Are You An User Experience Designer

The Series… K S

Yes …. U guessed it right ! You must be above 18 to watch further ….. Not really …. Enough of stupid KS jokes and branding

The Series… K S

The Series…

The heart or essence of what we are doing

Its more of a debate than a talk actually

Two way process, don’t just hear …speak !

Please feel free to interrupt

If the glamour/rhetoric / humor gets too much…

Due to the varied audience, I am doing a lot of “designer speak” or talking about things you already know

If you have questions

If it gets boring / uninteresting feel free to leave

http://www.webdesign.org/img_articles/9282/Heart-Blending.jpg

If we do not interact ….

I have spent quite some time doing this,

It will break my heart…if you don’t interact.

http://www.negotiationlawblog.com/heartbreak(1).jpg http://literatureisnotdead.com/merch/images/cover.jpg

An important note

Slides preceding this were an effort to quickly do some guerilla branding and set some ground rules for the knowledge sharing session we have at Texity.

We wanted debates not “presentations” per se.

An important note

There is a ground rule for Texity, “KS” series.

The ground rule reads “ there are nor rules”

http://www.texity.com

The real conversation starts after this….

For my colleagues at Texity who are reading this

It would be great if anyone of you can take this forward and build a better branding around Knowledge sharing

An activity

All User Experience designers please raise hands …..

Lets start the real topic.

“ Are you really a User Experience Designer ?” The shift from product design to process design a perspective

What are going to talk about …

what is user experience ? A bit of historical perspective

Who coined the term and what did he mean ? ( Don Norman coined this term)

how does IA, interaction design, usability, user research, relate to user experience ?

what is product user experience ?

how is different from user experience design of a service ?

More >

if this is User Experience, then what exactly is customer experience ?

Should there be a designation called User Experience designer?

The CEO, the engineer, the sales manager , product manager ….. are they UX designers or they aren’t ?

Product design vs Process design

The notion of a User , and who is the Customer ….. can user and customer be same ?

More >

A better term : DUX ( designing for user experience )

DUX

Why is this interesting for me ?

The blatant misuse of terms

Yes I can make an OS “ I know JavaScript , CSS HTML !! “

Yes I am designer I can make brand-identity, interactive multimedia, run usability test play role of an ethnographer.

And I am good at all of the above !

Lack of design research

Creativity being attributed as a sole ownership of designers …

Not just words , not just semantics, its more than that its deeper

A reality check, do we practice what we preach ?

Truly Multidisciplinary

Only ….Designers are creative

““ good design is good business”

TJ Watson, founder of IBM , an engineer a business man

“ When I am working on a problem, I never think about beauty. I think only how to solve the problem. But when I have finished, if the solution is not beautiful, I know it is wrong ”

Buckminster Fuller , the chemical scientist ”

Why is this interesting for me ?

The design of products and businesses not interfaces.

Apps that talk to each other smart apps

Different kinds of people need to talk to ach other, exchange their expertise ….

only then we can build truly smart, intelligent context aware apps.

When did this start for me ?

"User experience" feels like a term, and concept, whose meaningful time is over. I don't know what (if anything) will take its place. But there's clearly a lack of interest and effort in meaningful evolution. The energy seems to be behind the terms and concepts of "information architecture," "interaction design," and "usability engineering." Maybe we should take that as a sign.

- peter merholz

Founding partner adaptive path

Peter continues …

This--this feels right. User experience is not a discipline, or an approach, it's a thing, a quality, an emergent property between a person and a product or service.

Counter Arguments

Peter states, "The energy seems to be behind the terms and concepts of 'information architecture,' 'interaction design,' and 'usability engineering.' “

To me, that is sort of like saying, "The energy seems to be behind concepts like 'carpentry,' 'drywall hanging,' and 'plumbing'" when what you are really interested in is building a house.

Supporters

I never quite understood how, in a world with sensuround Vegas casinos, Cirque du Soleil, Harry Potter cross-merchandising, and Target, a bunch of web designers ever decided what they did should be called "user experience design."

Supporters

At my company, a not insignificant part of the user experience is defined by how the support guys respond to weekend datacenter problems. Another big piece of the pie is how our training folks work with customers. Having nothing to do with either of those facets, I feel kind of weird having "user experience designer" on my business card.

Its just semantics …academic stuff …

One problems about a consultant-dominated field is that consultants build fame by coining and popularizing new concepts.

Just at the point that a few customers might be starting to grasp the fact that they need more than pretty colours and flashy widgets to help their customers, the consultants realize that their pitch is no longer differentiated. So they need to invent a new term.

