Chapter Four. Research

To observe a fish, you must become one.

” JACQUES-YVES COUSTEAU

Be the ball.

” GOLFER TY WEBB (CHEVY CHASE) GIVING A PUTTING LESSON IN THE FILM CADDYSHACK

You begin the process of designing a speech-recognition system by developing a clear understanding of two things.

• What does the client/service-provider want to achieve?

• What does the caller want to do?

Designers need to perform meticulous research, because it is only through the detailed understanding of the system objectives that a designer can create and produce a successful application. To produce great speech-recognition systems, the designer needs to be many things, including

• A strategic thinker

• A master of logic

• A process expert

• A student of human nature

• A writer with a dramatist's ear for the subtleties of language and expression

Sometimes even a clairvoyant. (That's because the functionality is only one element of a speech-recognition system.) A well-designed speech-recognition system accounts for all aspects of the clients ' objectives and their callers ' objectives and needs.