Writing for an internal global initiative on Innovation, I spoke about imbibing a user-experience design framework (UXD) in the software development life-cycle (SDLC) that can consistently deliver better products. I am publishing the article here.
Designing a UX framework for Internal Applications
User-experience (UX) design deals with harnessing the feelings of a user — How people feel before, during and after they have used a product. It pertains to creating an interaction model that impacts a user’s perception of a system or a product which makes it more desirable for use again. Being a subset of UCD (user-centered design), the first step towards evolving an internal UX methodology is to understand the requirements and user-needs through research.
The User is King
Numerous internal applications are required to be accessed by users on a daily basis. Surprisingly, while the process intended for the greater organizational good is in place, a framework that can monitor the outcome in delivering the right experience to the end-user is missing. Consequentially users get turned-off while conducting simple tasks–either the session gets expired without warning or users are not allowed to recover from their errors. A reason for this is the narrow focus of our design efforts on the end-user’s vision of goals – incapability of internal teams in understanding the user’s mental model including time spent in completing tasks and the prioritization of the goals minimizes the efficiency of the interface and relevant technology. Shaping a central mechanism that comprises of UX design specialists to analyze the user activity (recording success and failure rates), gathering feedback from the end-users (understanding tasks and priority) and working continuously to re-model the user-interface (ensuring it matches user-goals) should be encouraged. Other factors like allowing users to choose the relevant content for their needs – a variant of the Web 2.0 theory – would help in improving the overall credibility of the system.
The Benefits
The better the UX of a system – less mental efforts, less mistakes — the more enthusiastically users are likely to visit it often. Key organizational activities will get deeper visibility due to the rise in visitor loyalty. In turn, an UCDian approach will bring clarity to the project — fewer U turns, management support and less time wasted, which would bring down costs and timescales. A good user-experience is a sign of a good product.
