Don Norman: We need more ‘generalists’

Posted on Tuesday, 20 September 2011 by graham

I found this speech tucked away in the Q&A section of Don Norman lecture at Stanford University. As usual, Don is completely on the money.

However, Its not only only design education that needs to change.

The industry still hires designers as ‘artists’ – and yes, I believe this is a hangover from the historically focused art & design education. We seem to be in a vicious circle of focusing on appearance alone and its doing little for the reputation of the wider interaction design industry.

Designers should have a broad understanding of technologies and their given audiences/users, but they should also be hired at the right level and be expected to quickly assume a deep knowledge of the business in much the same way as a product manager might.

Of course, we still need the ability to communicate visual concepts effectively, but without an intimate understanding of a given business model or product, our value or impact on ROI is significantly impeded.

Please note: I have edited slightly in places in the interest of readability.

The main principles you learn were (I think) historical, you look at previous designs and you copy them or you change them. Most of Apple comes from Braun (the German company), if you actually look at the iPods and you look at the early Braun products – they are very similar.

I’m not criticising them, in fact Johnny Ive (who is the main designer) is proud of that fact. Because design in the traditional sense is like art in a traditional sense; you learn about the other artists and you learn about them and you build upon them whilst doing your own thing.

…but all thats about appearance and its not about how we use it (interaction). Its not about what we call human centred – so that people can understand how to use it. Thats been big change and that change started with the home computer.

Interaction design started with the development of the first PC’s. We started to realise there were psychological principles like feedback, like conceptual models, like affordances, like constraints (etc) that could be applied and thats very far into most designers.

…and today design is still taught as an art. At CMU (technology school), the design department is located in the School of Arts and the Dean is a piano player. At most schools the design is located in the arts and humanities or they are separate design schools (he gives examples). They care about art…design is art.

So we need a new breed of designer and what we now have human computer interaction as a discipline with people really learning to understand how new technologies are evolving and used…and we have a design discipline but they seldom talk to each other…and so the stuff that HCI people put out tends to be ugly. They are not very good at communicating the real principles that they themselves are talking about…and we have communication designers (people study a lot about how we communicate concepts) but unfortunately they don’t work with the technologists. So I think that we are getting better, but we need to change our educational practices.

In the university, we pride ourselves on specialists…and the way to be bonafide is to become very specialised and quite narrow (you are really good at this). In the world of business and industry, we have to produce products, and products require expertise across a wide number of specialties – you require generalists. Well universities don’t train generalists. Because actually a generalist faculty member would either never get hired, or if they were hired by accident they wouldn’t get promoted. Because in any given field they would need letters to see if this was a great person.

We need more generalists. Designers are generalists, but right now they are generalists in art…and maybe on materials – but not enough. I think they need training in social sciences and the technologies. A lot of designers hate technology, they hate numbers.

Where I teach <snip>, the ones who hate technology are the ones who end up in the design department…and in a similar way, engineers hate people. But whats engineering about? Its about designing things and developing things that are to be used by people. And if you look at what modern design is about, its applied social sciences.

 

Posted in Business, Design, User experience | 1 Comment

Embedding a new user experience team

Posted on Sunday, 3 July 2011 by graham

Almost 3 years ago I left Yahoo! and London to embark on my new role at Symantec in Gloucester. I have honestly loved every minute of it…despite the regular sleepless nights!

At the time of joining my host organisation ‘MessageLabs’ had been acquired by Symantec and there were many big changes taking place…I was one of them.

Symantec already had a sizeable user-centred design team (which is excellent!) in the shared engineering service group, but I was the first to be embedded into the Symantec.cloud division. There were no other designers, design patterns or visual assets…hell, there wasn’t even any other Macs and nothing on the intranet seemed to work! It was a complete nightmare compared with working at Yahoo! which had a large Mac user base.

I was thrown this challenge (and I am paraphrasing…a little):

Make our complex IT products more accessible to the less IT literate small/medium sized businesses (SMB).

