Chris Hemsworth, Brian Tyree Henry, and Keegan-Michael Key—stars of the new film ’Transformers One’—visit WIRED to answer 50 of the most googled questions about Transformers. Are Transformers robots? Where do Transformers come from? Who is Primus? Why was Optimus Prime called Orion Pax? Were Orion Pax and Megatron once friends? How old are the Transformers? Answers to these questions and many more await with Chris Hemsworth, Brian Tyree Henry, and Keegan-Michael Key. Transformers One releases September 20

Archaeologist Cat Jarman, a Viking Age specialist, joins WIRED to answer the internet's burning questions about the Vikings. When did the Viking Age begin? How do we know about the Vikings? Where did they voyage to? How did they navigate so effectively? Did Vikings really sacrifice humans? Were the Vikings actually more violent than other cultures of their day? Answers to these questions and many more, today on Viking Support. 0:00 Viking Support 0:15 Nicknames 1:13 How violent were the Vikings? 2:08 Vikings on TV 3:50 Did Vikings really sacrifice humans? 5:02 How do we know about the Vikings? 7:54 Fun, if you’re a Viking 8:18 Where did the Vikings go? 9:57 When did the Viking Age begin? 10:39 Norse and Vikings 12:01 How did Vikings navigate? 12:39 …did they? 13:26 Everything you wanted to know about Viking sex but were afraid to ask 14:55 Did Vikings use soap? 16:28 What did the Vikings look like? 17:29 What do modern Norwegians and Danes think of the Viking era? 18:50 Descendants of Vikings online?

Actor Liev Schreiber visits WIRED to answer his most searched for questions on Google. What’s the correct way to pronounce Liev Schreiber’s name? What are his thoughts on his time playing Ray Donovan? Does Liev Schreiber play hockey? Who is he in ‘Scream?’ Has Liev Schreiber been in a Broadway show? Will Liev Schreiber return as the mutant Sabertooth in the Marvel Cinematic Universe? Liev answers these questions and many more on the WIRED Autocomplete Interview.The Perfect Couple is available to stream exclusively on Netflix.

Good Mythical Morning creators and hosts Rhett & Link return to WIRED to answer an updated batch of their most searched for questions on Google. What did Rhett and Link do before Good Mythical Morning? What academic degrees have the duo earned? Why did Rhett & Link sell Smosh? Why don’t Rhett & Link feed themselves while on camera? When did Rhett & Link first get popular? Will they ever retire? Answers to these questions and plenty more await on the WIRED Autocomplete Interview with Rhett McLaughlin and Link Neal.Wonderhole premiered August 23 on YouTube with new episodes released weekly on Fridays https://www.youtube.com/@rhettandlinkDirector: Justin WolfsonDirector of Photography: Ricardo PomaresEditor: Michael Suyeda; Louis LalireTalent: Link Neal; Rhett McLaughlinLine Producer: Joseph BuscemiAssociate Producer: Paul GulyasProduction Manager: Peter BrunetteProduction Coordinator: Rhyan LarkTalent Booker: Mica MedoffCamera Operator: Shay Eberle-GunstSound Mixer: Justin FoxProduction Assistant: Faith Evans; Spencer MathesenPost Production Supervisor: Christian OlguinPost Production Coordinator: Ian BryantSupervising Editor: Doug LarsenAssistant Editor: Justin Symonds

Volcanologist Jenni Barclay joins WIRED to answer the internet's lava-hot questions about volcanoes. How do volcanoes cause lightning? What would happen if you fell into a volcano? What do volcanologists study day-to-day? Are there any super volcanoes in the world overdue for an eruption? Why does Iceland have so many active volcanoes? These questions and many more are answered on Volcano Support.Jenni Barclay is a professor at The University of Bristol https://www.bristol.ac.uk/people/person/Jenni-Barclay-251603f7-bef1-4ebe-9adf-6b4906f3fc55/Director: Anna O'DonohueDirector of Photography: James FoxEditor: Philip AndersonExpert: Jenni BarclayProducer: Efrat KashaiLine Producer: Joseph BuscemiAssociate Producer: Paul GulyasProduction Manager: Peter BrunetteProduction Coordinator: Rhyan LarkCasting Producer: Nicholas SawyerCamera Operator: Neill FrancisSound Mixer: Mark CheffinsProduction Assistant: Jack HaynesPost Production Supervisor: Christian OlguinPost Production Coordinator: Ian BryantSupervising Editor: Doug LarsenAdditional Editor: Ron Douglas; Jason MaliziaAssistant Editor: Andy Morell