Views

'experience design' includes everything going on in the community; information architecture, technology, interaction design, politics. Whatever's on the mind of the people doing this work, however it's defined.

We still don't know if UX is or will be a field, a discipline, a practice, a methodology, a community, etc...

User Experience is the broad concept that encompasses interaction design, usability, information architecture, etc. It is not meant to replace other terms, but is a simple way of describing the greater topic. - Jess McMullin

An interesting bit of history :

I share Matthew Milan's concern over the term "user". As Tufte has said, referring to people as "users" is a custom of two professions:

computer scientists & drug dealers .

Some more random views

Usability/ Info Arch / IxD is not design.

We need to design better.

Usability : Its not a tool that helps you “design”

Usability is a tool to check for our lack/failures of design.

“ Aha” experience – Alan Cooper

We forgive products after this one experience

Products will fail, products are designed for 80% of the context.

Can we minimize failure by mapping predict all that a user might ever want ….

Practical examples that we’ve all faced

You Tele call centre

Mc Donald call center

Nokia battery explodes

When a Nokia battery explodes ,

what does that hamper ? Is it User Experience ?

Who is responsible ?

{

Isn’t the engineer

The shop owner

The call center guy …

}

responsible for “user experience ? “

Why is user experience attributed to only interactive system designers ?

Are we talking “system design” ?

The i-Pod success is not just due to design but mostly to a system approach to a certain problem.

Are we talking “system design” ?

How to deliver music to people?

A portable device with the maximum possible capability and a sales organization that at affordable prices can supply all types of music.

i-pod and i-tunes were the answer. Now the same can happen with video and books.

System and User Environment Design

The Apple system success is due to system engineering, the device can only get better, smaller and with more capacity, in the future the hard disk be substituted by a flash drive, simplifying the system itself.

Sony to compete, must propose a better system, not a lower capacity one..

System and User Environment design

The same can be said about written media, books, magazines etc. Sony by proposing its reader may be successful but again the entire system must be in place, the reader, really portable and efficient with enough

When the winning idea is a system, the final design look, while important, is not determinant.

Lets try to define UX …

A look at many UX models

UX elements

UX honeycomb

UX forces

UX umbrella

The famous “UX elements” model

The now famous model

Opposition to jesse’s model

This puts me in direct opposition with Jesse's diagram . Those aren't elements of user experience. Those are elements of web design.

Performing those elements well should lead to offering users a quality experience, yes. But "information architecture," "interaction design," "user needs," etc. etc. don't comprise the user experience.

A quality user experience is comprised of things like desirability, usability, enjoyability, utility, delight, satisfaction, etc. etc.

Improving the model

The Forces/ Relationships

The old favorite

UX honeycomb ( Peter morville )

Details of honeycomb

Useful If it's not useful, who cares if it's usable?

Usable Don't make me think! (Steve Krug, who wrote the book)

Desirable Positive experiences build brand loyalty.

Accessible Available to all, regardless of disability.

Findable You can't use what you can't find. (Peter Morville: The Age of Findability)

Credible Quality design builds trust.

Is the honeycomb too much ? Desirable Useful Usable Value

Adding structure/direction to honeycomb

You can’t use if you can’t find it

How does usable matter if its not useful.

A digression ( bit of customer experience)

Mark Hurst in a column on “customer experience” writes

How Ryanair succeeds with poor customer service

What happens when a company is known for poor and sometimes rude customer service, misleading advertising, and an exclusive focus on profit margins? If it's Ryanair, a low-cost European airline, it does very well.

A digression ( bit of customer experience)

This seems to run counter to my "good experience" premise - that customer-centric companies will eventually rise to the top of their industries. Customer-hostile companies aren't supposed to do well in the long term.

But in Ryanair's market, enough people - *customers* - want low fares badly enough that Ryanair now provides the desired customer experience: a low fare.

Hidden slide…too much text not usable

Here's how I explain each facet or quality of the user experience:

Useful. As practitioners, we can't be content to paint within the lines drawn by managers. We must have the courage and creativity to ask whether our products and systems are useful, and to apply our deep knowledge of craft and medium to define innovative solutions that are more useful.

Usable. Ease of use remains vital, and yet the interface-centered methods and perspectives of human-computer interaction do not address all dimensions of web design. In short, usability is necessary but not sufficient.

Desirable. Our quest for efficiency must be tempered by an appreciation for the power and value of image, identity, brand, and other elements of emotional design .

Findable. We must strive to design navigable web sites and locatable objects, so users can find what they need.