I thought it would be valuable to talk about my experiences of embedding a user experience team into an engineering organisation. I don’t confess to have perfected the process of embedding a user experience team into an engineering organisation, but I do feel that I have made significant ground on the challenges I saw at the time.

Misconceptions

We just make stuff look prettier

Its easy to get upset when people think that all you do is, take something an engineer did and make it look pretty. Try to resist the temptation to get into a vigorous discussion with someone about user experience design.

I quickly came to realisation that many folk, just won’t get it. You could rattle on about user research, pattern libraries and user flows for as long as you want but all you will do is wind yourself up and probably annoy the person you are talking to. That’s not a good place to be.

The best response I have found is, ‘Yes, making stuff pretty is part of what we do’. I then leave it until I actually work with them on a project to expose the full spectrum of user experience deliverables.

I am not Jesus and I certainly don’t have the talent or social charisma to convert everyone into interaction design ‘believers’, but what I can do is work hard to show promote its value on specific projects. People get that, consistently and without doubt.

We don’t do any work, we are just layabouts

I guess one of the problems with digital world is that you could be sat next to someone and they will never see any of your work because the people you work with are the other side of the earth and on an entirely different time zone.

If we were building a sculpture out of clay in the office people would take probably note. They might not understand it, but they can see effort. Digital work is different, unless you are clicking your mouse and keyboard at rapid pace throughout the day, its almost understandable that folk might start thinking that you don’t do any work.

Now engineers are tapping all day. If its not emails, its code. They sound busy and its an accepted or standard mode of business, so they may go around the office and engage in conversation with other engineers about how busy they are. Because we are a smaller team, we can’t do that…and there in lies the potential for misinterpretation.

Designers are generally passionately motivated about the work they do for the business and customers. They don’t see their work as a chore – they love what they do and why they do it: its customer driven (or socially driven), not technology driven. We are dealing with a the subtleties of of web development making the choices that help our business to be more successful than it’s competitors.

I digress a little.

Going back to the title of the section, this is a short sighted comment and those who suggest we are lazy are probably either covering their own tracks or jealous that we love our jobs so much. Ignore 100% or if it bugs you that much, take them into a meeting room and let them know it bothers you. If they persist go to their manager or HR. Its toxic and disruptive.

Everyone seems to name any document we create a ‘wireframe’

…and actually, it doesn’t matter too much. They can call it whatever they want, as long as the find it useful document to discuss and challenge – that’s all that matters.

Visual stuff doesn’t take more than an hour to produce

If you show someone a few page designs, they might be tempted to say that it only takes a couple of days to knock up; and of course, they have no idea that to establish the final designs you have to create user goals, user scenarios, user flows, wireframes and conduct user research to validate the approach.

It can be a bit of a chicken and egg scenario: You won’t be given the time you need unless they see value, but you can’t produce the value unless you are given the time.

The only way I could make this happen was by working closely with product managers and project managers to explain and explore our processes in detail. Make sure you tailor your communications to talking about time benefits with the project managers and quality benefits to the product manager. That is what they care about.

 

Do more of…

Talking to engineers

It is really important to get an understanding of every engineers skills and the challenges they face. They are usually up against some crazy time schedules and you could significantly cut their work load by making small changes to your designs.

Show and tell

When you have a great story to tell about your contribution to a project, tell everyone. In fact tell everyone and their dog! Promote what you did, as it will pave the way for other designers when they work with the same folk. Put the work on the walls, and be prepared to explain what you did when people stop to take a look.

Wiki/Sharepoint use

Making your work available to everyone in the organisation (and at all times) makes a huge difference to collaboration and exposure of our work. You can fire links around the company with very little effort at all. Granted, its a bit of a pain at first to set up project wiki pages and document every change or meeting…but its an impressive resource for all to see.

Clickable prototypes

People love stuff they can interact with and it doesn’t matter if its a very linear/strict prototype. Going the extra mile to product a prototype will ensure you get the buy-in you need – guaranteed.