Private investigator Mike LaCorte joins WIRED to answer the internet's burning questions about the profession of private investigator. How often are the people they're hired to watch cheating on their partner? What are PI's allowed and not allowed to do on the job, legally? Has anyone ever caught him investigating them? Answers to these questions and more await on Private Investigator Support.Mike LaCorte is CEO of Conflict International https://conflictinternational.com/Director: Anna O'DonohueDirector of Photography: James FoxEditor: Richard TrammellExpert: Mike LaCorteLine Producer: Joseph BuscemiAssociate Producer: Brandon WhiteProduction Manager: Peter BrunetteProduction Coordinator: Rhyan LarkTalent Booker: Nicholas SawyerCamera Operator: Neill FrancisSound Mixer: Mark CheffinsProduction Assistant: Jack HaynesPost Production Supervisor: Christian OlguinPost Production Coordinator: Ian BryantSupervising Editor: Doug LarsenAdditional Editor: JC ScruggsAssistant Editor: Andy Morell

Neuroscientist and Psychologist Dr. Richard J. Davidson joins WIRED to answer the internet's burning questions about our emotions. Are men truly less emotional than women? Can stress cause your brain to shrink? What are chemical imbalances and what do they do to our emotions? Why do we have emotions at all? Dr. Davidson answers these questions and more on Emotion Support.Dr. Richard J. Davidson is the founder of Healthy Minds Innovations and The Center For Healthy Minds.Director: Lisandro Perez-ReyDirector of Photography: Christopher EustacheEditor: Richard TrammellExpert: Dr. Richard J. DavidsonCreative Producer: Justin WolfsonLine Producer: Joseph BuscemiAssociate Producer: Brandon WhiteProduction Manager: Peter BrunetteProduction Coordinator: Rhyan LarkTalent Booker: Nicholas SawyerCamera Operator: Caleb WeissSound Mixer: Sean PaulsenProduction Assistant: Sonia ButtPost Production Supervisor: Christian OlguinPost Production Coordinator: Ian BryantSupervising Editor: Doug LarsenAdditional Editor: Jason MaliziaAssistant Editor: Justin Symonds

Andrew Garfield and Florence Pugh, stars of the film "We Live In Time," visit WIRED to answer their most searched for questions on Google. Will Andrew Garfield play Spider-Man again? Where is Florence Pugh's accent from? Are Andrew Garfield and Tobey Maguire friends? Is Florence Pugh going to be in another Marvel movie? Andrew Garfield and Florence Pugh answer these questions and plenty more on the WIRED Autocomplete Interview. WE LIVE IN TIME opens in NY/LA on October 11, and everywhere October 18 Director: Adam Lance Garcia Director of Photography: Dave Sanders Editor: Cory Stevens Talent: Andrew Garfield; Florence Pugh Creative Producer: Justin Wolfson Line Producer: Joseph Buscemi Associate Producer: Paul Gulyas Production Manager: Peter Brunette Production Coordinator: Rhyan Lark Talent Booker: Lauren Mendoza Camera Operator: Nigel Akam Gaffer: Dave Plank Sound Mixer: Kevin Teixeira Production Assistant: Nicole Murphy Post Production Supervisor: Christian Olguin Post Production Coordinator: Ian Bryant Supervising Editor: Doug Larsen Assistant Editor: Billy Ward

Superstar musician and actress JENNIE visits WIRED to answer her most searched for questions from Google. When did Jennie join Blackpink? When did Jennie Kim start singing? When did she move to New Zealand? What is Jennie Kim really like? What is her favorite fruit? Jennie answers these questions and plenty more on the WIRED Autocomplete Interview.

