimate goal of becoming a Usability Specialist. And, although you can see from her current title that she did achieve her goal, Oslob actually grew to like her job as recruiter. Picking a good test participant, a representative user, is the first step in making a usability test accurate. Oslob learned to love it and she used it as a stepping stone to her current position.

Oslob not only provided a reasonably detailed description for her former job, but she gave out goodies as well. I must confess that the possibility of winning a copy of Dreamweaver was a primary motivator for my party crashing excursion. And she gave out TWO copies. That’s the good news, but the bad news is that I didn’t win either. I did come away with a CD case though.

This is not the first party I’ve crashed lately, only the latest. I always come away with a new bit of knowledge and sometimes I come away with goodies. Sometimes the knowledge is a new job skill. Sometimes the knowledge just confirms that others feel the economic downturn as well. In this case, the knowledge demonstrates that creativity and determination produce results.

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