Personas Are Living Documents: Design Them to Evolve

We sometimes think of personas as final artifacts, when, in reality, personas are merely a representation of data, and data can change. An artifact that is too polished or difficult to update may result in an outdated and unused persona.

Summary: We sometimes think of personas as final artifacts, when, in reality, personas are merely a representation of data, and data can change. An artifact that is too polished or difficult to update may result in an outdated and unused persona.


Personas get a bad rap. Often when I talk to people about creating personas for their organization, I receive a list of reasons personas have failed for them in the past. We have previously documented some of the most common reasons that personas tend to fail:

But there is another way that personas can fail, and sometimes stakeholders are not even aware of it: the personas have become outdated. One might be tempted to place the blame for this state of affairs with the current stakeholders or owners of the personas, but, in reality, often the problem is with the personas’ original creators. The problem is that the personas were never created to be updated.

When and How to Update Personas

Personas should not be updated merely for the sake of doing so. In fact, unnecessary updates can be counterproductive to the organizational adoption of personas. The stability of personas over time is critical to their ability to be remembered and internalized. On the other hand, personas need to be flexible enough to accurately represent the organization’s current users. This tension between stability and flexibility can be challenging to navigate, but there are some tools and frameworks to help.

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Matt Brown | Sciencx (2024-03-29T11:07:26+00:00) » Personas Are Living Documents: Design Them to Evolve. Retrieved from https://www.scien.cx/2023/01/08/personas-are-living-documents-design-them-to-evolve/.
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" » Personas Are Living Documents: Design Them to Evolve." Matt Brown | Sciencx - Sunday January 8, 2023, https://www.scien.cx/2023/01/08/personas-are-living-documents-design-them-to-evolve/
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" » Personas Are Living Documents: Design Them to Evolve." Matt Brown | Sciencx - Accessed 2024-03-29T11:07:26+00:00. https://www.scien.cx/2023/01/08/personas-are-living-documents-design-them-to-evolve/
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" » Personas Are Living Documents: Design Them to Evolve." Matt Brown | Sciencx [Online]. Available: https://www.scien.cx/2023/01/08/personas-are-living-documents-design-them-to-evolve/. [Accessed: 2024-03-29T11:07:26+00:00]
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» Personas Are Living Documents: Design Them to Evolve | Matt Brown | Sciencx | https://www.scien.cx/2023/01/08/personas-are-living-documents-design-them-to-evolve/ | 2024-03-29T11:07:26+00:00
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