Historian Mark Lee Gardner joins WIRED to answer the internet's burning questions about the Wild West era. Who was the most dangerous outlaw in the old west? What did folks use for toilet paper way back then? How accurate is the depiction of life in the old west in "Red Dead Redemption 2?" Old west historian Mark Lee Gardner covers these questions and plenty more on Wild West Support. Director: Lisandro Perez-Rey Director of Photography: Josh Bane Editor: Philip Anderson Expert: Mark Lee Gardner Line Producer: Joseph Buscemi Associate Producer: Paul Gulyas Production Manager: Peter Brunette Production Coordinator: Rhyan Lark Casting Producer: Nicholas Sawyer Camera Operator: Freddie Ochoa Sound Mixer: Brad Dunn Production Assistant: Noelle Aguilar Post Production Supervisor: Christian Olguin Post Production Coordinator: Ian Bryant Supervising Editor: Doug Larsen Additional Editor: Jason Malizia Assistant Editor: Andy Morell Special Thanks: Vance Gardner

Anna Kendrick visits WIRED to answer her most searched for questions on Google. Did Anna Kendrick enjoy the 'Pitch Perfect' films? How old was she when she made 'Scott Pilgrim vs. The World?' How did Anna Kendrick get her start as a performer? Anna replies to these questions and many more on the WIRED Autocomplete Interview WOMAN OF THE HOUR starring and directed by Anna Kendrick premieres on Netflix October 18, 2024. http://www.netflix.com/womanofthehour Director: Justin Wolfson Director of Photography: AJ Young Editor: Louis Lalire Talent: Anna Kendrick Line Producer: Joseph Buscemi Associate Producer: Paul Gulyas Production Manager: Peter Brunette Production Coordinator: Rhyan Lark Talent Booker: Meredith Judkins, Mica Medoff Camera Operator: Marques Smith Sound Mixer: Gray Thomas-Sowers Production Assistant: Faith Evans, Spencer Mathesen Post Production Supervisor: Christian Olguin Post Production Coordinator: Ian Bryant Supervising Editor: Doug Larsen Assistant Editor: Fynn Lithgow

Singer-songwriter Charlie Puth visits WIRED to answer his most searched for questions on Google. What was Charlie Puth's first single? What famous songs has he written for other artists? How did Charlie Puth react to Taylor Swift's lyric referencing him? When is his birthday? Charlie Puth answers these questions and plenty more on the WIRED Autocomplete Interview. The Charlie Puth Show is now available on The Roku Channel Director: Justin Wolfson Director of Photography: Charlie Jordan Editor: Cory Stevens; Estan Esparza Talent: Charlie Puth Line Producer: Joseph Buscemi Associate Producer: Brandon White Production Manager: Peter Brunette Production Coordinator: Rhyan Lark Talent Booker: Paige Garbarini Camera Operator: Lauren Pruitt Sound Mixer: Sean Paulsen Production Assistant: Sonia Butt Post Production Supervisor: Christian Olguin Post Production Coordinator: Ian Bryant Supervising Editor: Doug Larsen Assistant Editor: Billy Ward

Linguist Gareth Roberts joins WIRED to answer the internet's burning questions about the etymologies of English words. How did the first languages first form? Was there once a single common language that all the others evolved from? When were swear words invented? Have words like "dude" and "bro" become gender neutral? Who came up with the word poop? Is "unalived" a real word now? Answers to all of these questions and plenty more await on Etymology Support. Director: Anna O'Donohue Director of Photography: Caleb Weiss Editor: Richard Trammell Expert: Gareth Roberts Line Producer: Joseph Buscemi Associate Producer: Brandon White Production Manager: Peter Brunette Production Coordinator: Rhyan Lark Casting Producer: Nicholas Sawyer Camera Operator: Christopher Eustache Sound Mixer: Sean Paulsen Production Assistant: Sonia Butt Post Production Supervisor: Christian Olguin Post Production Coordinator: Ian Bryant Supervising Editor: Doug Larsen Additional Editor: Paul Tael; Jason Malizia Assistant Editor: Andy Morell

Rapper Offset visits WIRED to answer his most searched for questions on Google. When did Offset start rapping? Where did Offset get his name from? When is Offset's album dropping? What was Offset's first song? What is Offset's fashion style? Offset answers all these questions and more on the WIRED Autocomplete Interview. Director: Justin Wolfson Director of Photography: Brad Wickham Editor: Ron Douglas Talent: Offset Line Producer: Joseph Buscemi Associate Producer: Brandon White Production Manager: Peter Brunette Production Coordinator: Rhyan Lark Talent Booker: Jenna Caldwell Camera Operator: Chloe Ramos Gaffer: David Djaco Sound Mixer: Sean Paulsen Production Assistant: Sonia Butt Post Production Supervisor: Christian Olguin Post Production Coordinator: Ian Bryant Supervising Editor: Doug Larsen Assistant Editor: Fynn Lithgow

