FEATURE ARTICLE

The Relevance of User Experience

by Daimon Caulk

User Experience (UX) matters because very few organizations work together in groups to build applications and systems for users. There is a gap in the development of systems, sites, and interfaces. The role of a UX professional is to bridge that gap between the product and the user.

In a typical organization, an executive is given or creates a strategic goal for the department. The goal is communicated to the line level managers and they, in turn, disseminate that directive to the working team. Given the multiple levels of the organization that the goal must traverse it can easily get lost in translation.

The goal may have been to increase sales in the 18 to 24 year old demographic. That objective ended up being “create a new site that uses looks flashy and uses AJAX.” In the immediate, the role of the UX professional is to either extract the root goal or help the organization create the goal and illustrate how that goal affects the customer/user. They are the only person charged with that task.

In addition, they have to be able to maintain the integrity of the goal as it relates to the end user through the duration of the project. Working closely with executives, marketers, developers, and testers it is a balancing act that includes some compromise but the end of the task will be usable, user-centric product that simply “just works.”

Businesses Need User Experience

Look at the struggle that PeopleSoft had last year with deconstructing their ERP systems to meet the needs of the medium business. When evaluating the product businesses chose a system that was the easiest to use. How could Apple swoop in with the iPhone and pull the rug out from under Motorola or Samsung? They thought about the user. They did not constrain themselves with the old framework of existing mobile phone technology. They melded the user interface with good technology— all focused on making tasks easier.

So why haven’t you heard of this category of professional before? Unfortunately, UX is not as well known as other disciplines such as project management, software development, and quality assurance. This role is simply not as mature as those mentioned. In this case, immaturity does not equate to lack of knowledge to get the job done. It simply means that the industry of UX and its associated disciplines of interface design, information architecture, and usability have more marketing to do.

Global and national organizations have been formed to assist with marketing and maturing the practice such as: Usability Professionals Association (UPA), Information Architecture Institute (IAI), Interaction Design Association (IxDA), Human Factors and Ergonomics (HFES), and others. So UX professionals are not just web designers or usability testers, they are a mix of skill sets that range from visual design to focused, cognitive psychology. This is illustrated by the number of associations that represent them.

What to Expect from UX

So how does the role work? UX professionals’ work can front load a project by working as a type of business analyst with a bent toward discovering the user requirements- taking into consideration feature, function, and risk to the user. They work on integrated teams of business intelligence professionals, developers, and product managers. Working hand in hand with project managers, UX professionals can provide keen insight into issues with research and testing, be a translator between the business, the users, and the developers, and provide a clearer direction than a development manager who is focused on the goal of delivering code on time.

What are the deliverables for the role? The documents look like many other documents delivered during the course of software and systems projects. However, below are few of the major ones that you may not be familiar with.
Personas— descriptions of the users, you can relate them to actors in a use case. These are used to having a meaningful conversation with stakeholders- insures that everyone is talking about the same customer/user.
Site Maps— diagrams of the “buckets” or container groups of information for a web site. These are used to illustrate the number of categories, convey appropriate nomenclature, and capture content requirements.
Wireframes— black and white/grayscale model screens before branding takes place. They are used to convey the arrangement of data and functionality on the screens.

Although there are more than mentioned, these are the deliverables you will encounter most from UX professionals. What is probably more interesting than the documents is the process in which they are created and how they are utilized. Don’t be surprised if you see sticky notes, magazines, markers and construction paper during the development of these deliverables. It’s a creative process that leads to the final documentation in many cases.

More UX professionals will be sought after and become a legitimate role that must be procured in order to create the right product, interface, and system that meets business goals and customer expectations. Systems that are designed with the user in mind are easier to use, easier to sell, and much easier to support. User Experience is the discipline that makes that happen.

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