Accessible. Just as our buildings have elevators and ramps, our web sites should be accessible to people with disabilities (more than 10% of the population). Today, it's good business and the ethical thing to do. Eventually, it will become the law.

Credible. Thanks to the Web Credibility Project , we're beginning to understand the design elements that influence whether users trust and believe what we tell them.

Valuable. Our sites must deliver value to our sponsors. For non-profits, the user experience must advance the mission. With for-profits, it must contribute to the bottom line and improve customer satisfaction.

The honeycomb hits the sweet spot by serving several purposes at once. First, it's a great tool for advancing the conversation beyond usability and for helping people understand the need to define priorities. Is it more important for your web site to be desirable or accessible? How about usable or credible? The truth is, it depends on your unique balance of context, content and users, and the required tradeoffs are better made explicitly than unconsciously.

Second, this model supports a modular approach to web design. Let's say you want to improve your site but lack the budget, time, or stomach for a complete overhaul. Why not try a targeted redesign, perhaps starting with Stanford's ten guidelines as a resource for evaluating and enhancing the credibility of your web site?

Third, each facet of the user experience honeycomb can serve as a singular looking glass, transforming how we see what we do, and enabling us to explore beyond conventional boundaries.

UX wheel - Magnus Revang

UX wheel explained

The Model should be explained from the inside. It starts in the middle.

Value is what we want to accomplish

For customers and providers , positive user experience is a win-win situation

We want to accomplish value through positive user experience

The user experience is a series of phases, we have to focus on positivity in findability , accessibility , desirability , usability , credibility and usefulness

Numerous factors contribute to the phases of user experience, the model shows 30 factors carefully placed

To achieve this we work backwards, starting and ending with search engine strategy , and going through and making a choice about each of the factors

UX wheel explained

Numerous factors contribute to the phases of user experience, the model shows 30 factors carefully placed

To achieve this we work backwards, starting and ending with search engine strategy , and going through and making a choice about each of the factors

Too many UX models ?

Here is a one you might like 

Presenting “Miss User Experience” Inspired by comments from Radhika . Usability consultant , Texity Systems http://www.abc.net.au/reslib/200505/r48586_128144.jpg miss universe

Value of UX : holistic approach by (experience dynamics ) http://www.experiencedynamics.com/science_of_usability/usability_posters/user_experience/

Scary isn’t it !

The value of UX : holistic approach

Why design ? Do the math …(my personal favorite model )

There is a desired behaviour that we need to create, we have no control over the person but, via interaction design, information architecture and interface design we control the environment.

Kurt Lewin ( social psychologist )

Lets take an example - taken from Peter Boersama

A single discipline & see how it relates to UX

Information Architecture

An example : Big IA, shallow IA, shoulder IA

T-model .

Deep vs shallow IA

An example : Big IA, shallow IA, shoulder IA The horizontal line overlaps with others where UX practitioners come

Who owns User experience ?

Is a graphic designer more of an UX person or an interaction designer

Is the copy writer not UX ? The engineer ?

The industrial designer ?

Who owns User experience ?

Why would Interaction designers be the ones to claim the "Big" label , effectively placing the related fields below IxD instead of at its side .

Do we posses a special skill that practitioners in the other fields don't?

What is that skill? Is it related to one of the deep subjects or one of the shallow subjects?

I cannot tell and I think it is wrong.

Interactive system designers own UX

NO !

But then what really is interactive ?

What are interactive systems ?

Is a bottle that you have on the table interactive …

Is a bike interactive ?

Are movies interactive ?

Is MS windows interactive ?

Interaction : two way , time –dependent, state change due to user action/feedback

Shoulder IA (coming back to our example)

Business strategy vs Info. Architecture

Now lots of debates ..& some history

Lets go back in history

Lets understand where did these things come from … that will help us solve the debate ?

Experience design

Experience design is the practice of designing products, processes, services, events, and environments -- each of which is a human experience -- based on the consideration of an individual's or group's needs, desires, beliefs, knowledge, skills, experiences, and perceptions.

Experience design

An emerging discipline, experience design attempts to draw from many sources including cognitive psychology and perceptual psychology , linguistics , cognitive science , architecture and environmental design , haptics , product design , information design , information architecture , ethnography , brand management , interaction design , service design , storytelling , heuristics , and design thinking . Another term for experience design is experiential design .

This one rocks !

Baxley’s model of Universal User Interface

He beautifully explains how everything is a UI, a movie , MS word , a glass, a toy, an ATM ( see the link below to read more )

Modified from www.baxleydesign.com/pdfs/dux03_baxleyUIModel.pdf

This one rocks !