Laura Bailey, Matthew Mercer, Sam Riegel, Travis Willingham, and Liam O’Brien visit WIRED to answer 50 of the most googled questions about their animated series “The Legend of Vox Machina,” based on the first campaign of their wildly-popular and long-running D&D series ‘Critical Role.’ Season Three of The Legend of Vox Machina is now available to watch on Prime Video

Historian Mikki Brock joins WIRED to answer the internet's bubbling cauldron of questions about witches, witchcraft, and witch hunting through the ages. Can men be witches or only women? Do witches really cast spells and create potions? Who came up with the concept of witches flying on brooms and why? Why do cartoon witches always have such a pointy nose? Why do we associate black cats with witches? Why did the Salem Witch trials start? Answers to these questions and an entire coven more await on Witchcraft Support. Correction: An edit in this episode makes out that Elizabeth I was the first queen of England. In fact, she was the first unmarried queen of England; the first queen was actually her half-sister, Mary I. Director: Anna O'Donohue Director of Photography: Ben Dewey Editor: Philip Anderson Expert: Mikki Brock Line Producer: Joseph Buscemi Associate Producer: Paul Gulyas; Brandon White Production Manager: Peter Brunette Production Coordinator: Rhyan Lark Casting Producer: Nicholas Sawyer Camera Operator: Constantine Economides Sound Mixer: Lily Van Leeuwen Production Assistant: Kalia Simms Post Production Supervisor: Christian Olguin Post Production Coordinator: Ian Bryant Supervising Editor: Doug Larsen Assistant Editor: Billy Ward

Beomgyu, Taehyun, Yeonjun, Soobin and Huening Kai of TOMORROW X TOGETHER visit WIRED to answer their most searched for questions on Google. What does TXT mean? What is the best TXT song? Who is the best dancer in the group? What collective name do TOMORROW X TOGETHER fans go by? What is Yeonjun's ideal type? What is Soobin’s personality like? Is Taehyun a magician? What does Beomgyu smell like? Does Huening Kai have perfect pitch? TXT answer these questions and many, many more on the WIRED Autocomplete Interview.Gen Z Icons TOMORROW X TOGETHER returned with the 7th Mini Album, The Star Chapter: SANCTUARY. Available on all streaming platforms now!Director: Justin WolfsonEditor: J.Y. ChunTalent: Beomgyu; Choi Soo-bin; Huening Kai; Taehyun; YeonjunLine Producer: Joseph BuscemiAssociate Producer: Paul Gulyas; Brandon WhiteProduction Manager: Peter BrunetteProduction Coordinator: Rhyan LarkTalent Booker: Jenna Caldwell; Katie PearcePost Production Supervisor: Christian OlguinPost Production Coordinator: Ian BryantSupervising Editor: Doug LarsenAssistant Editor: Billy Ward

Pierogi from Scammer Payback on YouTube joins WIRED to answer the internet's burning questions about scams and scambaiting. Why do scammers ask victims to buy gift cards? What are some of the biggest scammer red flags? Do they ever get caught? How many scams are out there? Should I mess with scammers for fun if I identify one? What software and hardware does Scammer Payback use? How can those creepy sex bot internet commenters lead to a scam? Pierogi answers these questions and many more on Scambaiting Support. Director: Lisandro Perez-Rey Director of Photography: Mark Denney Editor: Richard Trammell Expert: Pierogi Line Producer: Joseph Buscemi Associate Producer: Paul Gulyas Production Manager: Peter Brunette Production Coordinator: Rhyan Lark Talent Booker: Mica Medoff Camera Operator: Franz Criscione Sound Mixer: Mark Cochran Production Assistant: Reed Vrooman Post Production Supervisor: Christian Olguin Post Production Coordinator: Ian Bryant Supervising Editor: Doug Larsen Additional Editor: Paul Tael; Jason Malizia Assistant Editor: Billy Ward Special Thanks: The Entire Scammer Payback Team

