A friend of mine recently opted to buy the Samsung Galaxy instead of the Apple iPhone - for various reasons.
Samsung Galaxy is not the same as the Apple iPhone, however, it is really quite good by itself. It runs on the Google Android platform. Samsung among many others is part of the Open Handset Alliance.
The alliance has mobile operators; handset manufacturers; software companies; semiconductor companies...
It made me wonder that over the years, the consumer space has become to open and collaborative; companies are partnering with each other in ways that make sense to come up with meaningful products and services to consumers in a very desirable manner.
In my eyes such alliances reflect the realization that one company cannot do everything on it's own.
On the other hand, in the enterprise world, I still see companies trying to build a lot of things internally - not opening up to team up with expert players and collaboratively working on shipping meaningful products and services to customers in a desirable way.
There is so much innovation happening in the consumer space, so fast, the enterprise world is merely catching up. I feel, the least we can do is partner with some of the players in the consumer space. I have heard the usual arguments of security, complexity bla bla often as reasons why the enterprise world does not work on this model. I am sure these are aspects that are very important in any kind of application.
I don't believe the enterprise is unique.
Just because a user is using an enterprise software, does he/she have to endure bad design?
Thursday, August 26, 2010
Tuesday, July 27, 2010
What's "mine" ? and how much?
Recently, I was asked to showcase my portfolio of work to someone.
As long as I was full-time 'graphic designer', this was an easy task to do.
It was doable once I became a 'web designer' too - my work was still largely related to visual design.
As an interaction designer, I could still do this. Fortunately most of my early interaction design projects were with real products and I had a 'before and after' that I could showcase. Also, I was solely responsible for all the interaction design aspects of these products.
The last 5 years of my career has been rather different. I am a designer - part of a very large globally distributed user experience team. While I am officially designated as a designer, my tasks are not restricted to this. I've accomplished many things, however, I face a challenge to create a 'physical portfolio' that showcases these things.
In all my projects, I have strived to and have driven the attempt to get a 'holistic' understanding of the topic on hand. To do so, I have often engaged with with a huge number to stakeholders - developers; solution managers; field services; marketing and sales consultants; other designers to finally arrive at a democratic decision on things. Sometimes, we are lucky if this decision and its execution reaches the 'end-users' as intended.
However, often, the decisions get re-visited due to limitations that get discovered later on during execution. The final solution that reaches the hands of the end-users often only faintly resembles what we had all agreed on.
So, is my 'contribution' still valid?
(I believe, only that which an end user can touch and feel and use matters. The design of the solution will be judged by it's users on what they can see, touch and feel. They are not aware of all the wonderful designs I have in my drawer. Unfortunately, what they judge may have nothing to do with what I had designed.)
It is not at all gratifying to put some such work in my portfolio, when my work actually never reached the hands of an end user.
Besides, given this mode of working - what is it that I can call "mine?" (MY contribution)? Ideas came from every contributor and it was a joint /team effort. So how do I filter out 'my' contribution out of it?
A lot of sub-conscious things happen while we are working on such projects:
Aren't tasks and words like 'breaking organizational silos;' 'holistic approach' self-explanatory enough of their inherent challenges and the resulting accomplishments?
How does one 'showcase' such things in a portfolio (other than 'words') when I rarely restrict my work to sketching a piece of UI?
As long as I was full-time 'graphic designer', this was an easy task to do.
It was doable once I became a 'web designer' too - my work was still largely related to visual design.
As an interaction designer, I could still do this. Fortunately most of my early interaction design projects were with real products and I had a 'before and after' that I could showcase. Also, I was solely responsible for all the interaction design aspects of these products.
The last 5 years of my career has been rather different. I am a designer - part of a very large globally distributed user experience team. While I am officially designated as a designer, my tasks are not restricted to this. I've accomplished many things, however, I face a challenge to create a 'physical portfolio' that showcases these things.
In all my projects, I have strived to and have driven the attempt to get a 'holistic' understanding of the topic on hand. To do so, I have often engaged with with a huge number to stakeholders - developers; solution managers; field services; marketing and sales consultants; other designers to finally arrive at a democratic decision on things. Sometimes, we are lucky if this decision and its execution reaches the 'end-users' as intended.
However, often, the decisions get re-visited due to limitations that get discovered later on during execution. The final solution that reaches the hands of the end-users often only faintly resembles what we had all agreed on.
So, is my 'contribution' still valid?
(I believe, only that which an end user can touch and feel and use matters. The design of the solution will be judged by it's users on what they can see, touch and feel. They are not aware of all the wonderful designs I have in my drawer. Unfortunately, what they judge may have nothing to do with what I had designed.)
