By Amir Ansari, 26 May, 2008
It all started with an internal discussion we had at work. Our Design Director asked all the consultants if they had any inputs into a presentation on User Centred Design being delivered to a group of developers.
A flurry of emails followed – off the topic mind you - ranging from developers not caring about cost and usability and only loving their code, through to the need to get developers in the design process early because they are so valuable to this process.
While all these emails went back and forth, my mind began to sidetrack and wander. I started to stumble across the realization that this inherent instinct to protect one’s code or ‘creation’ is not just limited to developers, but it is in fact a human trait. We all do it! Let me explain.
I just recently bought some Venetian blinds and being a handy man, decided to install them myself. Now, most architraves and window framings are quite simple and support Venetian blinds reasonably well. My house isn’t quite so simple and hence I had to use my creative flare to install them. Five hours later and numerous efforts to find studs and adjusting the levelling due to our sinking house, I managed to install the blinds. Now let me make it clear that I am a Virgo, and hence a perfectionist. I step back and look at my hard work and effort and smile with arrogance at having won my battle with the window frame and successfully installed the blinds.
It took my wife three minutes to comment on the faults and imperfections of my installation. Funnily enough, I went into defensive mode straightaway and argued my case and my perfect job at finding a solution to this difficult problem. I was almost heart broken that she was focusing on the 'bigger picture' and hadn’t appreciated my hard work and intricate solution. The discussion at work I talked about earlier suddenly popped into my head. Oh my god, I’m one of those (referring to developers and their love for their clever code to a complex problem).
I had failed to step back and look at the bigger picture, which is what I do every day at work as a UCD practitioner. I had been sucked into a narrow tunnel of specific problem solving and had totally forgotten about the importance of installing the blind from an aesthetic level.
It is not just about developers. Humans by their nature tend to get bugged down with detail, especially when they’ve been engulfed with a specific problem solving activity.
So what am I actually trying to say? Two things: firstly, apologies to all those developers who constantly get referred to as “code loving techies who can’t step back and look at the bigger picture”. It’s not just you, it’s all of us. Secondly, I want to emphasise the importance of UCD practitioners (and indeed anyone) to constantly step back and question their own design solutions against the high level intended goal.
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By Amir Ansari, 5 May, 2008
While reading the book on personas (by the way, this blog isn't about personas!) entitled "The User Is Always Right" by Steve Mulder and Ziv Year, I came across a website that tabulates 200 years of baby names and ranks them in popularity.
Now, before visiting the website, you might envisage a big table of names, or some dynamic table where you select the year from a drop-down list and it ranks by baby name, or you select a name from a drop-down list, and it shows you the ranking for each year. Instead, I found that the website presented this data in a visual way that is not only clear and concise, but dynamic and interactive, providing an enjoyable user experience. Now, while I can think of some improvements to the interactivity of the graph, holistically it is quite clever.
The baby name page also provided a link to yet another amazing website with examples of other data visualisations. On this site my favourites are the "Thinking Machine", "Market Map" and "Many Eyes".
In my 10 years of usability consulting experience, it remains rare to get an opportunity to really push boundaries through applying unorthodox technologies and techniques to achieve a project's objectives. It is actually common for clients to be fairly conservative in their approach. They invest extensively in us to supply their online technology solutions, expecting a result that looks good, provides a rich user experience, but has some level of conservatism in order to satisfy internal politics, branding needs and other pre-requisites.
As user experience professionals, I believe it is our duty to push those boundaries on behalf of our clients. We should constantly evolve our creativity and continually question ways in which users expect to interact with and experience the online world, now and into the future. Happily, we seem increasingly to be getting our way. Client conservatism appears to be giving way to a broader acceptance of innovation, and we are now often asked by clients to help them think creatively about novel techniques for using the web and other technologies.
Visiting the two sites above has reminded me that there are clever people out there doing clever things. We should always keep a look out for new and different user interaction solutions so that we can make use of them... and hopefully take them further.
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Posted in Design, Innovation,
By Lisa McArley, 2 May, 2008
An incident in a car park this week got me thinking about the nature of
signs and the importance of placing them at the right point in the
journey. I'm not talking about labeling
here, the signs made perfect sense; the problem here was timing.
Signposts are there to ultimately get us to our destinations quickly,
safely and with the least amount of wrong turns or dead ends. Sometimes however signposts send us to the
wrong destination and, in this case, literally up against a brick wall. After parking in the underground car park, I
got out of the car and took several confident steps towards the large,
prominent sign saying "lifts". Then I
stopped. As I had got closer another
sign became visible that directed people to two different lifts, the public
lifts and the club lifts. I wanted the
public lifts so I followed the arrows, and that's when I hit the brick wall. Back I went to the first sign to check the
direction. No, I was definitely following
the signs...to a dead end. Looking up the
car ramp I could see the lifts within tantalizing reach but there were large
signs prohibiting pedestrians on the ramp.