 

Do less of…

Using UX or IA terminology

Pretty much everyone you speak to won’t understand words like: Information architecture, cognitive overload and mental models. Don’t waste time educating them, make it clear and concise in normal every day language.

Trying to convince people of the value of user experience/interaction design

Some folk are just so die hard against designers, its not even worth wasting your breath, but that doesn’t mean you should stop working with them. Always make yourself available and always remain positive. Hold out for the right scenario/situation to expose the value of your work.

 

 

 

 

 

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Consistent interaction conventions

Posted on Sunday, 3 July 2011 by graham

Chip and PIN deviceI stumbled across this Chip and PIN device at a petrol station near Swindon last.

I was reminded me of a talk by Jeremy Rewse-Davies (Design director of London Transport) some time ago where tube station employees had adapted poorly concieved posters to meet the needs of the public.

Without previously acknowledging it, most Chip and PIN devices across the world have a ‘enter’, ‘OK’ or green button on the bottom right-hand corner of the keyboard. This is usually the key you press once you have tapped in your PIN. Often the ‘OK’ button is larger than the other keys to increase visual impact.

However, in this example – the green key is not in the bottom right-hand corner. It is the same size as the other keys and it is obscurely situated one key from the right; it also incorporates an unconventional ’E’ printed on the key.

This entirely breaks the design conventions used on not only on other Chip and PIN devices, but also calculators and other interactive dialogues which instigate a user response.

In this case, the poor petrol station attendant has obviously got a little fed up of folk not being able to use the device and has stuck on a big arrow instructing customers to ‘please press’.

When I went to use the device, I immediately ignored the stuck-on note (as hand written notes often incur less authority) and went straight for the ‘Fn’ key after inputting my PIN code.

I had a little smile when I realised what was going on, but soon got a little stressed when I realised that there were 5 folk behind me in the queue waiting to use the machine.

I wonder what the impact of this design error has been?:

  • Think about how many folk use this device every day.
  • Think about how many times the petrol station attendant has to explain the note
  • Think about how many folk with poor or impaired eyesight get confused by the legibility of the handwritten note
  • Think about how much time is lost as folk incorrectly press the ‘Fn’ button instead of the green ‘E’
  • Think about how much time it takes to decipher the handwritten note and the purpose of the ‘E’ key.

Point-of-sale technology often assists in improving of customer turnaround… and yet this device seems to disrupt that process immeasurably.

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Creative leadership styles

Posted on Sunday, 3 July 2011 by graham

In our fast-paced modern world of web development, speed is of the essence. Indeed, innovation often takes a back seat in order to get ‘something’ into the wilds. This pioneering spirit allows businesses to capitalise on a new market segment and lead the industry. Myspace, Friends Reunited and Yahoo! all did this to varying degrees of success, but they are all testament to finding a niche and doing it quicker than anyone else.It isn’t often you are celebrated for being a good second place!

Of course sustaining first place is an entirely different issue, which I may explore in a future post.

This growing obsession with speed often collides with product quality; but it does it have to? Surely there is a win/win situation here? How can we as leaders adapt to the demands of the business without sacrificing quality?

The are two opposing leadership strategies in order to respond demands of the business. Without realising it, we may default into a particular style – especially when working in an unfamiliar environment or with unfamiliar people. It is rare that anyone stays on one extreme of the scale,  so I feel it is important to remind ourselves of the pros and cons of each approach so that we can adapt and change when appropriate.

Command and Control leadership

Command and control is derived from a military style of leadership where it has been used extensively for thousands of years. It is an authoritarian regime where one person holds absolute power and responsibility for the project and people. This enables total coordination and accountability for their subordinates.

Do exactly as I say

This style of leadership is appropriate for tasks and projects where there are uncomplicated simple tasks with little room for human error. A good example of this might be a car factory or a food plants where conveyor belts and other machinery are utilised.