It is not at all gratifying to put some such work in my portfolio, when my work actually never reached the hands of an end user.
Besides, given this mode of working - what is it that I can call "mine?" (MY contribution)? Ideas came from every contributor and it was a joint /team effort. So how do I filter out 'my' contribution out of it?
A lot of sub-conscious things happen while we are working on such projects:
- key personal relationships are built (to be tapped on later)
- learn about competencies of one another (to be leveraged appropriately later)
- mindsets have been changed
- newer communication channels have been established
- market/ customer insights have been gained
- new geographic locations visited/ worked with colleagues from a different culture
- impressions made about individuals
Aren't tasks and words like 'breaking organizational silos;' 'holistic approach' self-explanatory enough of their inherent challenges and the resulting accomplishments?
How does one 'showcase' such things in a portfolio (other than 'words') when I rarely restrict my work to sketching a piece of UI?
Forward thinking
A larger part of the world is just not 'forward thinking.' (strong statement - i know)
Most of us are more comfortable being 'reactive' than 'pro-active.'
All this 'green' and 'sustainability' initiatives around me are targetted at 'large companiesto 'correct' their ways and become more sustainable. Fair enough.
But, on the other hand, a new product, targetted at small and medium enterprise is not on the radar for such 'sustainable' initiatives. Why not? "well, cos this space has many more, higher priority issues to deal with."
Looks like, it is an acceptable path to first do all the "important" things...spend money on making money...later...spend money to correct the means...and become more sustainable
The entire process is so very sustainable!!!! (wink! wink!)
For an idealist like me, this market space would be best to tap into and get aggressive on sustainable practices as it would be so much easier - given their size and scale of operations when they are in this segment than when they grow larger / get taken over by some giant.
Now comes my 'why not...' stream of questions.
Most of us are more comfortable being 'reactive' than 'pro-active.'
All this 'green' and 'sustainability' initiatives around me are targetted at 'large companiesto 'correct' their ways and become more sustainable. Fair enough.
But, on the other hand, a new product, targetted at small and medium enterprise is not on the radar for such 'sustainable' initiatives. Why not? "well, cos this space has many more, higher priority issues to deal with."
Looks like, it is an acceptable path to first do all the "important" things...spend money on making money...later...spend money to correct the means...and become more sustainable
The entire process is so very sustainable!!!! (wink! wink!)
For an idealist like me, this market space would be best to tap into and get aggressive on sustainable practices as it would be so much easier - given their size and scale of operations when they are in this segment than when they grow larger / get taken over by some giant.
Now comes my 'why not...' stream of questions.
- Why not encourage smaller/medium enterprises to work on 'sustainable' practices early on?
- Why not engage in inculcating the culture of thinking upstream in 'younger' corporates?
- Why not engage in governmental agencies to set in some relevant regulations before granting permissions and licenses for companies?
Thursday, July 8, 2010
‘Dogmatism’ and User Centered Design
The ‘intention’ of every ‘process/methodology’ is to ‘enable’ something/some people to ‘achieve’ a bigger/higher goal.
However, becoming ‘dogmatic’ about any ‘process/methodology’ has the reverse effect.
Having listened to; engaged in intense discussions with practitioners of ‘User Centered Design’ particularly in ‘software’ industry, I get the feeling that the User Experience community has become too dogmatic about its processes and methodologies.
At first we in this community were struggling to make our presence felt, and now that there is a general recognition of this field, we are going overboard and preaching that User Centered Design is the ONLY way forward – to innovation; to increase customer satisfaction…answer to all our problems. Other professionals within the ‘eco-system’ of a typical software company perceive this message as telling them, “the way you do things is wrong, we will teach you how to do things right.”
With such a ‘message,’ one cannot expect the desired ‘co-operation’ and ‘collaboration’ that we seek.
Secondly, we have failed to adapt and/or evolve to changes around us. Business goals are becoming more aggressive – ‘more for less,’ but we stick to our methods and practices. “Sure, we can get end user feedback; however, it takes 4 weeks.”
As things become more and more ‘agile’ – this is simply not acceptable. We have to reflect on our methods and practices and be innovative to meet new demands.
We must remember, in most software companies, ‘UX’ has only been ‘recognized’ as a competency to have. We have not yet reached the stage where we can dictate terms (hope we don’t) and be dogmatic about our methods. It will only turn people off and reassure them that this aspect of product development is not feasible. We have to step down from our ivory towers and engage with the entire community in order to ‘change mindsets’ in an ‘organic’ and ‘sustainable’ manner.