In the other direction, I could see stairs, but they were going down and
I needed to go up. So there I was, seemingly
literally stuck between a rock and a hard place.
This experience got me thinking about the importance not just of proper sign
labeling, but of placement and destination. At what point in the site journey do we place
the sign to the next step we want users to take? When do we give them signs to other destinations? Through testing and working with users, I
have learned to place signs (such as registration calls-to-action or related
information details) at the point in the journey where users are most receptive
to them. Sometimes this might be at the
start, but sometimes it's after they've done a little bit of exploring on their
own and are ready to look for, or be prompted with, that next step. Take the example of someone arriving at a
product site and being forced to register before they can browse items or add
them to their basket (yes, this still happens).
Forcing people to register before they've decided its worth their while
will only drive users to other sites where shopping is easier. Sites should also allow users to choose
whether to register (because there's an advantage in doing so, like saving time
on repeat purchases) or to simply make the transaction (including bill payment)
without registering.
Likewise, hitting people with information about hotels when they've
arrived at the flight search page is a little premature but showing them that
information after they've booked a
flight is helpful because they're now ready to take the next step in their
travel arrangement process.
So, did I get out of the car park?
Yes, I took my chances with the vehicles and walked up the cars-only
ramp to the lifts. The door into the
lift foyer had no affordance, but that's a whole other issue, nor did it tell
me what floor I was on (a hazard for the return journey!) but I did manage to
eventually get myself onto the street above.
Moral of the story? Don't send
your users into brick walls. If the
directional sign to the lifts had been placed after I had proceeded down a
flight of stairs, I would have found them easily instead of being deterred too
soon and sent literally up against a brick wall. So think about when and where to give
directions. When will your users be
receptive to further information or calls-to-action? When is the right time to show them secondary
directions? What would be useful to know
now and to where would they like to go?
Remember, it's a lot easier to leave your site than to exit a car park,
so make sure you use signs well.
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Posted in Design, Usability,
By Amir Ansari, 8 January, 2008
How often have you burnt your hand trying to pick up a saucepan by the handle, or touching a hot plate at a restaurant? When it comes to the web, as technologies improve and more and more people (including my mum) start to use the web, people's expectations of website usability increase and comapnies need to respond to stay in the game. Yet, when it comes to consumer products, although technologies have also improved in the fields of metals, plastics etc, we still see so many products on the shelf which could easily have been tweaked to make them more user-friendly . In the example above, it would be simple to incorporate smart materials so that a handle of a saucepan changes colour to inform you that it's hot. Some saucepan manufacturers have incorporated technologies to display a red circle in the middle of the pan telling us it's at the optimum temperature for cooking, so why don't they do the same with their handles to tell us that's it's at the optimum level for... burning your hand!
Here are a few thoughts as to why the consumer product industry has been outstripped by the web industry in instilling usability:
- With millions of websites out there, the competition for people's attention is intense, placing greater pressure on companies to improve their web usability in order to attract and retain users against the competition;
- Specialised organisations and companies such as the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) and Stamford Interactive exist, defining clear standards for the internet and embodying them in user-friendly websites respectively;
- Users can easily provide feedback to companies and webmasters regarding issues they have with websites, either via a simple email to the webmaster or the completion of a feedback form.
The above three points are not reflected in the consumer goods and manufacturing industries. Although there are many saucepans out there and we have a choice, brand loyalty, country of manufacture, and pricing force us into that choice. Secondly , there are no organisations like W3C in manufacturing of consumer good, and although safety standards exist, they are not really linked in with the usability of the product. Finally, the mechanisms for providing feedback for physical products require far greater effort, and the fact that few of our own consumer products are manufactured in Austaralia users further discourages users to provide their constructive feedback to overseas companies.
Now, I'm not saying that the web has attained a universally high level of usability and we all know there are still countless poor websites out there. It just seems that although the web is still in its infancy, it is already leading the field in terms of both expectation and delivery of usability and user experience.
So what is the solution?
I think we, as consumers, could raise our expectations of manufacturers to provide us with sensible products and be actively engaged in providing feedback for the products we use day to day. We should also learn to be more discriminating about good design, ensuring companies that have put some brain power behind their good products are rewarded for their efforts. This way we can hopefully raise the bar for other manufacturers and over time, reap the benefits of a world full of good, usable products.
As they say, "It's the squeaky wheel that gets the grease!"
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Posted in Design, Usability, Innovation,
By Amanda Harding, 22 November, 2007
Ruth Ellison presented to the Canberra Web Standards Group on 12 November 2007 at the National Library of Australia on the topic of Implementing Accessibility in Government. The Web Standards Group is for people who are interested in web standards and best practices. There are currently over 5000 members from 112 countries.