Pros

Many theorists have suggested that command and control is now extinct in the developed world, however there are a few notable leaders who have more than a ‘nod’ to the command and control style. Steve Jobs has ultimate control and authority over the products that Apple produce. This has enabled disparate disciplines within the company to produce products of exceptional quality. In other companies (such as Microsoft and Blackberry) design and user experience often takes a back seat and encourage a culture of ‘engineers are king’. Apple decided to actively enforce a customer focused regime using some elements of ‘absolute authority’.

Nick Park of Ardman Animations (Oscar-winning animation studio) has openly suggested that he prefers absolute control over the creative process. This again has enabled a number of quality films each of which feature an unmistakeably ‘Aardman’ style, an effective way of marketing the companies efforts in a crowded industry.

Cons

The downside of this approach is that communications can become a major overhead. If you have a hundred people reporting back to one person requesting a review or instruction you may run the risk of slowing your company down to the rate of your communications rather than the speed it takes to make your widgets.

Another downside is moral and business flexibility. People who work under these regimes are normally nominally paid and they have very little ability to influence the decisions made at the higher levels. This can incur suffering or neglect when a new change is imposed.

Often, only the leader will get rewarded for the results of the project.

Finally, because communication is often in a silo from one leader to many, there can be little room for exploration or serendipity. Finding the win/win solution between speed and quality will be more difficult and can rely wholly on the insight and experience of the leader…and as any leader knows, information and context is the only way to make ‘good’ decisions.

If you hear someone on a project saying something like ‘I am doing X, but I don’t agree with it’, there might be a perceived command and control culture and opportunity to adopt a more autocratic style of leadership.

Autocratic leadership

This is probably the most prevalent leadership style in modern industry. It works on the principle that the folk we employ have professional skills whom we empower to make decisions on our behalf.

Do as you see fit

Generally the tasks of these projects will involve a high level of complexity and numerous stakeholders. The employee will be required to make their own decisions and instigate or influence ongoing communications with other members of the project team.

In an autocratic regime, employees will often display high levels of responsibility for the tasks they conduct and are more likely to establish a win/win consensus when faced with unforeseen complexity.

Pros

The benefits of this regime are that employees can show high levels of confidence and motivation around tasks. Moral is generally higher as the project team have a high level of control and influence over the future direction of the project.

Companies will be more flexible and can change rapidly to meet the demands of the industry.

Employees will be paid highly depending on the supply and demands of their skills.

Projects which empower staff will encourage collaboration between (often) contrasting disciplines. This will often result in more ideas and strategies to respond to the project brief.

Loose or vaguely defined projects are more likely to succeed in an autocratic culture as the professionals you employ will quickly seek to fill in the gaps.

Employees are more likely to get rewarded for their efforts.

Innovation is more likely to occur in these teams, but it will often require an astute executive to recognise the opportunity as the empowerment to make it happen may outside the responsibility of the project team.

Cons

Communication can become excessive and may itself kill a project. Project managers may often assist this process by offering reminder of time and schedule during ongoing project discussions (this is another nod back to the ‘command and control’ style).

Sometimes a consensus may not be possible due to the competing demands of the project team and it may not be clear who can escalate the issue.

Motivation and morale will be important factors in sustaining an autocratic culture and much time and effort must be spent on producing personal development schemes or social events (this enables easier communication/collaboration).

You may unknowingly create superstar ‘employees’. High achievers who could become less likely to collaborate with others and  may reduce the moral of other employees.

Conclusion

There is no right or wrong way to instigate a leadership culture within a company. What matters is that you select or utilise the right methods for the appropriate scenario.

If you have bad results from utilising one approach, why not try another? The results may surprise you.

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Myspace’s UX-Induced Death | UX Magazine

Posted on Sunday, 12 June 2011 by graham

Myspace’s UX-Induced Death | UX Magazine –

Posted in Internet | Tagged , , | Leave a comment