(I have firsthand experience and reason enough to believe this slow but organic approach works)
Thirdly, we have to understand the fact that a product has various dimensions to it. These keep growing – sustainability being the latest one. Perspectives from the ‘end users’ are just ONE such dimension and is by no means the MOST IMPORTANT one. Being philanthropic about ‘end user’ needs alone will not find a place in the world of ‘business.’
Just as we in the community become activists to demand ‘respect’ for our competencies from others, we need to walk the talk too. We need to respect the perspectives and priorities from others too.
They are all equally important. We need to respect the fact that other competencies have equally valuable inputs to provide to the cycle of product development.
Collaboration, synthesis and shared understanding of the goal among multi-disciplinary team members are the KEY to successful product definition.
Fourthly, I have often heard the debate about ‘need to improve designer: developer ratio’ in order to improve the ‘user experience’ of products effectively. Sadly, ‘more people’ does not necessarily result in ‘better.’ The population within UX communities are growing progressively, however, in the field of software, there are not too many game changing products out there from a user experience perspective. One might say, “Oh because we are so few people, we have not had the chance to do so.”
In my opinion, we just have not pushed the boundaries enough.
We have not bothered to learn from our peers – product designers/ fashion designers / game designers /automobile designers … are we too egoistic to do so?
In most of the above mentioned areas of design, the ‘designer: engineer’ ration is much more imbalanced than the utopia we are striving for in software companies.
The key is, in these other areas of design, the ‘designer’ is one AMONG other disciplines and people talk to each other a lot more than we do.
We need to ‘earn’ a seat by the table and not ‘demand’ it.
It’s time we evolved.
However, becoming ‘dogmatic’ about any ‘process/methodology’ has the reverse effect.
Having listened to; engaged in intense discussions with practitioners of ‘User Centered Design’ particularly in ‘software’ industry, I get the feeling that the User Experience community has become too dogmatic about its processes and methodologies.
At first we in this community were struggling to make our presence felt, and now that there is a general recognition of this field, we are going overboard and preaching that User Centered Design is the ONLY way forward – to innovation; to increase customer satisfaction…answer to all our problems. Other professionals within the ‘eco-system’ of a typical software company perceive this message as telling them, “the way you do things is wrong, we will teach you how to do things right.”
With such a ‘message,’ one cannot expect the desired ‘co-operation’ and ‘collaboration’ that we seek.
Secondly, we have failed to adapt and/or evolve to changes around us. Business goals are becoming more aggressive – ‘more for less,’ but we stick to our methods and practices. “Sure, we can get end user feedback; however, it takes 4 weeks.”
As things become more and more ‘agile’ – this is simply not acceptable. We have to reflect on our methods and practices and be innovative to meet new demands.
We must remember, in most software companies, ‘UX’ has only been ‘recognized’ as a competency to have. We have not yet reached the stage where we can dictate terms (hope we don’t) and be dogmatic about our methods. It will only turn people off and reassure them that this aspect of product development is not feasible. We have to step down from our ivory towers and engage with the entire community in order to ‘change mindsets’ in an ‘organic’ and ‘sustainable’ manner.
(I have firsthand experience and reason enough to believe this slow but organic approach works)
Thirdly, we have to understand the fact that a product has various dimensions to it. These keep growing – sustainability being the latest one. Perspectives from the ‘end users’ are just ONE such dimension and is by no means the MOST IMPORTANT one. Being philanthropic about ‘end user’ needs alone will not find a place in the world of ‘business.’
Just as we in the community become activists to demand ‘respect’ for our competencies from others, we need to walk the talk too. We need to respect the perspectives and priorities from others too.
They are all equally important. We need to respect the fact that other competencies have equally valuable inputs to provide to the cycle of product development.
Collaboration, synthesis and shared understanding of the goal among multi-disciplinary team members are the KEY to successful product definition.
Fourthly, I have often heard the debate about ‘need to improve designer: developer ratio’ in order to improve the ‘user experience’ of products effectively. Sadly, ‘more people’ does not necessarily result in ‘better.’ The population within UX communities are growing progressively, however, in the field of software, there are not too many game changing products out there from a user experience perspective. One might say, “Oh because we are so few people, we have not had the chance to do so.”
In my opinion, we just have not pushed the boundaries enough.
We have not bothered to learn from our peers – product designers/ fashion designers / game designers /automobile designers … are we too egoistic to do so?
In most of the above mentioned areas of design, the ‘designer: engineer’ ration is much more imbalanced than the utopia we are striving for in software companies.
The key is, in these other areas of design, the ‘designer’ is one AMONG other disciplines and people talk to each other a lot more than we do.
