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Redesign
           Must Die
Lou Rosenfeld •  Rosenfeld Media •  rosenfeldmedia.com

             UX London •  April 13, 2011
Hello, my name is Lou
Hello, my name is Lou
More importantly, #uxlondon
What is redesign
and why should it die?
Why I’m so down on redesign
Why I’m so down on redesign
A redesign story about
my alma mater
A story in the Ann Arbor
News
UM was going to redesign its
Gateway
UM was going to redesign its
Gateway
UM was going to redesign its
Gateway
UM was going to redesign its
Gateway
Leadership and $ were on
board
Leadership and $ were on
board



$250,000
student labor
student labor
+ 
some software   .
student labor
+ 
some software       .
   successful redesign
They even had a ribbon-cutting
This became...
...this
...this
...this
...this
Then they did it
all over again
Then they did it
all over again
and again
Then they did it
all over again
and again
and again
Then they did it
all over again
and again
and again
and again
Where we are today
Where we are today
Where we are today
Where we are today
Redesign is
hollow,
meaningless,
and vain.
Endlessly
repeated,
it is a true
example of
insanity.
Ill-defined problems
cause insanity and vanity
Ill-defined problems
cause insanity and vanity
 We attempt the impossible: “boil the ocean”
 in no time at great cost
Ill-defined problems
cause insanity and vanity
 We attempt the impossible: “boil the ocean”
 in no time at great cost
 We believe the unbelievable: unwarranted
 claims from agencies and software vendors
Ill-defined problems
cause insanity and vanity
 We attempt the impossible: “boil the ocean”
 in no time at great cost
 We believe the unbelievable: unwarranted
 claims from agencies and software vendors
 We become irresponsible: we serve
 ourselves and declare victory at the expense
 of our teams and users
See the problem differently
See the problem differently
Reframe the problem
Reframe the problem



     redesign
Reframe the problem
Your site is a
complex adaptive system
John Holland:
“A Complex Adaptive System
is a dynamic network of
many agents acting in parallel,
constantly acting and reacting
to what the other agents are
doing.”
Examples of CAS
Examples of CAS
Examples of CAS
Your site is a moving target
built upon moving targets
Your site is out of your control


 more John Holland:
 “The control of a complex adaptive system
 tends to be highly dispersed and
 decentralized... “The overall behavior of the
 system is the result of a huge number of
 decisions made every moment by many
 individual agents.”
The constant pendulum swing
Regime A:
“We’ve gotconstant
    The to           pendulum swing
get control of
  this mess”
Regime A:
“We’ve gotconstant
    The to           pendulum swing
get control of
  this mess”                  Regime B:
                               “Let’s let a
                            thousand flowers
                                bloom”
Regime A:
“We’ve gotconstant
    The to           pendulum swing
get control of
  this mess”                  Regime B:
                               “Let’s let a
                            thousand flowers
                                bloom”


 Regime C:
“We’ve got to
get control of
  this mess”
Friends are hard to find
   and harder to keep




“Three weeks after the redesign, unique daily visits to
the flagship Gawker blog slumped by 50 per cent...”
Friends are hard to find
   and harder to keep

                                     Andy Budd:
                                     "People expect the
                                     pain of losing something
                                     to be greater than the
                                     value gained from
                                     its replacement"
                                     http://ind.pn/gSKcnH



“Three weeks after the redesign, unique daily visits to
the flagship Gawker blog slumped by 50 per cent...”
“The perfect is the
enemy of the good.”

Voltaire might
have added:
“Constant change
means never having
to say you’re sorry.”
So you can’t redesign
But you must refine


1. Prioritize: Identify the important problems
   regularly
2. Tune: Address those problems regularly
3. Be opportunistic: Look for low-hanging fruit
#1: Prioritize because
a little goes a long way
The Zipf Distribution
The Zipf Distribution
The Zipf Distribution
The Zipf Distribution




      SHORT
      HEAD:
       love it
The Zipf Distribution
The Zipf Distribution




      SHORT
      HEAD:         LONG
       love it      TAIL:
                   leave it
Zipf displayed textually
Unverified rumor:
90% of Microsoft.com’s content
   has never been accessed
Zipf is everywhere

• A few search queries go a long way
• A few documents go a long way
• A little bit of navigation goes a long way
• A few of your audiences matter the most
• ...
Important audiences, essential wants and needs
#2: Be an incrementalist:
tune because things change
Things change: you must fix the
airplane while flying it
Things change: you must fix the
airplane while flying it
Impact of change on design
(queries)
IRS before 4/15
Before
                  April 15
IRS before 4/15
IRS after 4/15
After
                 April 15
IRS after 4/15
From projects to processes:
a regular regimen of design




  Example: the rolling content inventory
User Research Landscape




from Christian Rohrer: http://is.gd/95HSQ2
User Research Landscape


                                             Which of us can you do
                                             monthly? weekly? daily?




from Christian Rohrer: http://is.gd/95HSQ2
#3: Be an opportunist:
find the low-hanging fruit
#3: Be an opportunist:
find the low-hanging fruit
➡ High priorities with low costs
#3: Be an opportunist:
find the low-hanging fruit
➡ High priorities with low costs
➡ Semantic webs to support contextual navigation
#3: Be an opportunist:
find the low-hanging fruit
➡ High priorities with low costs
➡ Semantic webs to support contextual navigation
➡ Small improvements to search
Care for some low-hanging fruit?
Care for some low-hanging fruit?
Care for some low-hanging fruit?
Care for some low-hanging fruit?
More fruit:
    contextual navigation




More fruit: improving
contextual navigation a la BBC
http://slidesha.re/fzChQB
More fruit:
                            small search




More fruit:
teaching the search engine
to be smart at Hewlett-Packard
More fruit:
                            small search




More fruit:
teaching the search engine
to be smart at Hewlett-Packard
More fruit:
                            small search




More fruit:
teaching the search engine
to be smart at Hewlett-Packard
Life by a thousand cuts

  50% of users are search dominant
x 5% of all queries are typos, fixed by spell checking.
 2.5% improvement to the UX

  50% of all users are search dominant
x 30% (add best bet results to top 100 queries)
  15% improvement to the UX


Ditto for improving content, search results design,
navigation design…