Former Chief Urban Designer of The City of New York Alex Washburn returns to WIRED to answer another round of the internet's burning questions about city planning. How should cities accommodate electric bikes? Can urban planning mitigate over-gentrification? How can urban planning prevent crimes? What does the future of public transportation in urban centers look like? Can a city ever reach population capacity? How's it possible for a city to run out of water? Alex Washburn answers these questions and many more on City Planning Support, Vol. 2. Director: Justin Wolfson Director of Photography: Constantine Economides Editor: Richard Trammell Expert: Alex Washburn Line Producer: Joseph Buscemi Associate Producer: Brandon White Production Manager: Peter Brunette Production Coordinator: Rhyan Lark Casting Producer: Nicholas Sawyer Camera Operator: Christopher Eustache Sound Mixer: Sean Paulsen Production Assistant: Kalia Simms Post Production Supervisor: Christian Olguin Post Production Coordinator: Ian Bryant Supervising Editor: Doug Larsen Additional Editor: Jason Malizia Assistant Editor: Billy Ward

“We hope that India’s worst foreign policy setback in decades is being honourably resolved,” says Congress general secretary in-charge communications Jairam Ramesh

Do you find yourself designing screens with only a vague idea of how the things on the screen relate to the things elsewhere in the system? Do you leave stakeholder meetings with unclear directives that often seem to contradict previous conversations? You know a better understanding of user needs would help the team get clear on what you are actually trying to accomplish, but time and budget for research is tight. When it comes to asking for more direct contact with your users, you might feel like poor Oliver Twist, timidly asking, “Please, sir, I want some more.” 

Here’s the trick. You need to get stakeholders themselves to identify high-risk assumptions and hidden complexity, so that they become just as motivated as you to get answers from users. Basically, you need to make them think it’s their idea. 

In this article, I’ll show you how to collaboratively expose misalignment and gaps in the team’s shared understanding by bringing the team together around two simple questions:

1. What are the objects?
2. What are the relationships between those objects?

A gauntlet between research and screen design

These two questions align to the first two steps of the ORCA process, which might become your new best friend when it comes to reducing guesswork. Wait, what’s ORCA?! Glad you asked.

ORCA stands for Objects, Relationships, CTAs, and Attributes, and it outlines a process for creating solid object-oriented user experiences. Object-oriented UX is my design philosophy. ORCA is an iterative methodology for synthesizing user research into an elegant structural foundation to support screen and interaction design. OOUX and ORCA have made my work as a UX designer more collaborative, effective, efficient, fun, strategic, and meaningful.

The ORCA process has four iterative rounds and a whopping fifteen steps. In each round we get more clarity on our Os, Rs, Cs, and As.

I sometimes say that ORCA is a “garbage in, garbage out” process. To ensure that the testable prototype produced in the final round actually tests well, the process needs to be fed by good research. But if you don’t have a ton of research, the beginning of the ORCA process serves another purpose: it helps you sell the need for research.

In other words, the ORCA process serves as a gauntlet between research and design. With good research, you can gracefully ride the killer whale from research into design. But without good research, the process effectively spits you back into research and with a cache of specific open questions.

Getting in the same curiosity-boat

What gets us into trouble is not what we don’t know. It’s what we know for sure that just ain’t so.

Mark Twain

The first two steps of the ORCA process—Object Discovery and Relationship Discovery—shine a spotlight on the dark, dusty corners of your team’s misalignments and any inherent complexity that’s been swept under the rug. It begins to expose what this classic comic so beautifully illustrates:

This is one reason why so many UX designers are frustrated in their job and why many projects fail. And this is also why we often can’t sell research: every decision-maker is confident in their own mental picture. 

Once we expose hidden fuzzy patches in each picture and the differences between them all, the case for user research makes itself.

But how we do this is important. However much we might want to, we can’t just tell everyone, “YOU ARE WRONG!” Instead, we need to facilitate and guide our team members to self-identify holes in their picture. When stakeholders take ownership of assumptions and gaps in understanding, BAM! Suddenly, UX research is not such a hard sell, and everyone is aboard the same curiosity-boat.

Say your users are doctors. And you have no idea how doctors use the system you are tasked with redesigning.

You might try to sell research by honestly saying: “We need to understand doctors better! What are their pain points? How do they use the current app?” But here’s the problem with that. Those questions are vague, and the answers to them don’t feel acutely actionable.

Instead, you want your stakeholders themselves to ask super-specific questions. This is more like the kind of conversation you need to facilitate. Let’s listen in:

“Wait a sec, how often do doctors share patients? Does a patient in this system have primary and secondary doctors?”

“Can a patient even have more than one primary doctor?”

“Is it a ‘primary doctor’ or just a ‘primary caregiver’… Can’t that role be a nurse practitioner?”

