An Investigation of the Use of Chrono, A Time Management and Community Writing Application
Stages of the Product: Early stage
My Role: Quantitative researcher
Research Type: Exploratory/Generative research (Longitudinal Study)
Methods: Configurational Analysis; Factor Analysis; Longitudinal Surveys; UX Data Analysis
Tools: Qualtrics; SPSS; Teams; Canva; Excel; Fuzzy-Set Qualitative Comparative Analysis (fsQCA)
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Disclaimer: The content you see on this page is based on my master's thesis, An Investigation on Information Technology Use: A Configurational Approach of Chrono’s Features and User Experiences with Respect to Individual Performance, at HEC Montréal. It is for showcasing my research ability.
Background
Chrono, embedding the group pomodoro methodology, is a time management and community writing webapp launched in January 2022. It is developed through a collaboration between researchers and Thèsez-vous, a non-profit organization (NPO) based in Quebec, Canada.
Thèsez-vous specializes in creating physical and human environments to facilitate scientific writing, supporting students (graduate students and Ph.D. students) and researchers in academic writing, from dissertation to thesis, including scientific articles, scholarship applications, session work, comprehensive exam, or the internship report.
The Challenge
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The client wanted to conduct a generative research to investigate new research and design opportunities to enhance Chrono (e.g., learn about the users' usage pattern), including its various features and overall user experience.
The Artifact
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The artifact evaluated is Chrono. It is significant to note that the community language of Thèsez-vous (Chrono) is French. Thus, the language used in the data collection process (e.g., follow-up emails, recruitment messages and questionnaires) is exclusively French.
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The webapp can be accessed at: https://chrono.thesez-vous.org/
Research Objectives
Business Goals​
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To assess Chrono's user experience, gather valuable insights for enhancing its diverse features, and discover ways to help users achieve optimal performance during their writing sessions with Chrono.
Research Goal
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To investigate whether there are different ways in which the features of Chrono and users' perceptions of UX quality (hedonic and pragmatic qualities) within the application allow users to achieve high performance.
Research Question
What are the various combinations of Chrono's features that, combined with users' perceptions of the pragmatic and hedonic quality of Chrono, enable them to achieve equally high perceived performance?
Chrono's Features
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Data Collection
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Sampling Method: A convenience and voluntary sampling method
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Recruitment through three leading platforms: the chat zone of Chrono, class group chats, and the Facebook group of Thèsez-vous (i.e., Thèsez-vous ENSEMBLE).
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Data Collection Platform: Qualtrics
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Research Type: Longitudinal Study
Analysis Tools
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Fuzzy-set Qualitative Comparative Analysis (fsQCA)
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SPSS (exploratory factor analysis)
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Excel
Results Highlights
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It is important to interpret four configurations holistically.
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​Pragmatic or hedonic quality is not sufficient by itself to bring about good performance regardless of whether the writing mode feature is used. (HP1 & HP3)
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​Pragmatic and hedonic qualities along with writing mode and support features are sufficient to achieve good performance even when the other features are not used. (HP4)​
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Pragmatic and hedonic qualities along with progress tracking features are sufficient to achieve good performance when the writing mode feature is not used. (HP2)
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Theoretically, these results point to equifinality, meaning that there are different ways in which users can equally achieving good performance with Chrono.​
Implications to Practice
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From the point of view of Chrono, my findings highlight the importance of combining the use of Chrono’s diverse features and its UX quality perceptions for users in reaching good performance.
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Managers should prioritize investing in strategies that encourage users to utilize features aligned with their writing tasks and goals.
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From the perspective of the users, the results show that one could modify the way his or her use of Chrono by selectively utilizing its features to benefit from the fit between the writing task (goal) and Chrono's features. By understanding the differences between the elements that explain high, above average, and not high writing progress performance, users can identify different types of IT use combinations (or patterns).
My Learnings
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Avoid striving for perfectionism, particularly in the initial stages of a long-term project.
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Maintaining regular updates with your stakeholders regarding your research progress enables them to offer you more effective help and prioritize the next steps.
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Plan before you start research, and document your plan. Planning is important, but the most important part of every plan is to plan on the plan not going according to plan.
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Piloting your studies (whether interviews, surveys, usability tests, card sorts etc, etc. ) will help you identify whether you’re asking the right questions, using the right methods, and help you catch mistakes.
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The report’s presentation will not be the same, depending on the audience. It is very important to know, who is the recipient of the report, and to understand how will the results be used.
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