9A - Testing the Hypothesis Part 2

In this next phase of testing the hypothesis, I identified five interview candidates that at simple glance may have fallen under the “prototypical customer” label but upon further conversation I realize that they fall outside the boundaries of what would qualify them as prototypical customers described in my last assignments. In this phase, I interviewed Mason King (5^th year engineer), Jason Shur (5^th year Engineer), Joe Lavoie (3^rd year Political Science), Matt Davis (3^rd year Business), and Alex Idriss (4^th year Construction Management). I have identified the prototypical customer to be a college student at the University of Florida that has a desire and willingness to go to a campus library to complete assignments and other academic tasks.

Who: Although these individuals are students at the University of Florida and all of them have demanding coursework that requires studying and completion of assignments, I found that these 5 students do not have the same needs as other identified customers that I have spoken to in the past. Upon further conversation, I found that these candidates have never preferred going to the library throughout their college career. A couple of them claimed that they get too distracted while others said that they go to classrooms on campus or stay at home to study.

What: I believe the underlying needs between the outsiders and the insiders diverges at the targeted customer’s personal preferences.

Why:  If a student does not prefer to go to libraries in the first place, then they will be less open to the idea that I am proposing. I believe that more students than not prefer to visit libraries in order to accomplish academic and involvement related assignments, though.

Inside the Boundary	Outside the Boundary
Students whom prefer to library atmospheres to be productive and efficient in academia	Students whom prefer non-library settings to study and complete academic related tasks
The ability to find open seating in campus libraries much easier	The need is not to change people’s perspective on libraries and is not aimed to get more students to attend libraries
It is often very difficult to find seating and productive areas in crowded libraries. Currently, nothing exists at the University of Florida to assist these students looking for seating at libraries	Other settings such as classrooms, coffee shops, homes, etc. may be preferred for studying than libraries for the people outside the boundaries.