“No, caregivers are something else… That’s the patient’s family contacts, right?”

“So are caregivers in scope for this redesign?”

“Yeah, because if a caregiver is present at an appointment, the doctor needs to note that. Like, tag the caregiver on the note… Or on the appointment?”

Now we are getting somewhere. Do you see how powerful it can be getting stakeholders to debate these questions themselves? The diabolical goal here is to shake their confidence—gently and diplomatically.

When these kinds of questions bubble up collaboratively and come directly from the mouths of your stakeholders and decision-makers, suddenly, designing screens without knowing the answers to these questions seems incredibly risky, even silly.

If we create software without understanding the real-world information environment of our users, we will likely create software that does not align to the real-world information environment of our users. And this will, hands down, result in a more confusing, more complex, and less intuitive software product.

The two questions

But how do we get to these kinds of meaty questions diplomatically, efficiently, collaboratively, and reliably? 

We can do this by starting with those two big questions that align to the first two steps of the ORCA process:

1. What are the objects?
2. What are the relationships between those objects?

In practice, getting to these answers is easier said than done. I’m going to show you how these two simple questions can provide the outline for an Object Definition Workshop. During this workshop, these “seed” questions will blossom into dozens of specific questions and shine a spotlight on the need for more user research.

Prep work: Noun foraging

In the next section, I’ll show you how to run an Object Definition Workshop with your stakeholders (and entire cross-functional team, hopefully). But first, you need to do some prep work.

Basically, look for nouns that are particular to the business or industry of your project, and do it across at least a few sources. I call this noun foraging.

Here are just a few great noun foraging sources:

• the product’s marketing site
• the product’s competitors’ marketing sites (competitive analysis, anyone?)
• the existing product (look at labels!)
• user interview transcripts
• notes from stakeholder interviews or vision docs from stakeholders

Put your detective hat on, my dear Watson. Get resourceful and leverage what you have. If all you have is a marketing website, some screenshots of the existing legacy system, and access to customer service chat logs, then use those.

As you peruse these sources, watch for the nouns that are used over and over again, and start listing them (preferably on blue sticky notes if you’ll be creating an object map later!).

You’ll want to focus on nouns that might represent objects in your system. If you are having trouble determining if a noun might be object-worthy, remember the acronym SIP and test for:

1. Structure
2. Instances
3. Purpose

Think of a library app, for example. Is “book” an object?

Structure: can you think of a few attributes for this potential object? Title, author, publish date… Yep, it has structure. Check!

Instance: what are some examples of this potential “book” object? Can you name a few? The Alchemist, Ready Player One, Everybody Poops… OK, check!

Purpose: why is this object important to the users and business? Well, “book” is what our library client is providing to people and books are why people come to the library… Check, check, check!

As you are noun foraging, focus on capturing the nouns that have SIP. Avoid capturing components like dropdowns, checkboxes, and calendar pickers—your UX system is not your design system! Components are just the packaging for objects—they are a means to an end. No one is coming to your digital place to play with your dropdown! They are coming for the VALUABLE THINGS and what they can do with them. Those things, or objects, are what we are trying to identify.

Let’s say we work for a startup disrupting the email experience. This is how I’d start my noun foraging.

First I’d look at my own email client, which happens to be Gmail. I’d then look at Outlook and the new HEY email. I’d look at Yahoo, Hotmail…I’d even look at Slack and Basecamp and other so-called “email replacers.” I’d read some articles, reviews, and forum threads where people are complaining about email. While doing all this, I would look for and write down the nouns.

(Before moving on, feel free to go noun foraging for this hypothetical product, too, and then scroll down to see how much our lists match up. Just don’t get lost in your own emails! Come back to me!)

Drumroll, please…

Here are a few nouns I came up with during my noun foraging:

• email message
• thread
• contact
• client
• rule/automation
• email address that is not a contact?
• contact groups
• attachment
• Google doc file / other integrated file
• newsletter? (HEY treats this differently)
• saved responses and templates

Scan your list of nouns and pick out words that you are completely clueless about. In our email example, it might be client or automation. Do as much homework as you can before your session with stakeholders: google what’s googleable. But other terms might be so specific to the product or domain that you need to have a conversation about them.

Aside: here are some real nouns foraged during my own past project work that I needed my stakeholders to help me understand:

• Record Locator
• Incentive Home
• Augmented Line Item
• Curriculum-Based Measurement Probe

This is really all you need to prepare for the workshop session: a list of nouns that represent potential objects and a short list of nouns that need to be defined further.

