Benefits

• Gives users a voice in the design process.
• Enables technical and non-technical participants to contribute equally.
• Shifts the focus from purely technical requirements and issues towards the needs of the business and users.
• A forum for developers to meet, work with, and understand their users.
• A forum for identifying issues and assigning them to people for resolution.
• A forum to specify Design Goals that can be used for current and future products or versions.
• Enables a team to rapidly design, evaluate and iterate design approaches.
• Increases oppportunities to promote “buy-in” from users. Buy-in is the extent to which people who will use a system feel attached to it and support its goals. By having users help make design decisions, they are less likely to reject the system being designed.
• A forum to introduce UX into an organization - Selling UX

Planning Questions

• What do you want to achieve?
• Can it best be achieved by participatory design or, for example, by having one developer or designer work on the issue?
• How important is the activity you’re undertaking? i.e. There is not much point conducting extensive participatory design activities for a piece of functionality that will be rarely used.