Ruth took a look at some things to be aware of when implementing accessibility in an Australian Government context, from organisational level issues to people and technology challenges.
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Posted in Conferences, Design,
By Amanda Harding, 13 November, 2007
Paul Cruse, Stamford founding Director and Principal Consultant, has written the attached white paper. The paper is based on a recent presentation to our Canberra clients and covers the history and subsequent evolution of government intranets in Australia.
Next Generation Intranets for Government
PDF (750kb)
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Posted in Innovation,
By Stephen Zafir, 31 October, 2007
Just as the World Wide Web brought each of us access to millions of points of content around the world, Web 2.0 now mobilises the information and allows us to interact with it. Social networking and folksonomies offer an engaging new level of connection between people and ideas. Like all innovative technologies, however, they represent a great set of concepts and features, but not necessarily the full realisation of their potential. As user-centred designers, it is our role to understand the extended meaning and potential of these innovations so that we can apply the approaches and learnings to the real-world requirements of our customers and their users. For example, the use of tagging, tag clouds and organic information hierarchies points to a new way forward for traditional Information Architecture. Although traditionally most company websites or intranets are a static proposition, each user brings a unique approach to the information. Consequently, even a good static Information Architecture represents a compromise between the different mental approaches brought to the website or intranet by the range of users. Allowing users to tag information elements essentially creates an evolving categorisation model whereby users can form their own logical relationships across existing information structures. These relationships can then be utilised in two ways;
- By the system, to provide a mechanism for direct linking to related elements.
- By the Information Architect, to inform evolution of the Information Hierarchies themselves.
In this way traditional, off-line analysis techniques for Information Architecture (such as card-sorting etc.) can be augmented by new on-line information, provided by real users whilst engaged in day-to-day interactions with the information. The result may be a measured movement toward more fluid information architectures which, over time, can evolve to reflect the mental approaches of their users.
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Posted in Design,
By Susan Ingram, 18 October, 2007
I learned a valuable lesson recently. During a recent website redesign project, I found that asking the same questions in two different ways, in two different locations, produced some really valuable insights.
During initial focus groups with users, I asked if they needed a particular type of online form. The resounding answer was "No".
A week or so later, I conducted a few site visits and asked the same question in a different way and found out some interesting tid-bits. Users definitely didn't want the new online form because they were very used to the current form. From an outsiders view, I could see the current form was not user friendly and was missing some information that was key to the organisation. Users had invested time learning the current form and had developed workarounds so that they could use it, and had become quite adept at filling out the form. They didn't want things to change because they didn't want to have to learn something new.
And the lesson is...
Be careful how you phrase questions to users and try to gather as much background information about their answers as possible. Be aware that humans, in general, do not like change, and if something remotely sniffs of a change, they may resist it, even if the current offering isn't the best.
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By Susan Ingram, 11 October, 2007
With the implementation of a new or re-designed intranet, attention should always be paid to managing the introduction of the system across the organisation. Some organisations do not understand or value change management and expect employees to accept changes with a willing and altruistic attitude. However, most people dislike change. Even if the change involves something that is undisputedly better, change is still uncomfortable and often resisted.
Change management should be considered at the outset of all intranet design and development phases. Change management should be run concurrently to design and development rather than as an add-on obligation at the end of the phase, just prior to the change being released.
Change management
The change management and communications process can be broken into the following stages. Change is not always a linear process and it is possible to move back a stage at any time. Planning and knowledge of these stages should enable the intranet team to see what obstacles may be encountered and how to navigate through to a successful implementation.
The stages of change management are:
- Change awareness - intranet users are made aware of upcoming changes to the intranet.
- Change resistance - change is resisted by some and this change is anticipated by the intranet team. Resistance is discussed and issues resolved.
- Change acceptance - the change is accepted and managers and staff begin to work with the change.
Change awareness
Staff must be made aware of impending intranet changes and how the change will impact them individually and how it will impact the organisation. The more significant the change, the more important it will be to ensure that full awareness of this change is communicated. Top-level information architecture changes, search interface changes, visual design changes and homepage changes are considered more significant for intranet users than changes to low-level information architecture categories, content pages and "backend" changes.
Many organisations utilise email, the intranet or a newsletter to inform intranet users of an upcoming change. For significant changes and those changes which affect the way that people work, this will not be enough (introduction of collaboration work tools is an example of a change that will affect the way that people work). There must be a commitment within the organisation to ensuring that staff fully appreciate the nature of a change and that they then have opportunities to address the inevitable resistance and questioning that is likely to occur. Awareness campaigns can include not only email or intranet updates, but also information sessions, poster drops, and presentations at divisional staff meetings. User-centred design can be an early part of a change awareness campaign. User-centred activities involve staff by asking for their contribution in the analysis and design of an intranet feature or tool.