Facilitate an Object Definition Workshop

You could actually start your workshop with noun foraging—this activity can be done collaboratively. If you have five people in the room, pick five sources, assign one to every person, and give everyone ten minutes to find the objects within their source. When the time’s up, come together and find the overlap. Affinity mapping is your friend here!

If your team is short on time and might be reluctant to do this kind of grunt work (which is usually the case) do your own noun foraging beforehand, but be prepared to show your work. I love presenting screenshots of documents and screens with all the nouns already highlighted. Bring the artifacts of your process, and start the workshop with a five-minute overview of your noun foraging journey.

HOT TIP: before jumping into the workshop, frame the conversation as a requirements-gathering session to help you better understand the scope and details of the system. You don’t need to let them know that you’re looking for gaps in the team’s understanding so that you can prove the need for more user research—that will be our little secret. Instead, go into the session optimistically, as if your knowledgeable stakeholders and PMs and biz folks already have all the answers. 

Then, let the question whack-a-mole commence.

1. What is this thing?

Want to have some real fun? At the beginning of your session, ask stakeholders to privately write definitions for the handful of obscure nouns you might be uncertain about. Then, have everyone show their cards at the same time and see if you get different definitions (you will). This is gold for exposing misalignment and starting great conversations.

As your discussion unfolds, capture any agreed-upon definitions. And when uncertainty emerges, quietly (but visibly) start an “open questions” parking lot. ????

After definitions solidify, here’s a great follow-up:

2. Do our users know what these things are? What do users call this thing?

Stakeholder 1: They probably call email clients “apps.” But I’m not sure.

Stakeholder 2: Automations are often called “workflows,” I think. Or, maybe users think workflows are something different.

If a more user-friendly term emerges, ask the group if they can agree to use only that term moving forward. This way, the team can better align to the users’ language and mindset.

OK, moving on. 

If you have two or more objects that seem to overlap in purpose, ask one of these questions:

3. Are these the same thing? Or are these different? If they are not the same, how are they different?

You: Is a saved response the same as a template?

Stakeholder 1: Yes! Definitely.

Stakeholder 2: I don’t think so… A saved response is text with links and variables, but a template is more about the look and feel, like default fonts, colors, and placeholder images. 

Continue to build out your growing glossary of objects. And continue to capture areas of uncertainty in your “open questions” parking lot.

If you successfully determine that two similar things are, in fact, different, here’s your next follow-up question:

4. What’s the relationship between these objects?

You: Are saved responses and templates related in any way?

Stakeholder 3:  Yeah, a template can be applied to a saved response.

You, always with the follow-ups: When is the template applied to a saved response? Does that happen when the user is constructing the saved response? Or when they apply the saved response to an email? How does that actually work?

Listen. Capture uncertainty. Once the list of “open questions” grows to a critical mass, pause to start assigning questions to groups or individuals. Some questions might be for the dev team (hopefully at least one developer is in the room with you). One question might be specifically for someone who couldn’t make it to the workshop. And many questions will need to be labeled “user.” 

Do you see how we are building up to our UXR sales pitch?

5. Is this object in scope?

Your next question narrows the team’s focus toward what’s most important to your users. You can simply ask, “Are saved responses in scope for our first release?,” but I’ve got a better, more devious strategy.

By now, you should have a list of clearly defined objects. Ask participants to sort these objects from most to least important, either in small breakout groups or individually. Then, like you did with the definitions, have everyone reveal their sort order at once. Surprisingly—or not so surprisingly—it’s not unusual for the VP to rank something like “saved responses” as #2 while everyone else puts it at the bottom of the list. Try not to look too smug as you inevitably expose more misalignment.

I did this for a startup a few years ago. We posted the three groups’ wildly different sort orders on the whiteboard.

The CEO stood back, looked at it, and said, “This is why we haven’t been able to move forward in two years.”

Admittedly, it’s tragic to hear that, but as a professional, it feels pretty awesome to be the one who facilitated a watershed realization.

Once you have a good idea of in-scope, clearly defined things, this is when you move on to doing more relationship mapping.

