Usability Success Stories: How Organizations Improve By Making Easier-To-Use Software and Web Sites by

Language: eng
Format: azw3
Publisher: Taylor and Francis
Published: 2016-02-10T16:00:00+00:00

ANOTHER IMPASSE: PRELUDE TO UNDERSTANDING THE UNDERLYING ISSUES

Chris opened the meeting by asking Anita to present her design, asking others to hold back comments until she was finished, after which there would be time for feedback. Anita was pleased that Chris had taken a stronger role as leader. She presented her design without interruptions. Anita was glad she had asked Chris to help the group stay focused. Everything seemed to be progressing according to her plan.

However, after she finished, Chris shared his reactions to the design. Chris did not like the new design. He believed that the current design was simple and worked well. He did not believe that the change was significant; moreover, he thought it was too risky to make a dramatic change from the current design.

What Chris did not say was that he wanted to create a high-quality product but was impatient. Chris also did not say that he had limited experience with, and did not understand the value of, usability research. Even more significantly, Chris did not speak explicitly about his personal situation: Chris had recently received a negative performance appraisal. He had been specifically criticised for bad judgement in some of his decisions. He knew the company was considering lay-offs, and he did not want to lose his job. He was reluctant to make a radical change: if it was not successful, it would provide further evidence of his bad judegment.

Ellen expressed concern about the schedule. As the developer, she had to do the programming to make it all work. She already felt overloaded and unable to meet her timeline. She did not want to add more work to her already heavy load. Ellen’s concerns were not hidden: she had been clear and open expressing her needs.

Debbie attacked the design, focusing her comments on the first screen. She discussed, in great detail, every mistake and flaw in the design. What she did not say is that she continued to feel the same concern that she had previously raised. She did not see a need for the recommendation engine. She believed that it would undermine sales by guiding consumers away from the higher-priced product and saw no reason to spend money to reduce income. However, since she had previously raised this issue, she was reluctant to do so again.

Anita was surprised and frustrated at the negative reactions to her design. She did not understand why no one had responded to her when she had sent the design to everyone for review. She began to defend herself, reviewing her research findings, explaining why the design was correct.

Chris stopped her. He needed to end the meeting on time. He tried to address some of the issues by defining some action items to be completed prior to the next meeting in two days. He asked Anita and Ellen to meet and discuss the impact of adding the design to the current development schedule. He also asked Brian and Debbie to meet with him to discuss the issue of the recommendation engine and the impact upon sales.

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