Change awareness will not only be important for intranet users, but also intranet content managers and authors. If changes are being made to the publishing workflow used to publish content on the intranet this will affect current intranet authors and content managers. This will change the way that content managers and content authors work and will, in some instances, result in current content managers no longer having content management permissions in the Content Management System (CMS). Change awareness with these individuals must be carried out to help the transition to change. This is could include learning sessions, guidelines and possibly even one-on-one discussions.
Change resistance
Resistance can happen when individuals and groups perceive that a change is a threat to them. Intranet teams should listen, empathise and respond openly and authentically to resistance. Strategies for managing resistance are:
- Involvement - one of the best methods for getting people to support the change is to get them involved. Again, user-centred activities can certainly help to make people to feel involved, heard and valued.
- Facilitation - a good approach to dealing with resistance is to openly engage with people who display resistance and help them achieve goals that also reach the goals of the changing intranet.
- Education - once people understand a rationale for the change, they may decide to support the change realising why the change is needed and what is needed of them.
- Negotiation - when a resisting person or group cannot easily be persuaded, then negotiating may be the best solution. Discuss what they are seeking and what they want and find out what they will never accept. Work out a mutually agreeable solution that works for them and for you.
Intranet teams should prepare themselves to recognise signs of resistance. Gossip, grumbling and complaints are early signs of resistance. Others include failure to co-operate at meetings, failure for people to follow through on tasks assigned to them, and open arguments and attack.
This stage can be lengthy, intense and exhaustive but if there isn't adequate consideration of the resistance issues raised and thought given to potential modifications to the proposed solution, it can forecast the failure of the ultimate implementation. Ignoring or failing to recognise any resistance may pose a risk for the success of the change. Resources and time must be allocated to address concerns and realistically look at some of the impacts and issues that may have been overlooked.
Change acceptance
With careful management, resistance will gradually dissipate and acceptance that the change is going to occur will increase. Some staff may still not like or agree with the change, but they accept that the change is going to happen. If the solution is strong and awareness and resistance are effectively managed, intranet users should come to accept the change.
Acceptance is typically visible by people taking ownership for both themselves and their responsibilities. They will appear increasingly happier and more content as they find their way forward using the new intranet. People may need support or training to help establish themselves permanently in their new position. Congratulate people and groups on getting through the change and celebrate the successful transition.
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Posted in Usability,
By Susan Ingram, 12 September, 2007
So you are ready to release your brand new, shiny intranet which fixes problems with your current intranet (e.g. the current information architecture isn't intuitive to intranet users, search results aren't "logical" and a host of other frustrating "quirks".) You've taken a user-centred approach and asked staff what they want from the intranet and you feel confident that the new intranet is going to be a winner. But don't relax just yet, things are going to get worse before they get better.
Staff grumble and have to "unlearn"
Often issues with an ineffective search and an illogical structure to an intranet result in staff developing workarounds and memorising ways to get what they need from an intranet. When changes are made to the intranet there may be grumbling and resistance as staff "unlearn" the workarounds associated with their current habits. Undoubtedly it will initially take longer or be more cumbersome for users to figure out the new way of doing things rather than doing it the "old" way.
This reaction is predicted in the "J Curve" effect, which means whenever change is introduced into an established system, things will usually get worse before they get better.
Two examples of common situations
- An upgraded intranet Content Management System (CMS) will make it simpler to manage intranet content and allow people to directly author content within the CMS. Not only will these people need to learn to fulfil their new authorship responsibilities, time will also be required to master the new tool, and in the short term, individuals with already full days may resent the time and effort involved. And there may be errors and also situations where it was a lot faster the old way.
- Some staff may have memorised how to quickly navigate to a page or a few pages on the intranet that they use regularly, because navigating through the current information architecture is cumbersome and illogical. In a new information architecture, where information is intuitively structured and user-focused, it may be very simple to navigate from the home page through to the various areas, eliminating the need for memorisation or bookmarking pages. However while learning where information has been relocated, old workarounds or memorised locations no longer work and it may require a little extra time to learn where the new information is stored - even if it is a significant improvement over the previous IA.
Managing the J Curve effect
While staff are experiencing frustrations like those above, they may also be subject to some minor bugs within a new intranet, CMS, search, or IA, further exacerbating their frustrations. So while the new changes may have originally been promoted to managers and staff as a series of benefits and increased efficiencies, initially the change doesn't meet those expectations.
Being aware of the "J Curve" effect and other frustrations likely to be experienced by staff after the release of a change is helpful in managing these issues. These kinds of issues which occur during adjustment periods after the implementation of a change can be managed with effective, pre-emptive communications. Warning staff about a transition period ahead of time and that some inconveniences will be experienced is important. Also, advise managers to determine the success or failure of the change at some point after the "J Curve" transition period.
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