6. Create a visual representation of the objects’ relationships

We’ve already done a bit of this while trying to determine if two things are different, but this time, ask the team about every potential relationship. For each object, ask how it relates to all the other objects. In what ways are the objects connected? To visualize all the connections, pull out your trusty boxes-and-arrows technique. Here, we are connecting our objects with verbs. I like to keep my verbs to simple “has a” and “has many” statements.

This system modeling activity brings up all sorts of new questions:

• Can a saved response have attachments?
• Can a saved response use a template? If so, if an email uses a saved response with a template, can the user override that template?
• Do users want to see all the emails they sent that included a particular attachment? For example, “show me all the emails I sent with ProfessionalImage.jpg attached. I’ve changed my professional photo and I want to alert everyone to update it.” 

Solid answers might emerge directly from the workshop participants. Great! Capture that new shared understanding. But when uncertainty surfaces, continue to add questions to your growing parking lot.

Light the fuse

You’ve positioned the explosives all along the floodgates. Now you simply have to light the fuse and BOOM. Watch the buy-in for user research flooooow.

Before your workshop wraps up, have the group reflect on the list of open questions. Make plans for getting answers internally, then focus on the questions that need to be brought before users.

Here’s your final step. Take those questions you’ve compiled for user research and discuss the level of risk associated with NOT answering them. Ask, “if we design without an answer to this question, if we make up our own answer and we are wrong, how bad might that turn out?” 

With this methodology, we are cornering our decision-makers into advocating for user research as they themselves label questions as high-risk. Sorry, not sorry. 

Now is your moment of truth. With everyone in the room, ask for a reasonable budget of time and money to conduct 6–8 user interviews focused specifically on these questions. 

HOT TIP: if you are new to UX research, please note that you’ll likely need to rephrase the questions that came up during the workshop before you present them to users. Make sure your questions are open-ended and don’t lead the user into any default answers.

Final words: Hold the screen design!

Seriously, if at all possible, do not ever design screens again without first answering these fundamental questions: what are the objects and how do they relate?

I promise you this: if you can secure a shared understanding between the business, design, and development teams before you start designing screens, you will have less heartache and save more time and money, and (it almost feels like a bonus at this point!) users will be more receptive to what you put out into the world. 

I sincerely hope this helps you win time and budget to go talk to your users and gain clarity on what you are designing before you start building screens. If you find success using noun foraging and the Object Definition Workshop, there’s more where that came from in the rest of the ORCA process, which will help prevent even more late-in-the-game scope tugs-of-war and strategy pivots. 

All the best of luck! Now go sell research!

BRS leader accuses Congress govt. of betraying BCs as it did with other sections in its 11-month rule

The question asked students to consider the case from a human rights perspective

According to the NAB officials, the PTI founder and his wife obtained land worth billions of rupees from the property tycoon, to build an educational institute, called Al-Qadir University

The protesters waved Georgian and European Union flags and gathered outside the Georgian parliament

Durham, North Carolina : Pitchstone Publishing, [2024]

The Coimbatore police question IMK youth wing leader for threatening to “chop off editor’s tongue”, sparking legal action and protests

Former Fisheries Minister D. Jayakumar told journalists at the party headquarters that the AIADMK would have no truck with the BJP not only in 2026 but also in other elections in the future

The Centre should not relax its clinical trials norms unless the situation is exceptional or dire

The ruling party seems to be unwilling to grant opposition status to YSRCP as it will have to allocate time and opportunities for the party to question the government, he says

Berlin : Springer, 2005

BJP to strongly defend Aligarh Muslim University’s minority status in Supreme Court, overruling 1967 judgement

When people evaluate services, they often consider factors like cost, features, reliability, and performance. For AI, we want to extend those factors by asking questions about how the AI model is built and its impact.

How we deploy AI in our work and product development may hold as much weight in shaping the risks and ethics as the specific models we choose.

Champions City face crisis with four straight losses, while Liverpool shines; Guardiola faces unprecedented challenge in management career.

Some have been advocating an improvised version of the art form on international platforms. However, stakeholders maintain that Kerala is still identified with Kathakali

Maharashtra Polls: A war of word has broke out between the both factions of the Shiv Sena over baggage check of Uddhar Thackeray ahead of a rally.

A democratically elected government needs to take its citizens into confidence about moves that have deep consequences

Maharashtra Polls: A war of word has broke out between the both factions of the Shiv Sena over baggage check of Uddhar Thackeray ahead of a rally.

The communication from the Information and Broadcasting Ministry said there is a view that a small group exercises editorial control on its pages