Experience design

User Experience – wikipedia

User experience design is a subset of the field of experience design which pertains to the creation of the architecture and interaction models which impact a user's perception of a device or system.

The scope of the field is directed at affecting "all aspects of the user’s interaction with the product: how it is perceived, learned, and used.”

User Experience – Don Norman

The history …term coined by Don Norman

The only reason that "user experience" is associated with interactive systems designers is because Don Norman didn't want his group at Apple relegated to pushing pixels in the "user interface."

User Experience – Don Norman

Don wrote :

I invented the term because I thought Human Interface and usability were too narrow: I wanted to cover all aspects of the person's experience with a system , including industrial design, graphics, the interface, the physical interaction, and the manual. Since then, the term has spread widely, so much so that it is starting to lose its meaning.

Customer Experience – HBS review

They design the right offers and experiences for the right customers.

They deliver these propositions by focusing the entire company on them with an emphasis on cross-functional collaboration.

They develop their capabilities to please customers again and again—by such means as revamping the planning process, training people in how to create new customer propositions, and establishing direct accountability for the customer experience.

Customer experience

Experience that a person has across all touch points with the company

&

the product.

Touch points of Customer

Touch points can be people or other products

Shop where the product is bought

The product itself

Call center

Engineering

Sales , after sales service

Etc.

Customer experience ( as we see it today) product Service touch-points Service touch-points Customer experience design Design of product as well as services

Along came the consultants …invented terms !

The earlier original meaning of user experience ( as given by Don Norman )

is what we call today as customer experience

Experience design became “customer experience”

User experience got limited only to “product user relationship”

Product user experience product Service touch-points Service touch-points Product user experience design Design of product not services

Relationships ( User vs Customer )

Product experience – Related to User ( the person who uses the product )

Customer experience – “Product + service” design

Relationships ( Customer vs User )

Customer and user might be different or they might be same

If you design for a service across all its touch points its customer focused design

If you consider only a product its user focused design

Design must consider both

.

a real world example …

“ In a design project that we did in Indian markets, Though most of the users of TV are women, I was asked to design keeping in mind the men too.

The men had the buying , decision making power. The customers were men and users were primarily women

We did an extensive user research to check if women ( the user) had enough buying power to be customers too.

a real world example …

If we just catered to women and their preferences that was not enough. The 1 st touch point with the TV was at the shop.

The men came and bought, here the customer decided what to buy… he might or might not have kept the user’s preferences ( women ) in mind.

Taken from

Supriya Ajmera

Design consultant Texity Systems ( http://www.texity.com )

A better term

DUX – designing for user experience

DUX ! The savior

User experience is everyone's responsibility. It is not the special province of interactive systems designers.

DUX ! The savior

User experience should not be just about interactive systems -- it's a quality that reflects the sum total of a person's experiences with any product, service, organization.

Peter merholz

Remember the scary diagram ?

What the diagram really means is ..

The scope of people involved in helping supply a quality user experience is so vast, that you cannot draw an interesting circle around it and say, "that's the community."

DUX ! The savior

When I walk into a store, I'm having a "user experience." When I call an airline to make a reservation, I'm having a "user experience." And innumerable elements contribute to affect that quality of experience.

DUX ! The savior

So what can we do? We can move forward by talking about what goes into developing quality user experiences.

We should never talk about "user experience design" -- there is no customer or user-facing design that doesn't involve a user's experience.

DUX ! The savior

But we can talk about how our methods, processes, approaches, mindsets, and understandings can contribute to improving the user experiences of the products and services people deal with.

A brilliant summarization - RohanDsouza

I would agree usability ( UX ) is a quality, few of my thoughts to add

I have always read usability as a term evolving around providing a better experience for the user or customer , it could be in design in service or in thought . It’s omnipresent in all industries and for some time provides a competitive edge for those who deploy it earlier then others.

This competitive edge stays around for a while and then becomes a standard where everybody deploys it, till the next big step comes forward in better user/customer experience.

A brilliant summarization

For ex: a bank that gives a faster service has an edge just like a toaster which has simpler and minimal control or a website that lets user find what he wants fast and simple.

What surprises me is usability is increasingly being associated as a magic wand; some have even attributed the dotcom bust to lack of usability. I really wonder if we are biting in more than we can chew.

A brilliant summarization

Just giving Usability( as a discipline) cannot and will not get customers.

- Usability is no rocket science, it’s a constituent of simple methods worked to get simpler solutions.

- Usability is mandatory for all corporate who keep customers/users as a priority, and it does not necessarily mean employing a usability professional

- Usability is multi-professional, it involves dedication of people from different professions and different skillets to ensure the user is at the helm