We need to ‘earn’ a seat by the table and not ‘demand’ it.
It’s time we evolved.
Wednesday, May 26, 2010
My list of most misued/misunderstood words in Biz
'Wow' factor
'Beautiful'
'Design'
'Innovation'
'Collaboration'
'Next Generation'
'Agile/Lean'
'Web 2.0'
'Usability'
'Vision'
'Mission'
'Strategy'
'Goals'
'Beautiful'
'Design'
'Innovation'
'Collaboration'
'Next Generation'
'Agile/Lean'
'Web 2.0'
'Usability'
'Vision'
'Mission'
'Strategy'
'Goals'
Tuesday, May 4, 2010
Food for thought: From CHI 2010
Among other things Genevieve spoke about in her opening plenary session, one thing playing in my mind was the comment, "while many companies tend to focus their attention on creating technology for today’s youth, it’s the older generations who comprise the majority of the world’s population, and so technology should be more geared toward that demographic."
This brought tons of questions/thoughts to my mind:
Are these then the 'idealized images' as shown by Genevieve in her presentation? Notice, the visuals always show 'young' people. ;-)
I as a relatively 'younger' citizen of this planet, can IMAGINE some of these 'futuristic predictions,' the 'older generation' cannot fathom these concepts. While some make an attempt to challenge themselves and feel proud of being able to embrace technology, others get more and more turned off by them.
In the midst of all this, some communities are forever discussing the big debate of 'bridging the digital divide.'
I ask myself:
This brought tons of questions/thoughts to my mind:
- A lot is discussed about 'cultural' differences while doing 'international user research,' but not much emphasis laid on the 'age' factor and all resulting aspects
- While recruiting participants for Usability Tests, the focus is primarily on the 'fitment to the role' and the 'tasks' done by the user. Age is incidental/an after thought.
- Rarely do 'analyze' our findings based on 'age'.
- Wonder: Is this the reason 'touch' has become to successful compared to interacting with other input devices?
- Most self services in the 'western world are offered as 'touch' interfaces. Usage of these systems are quite widespread. ATM machines; ticketing machines...
- While Apple gets the flack from its 'younger' user base for not having 'multi-tasking' capabilities in their iPad, perhaps this is good news for the majority of the population. Keeps things focussed and simpler.
- Does this explain why despite technological advancements, we have not achieved the dream of a 'paper less' world.
- Applications like 'Facebook' and 'Twitter' is getting adopted by older generations - perhaps driven by the need of distributed family members and friends. However, such applications are rather easy to sign up and start using.
- The age old debate of 'novice user versus expert user' now turn into the 'elder user versus younger user?'
Are these then the 'idealized images' as shown by Genevieve in her presentation? Notice, the visuals always show 'young' people. ;-)
I as a relatively 'younger' citizen of this planet, can IMAGINE some of these 'futuristic predictions,' the 'older generation' cannot fathom these concepts. While some make an attempt to challenge themselves and feel proud of being able to embrace technology, others get more and more turned off by them.
In the midst of all this, some communities are forever discussing the big debate of 'bridging the digital divide.'
I ask myself:
- Do I know the average age of the users currently using the product I am involved with?
- How long are these users likely to remain users of this product? (owing to retirement etc)
- Thereby, what is the likely average age of the so called 'next generation' users of this product?
Friday, April 23, 2010
Abnormal situations and Design
I got to experience such a situation first hand when Eyjafjallajoekull started to erupt.
On Saturday I learnt that my Sunday evening flight to return to Frankfurt is cancelled.
Now starts the process of finding alternatives ways to get home.
A huge line waits in front of the Delta international counters. A Delta staff gives us a 'Service Advisory' post card with a number to call and tells us, either you wait in the line here or you call them and be prepared to be put on hold for a long time.
I got a new reservation for the following Sunday, 25th April.
Meanwhile, my office travel team helps me get on a flight to Rome on Tue evening instead of waiting untill Sunday.
Once in Rome, I figured there are no flights to Southern Germany available. So train was an option.
In the Rome train station ticket counter I am welcomed by posters stating, 'all trains to Northern Europe are booked untill 23rd April 2010.'
Service Design
I noticed, there seems to be some attempt to 'filter' the desperate versus the not so desperate passengers. I can understand the need to 'filter' to be able to manage the volume of impacted people, but I wonder if this is the best way to do so:
Moreso, in abnormal situations, the design of such services need to be more 'comforting' to its consumers. But more often than not, systems fail to function efficiently, when they are needed the most.
Compared to a lot of other impacted people, I was fortunate enough to be relatively more comfortable. It however made me think, of ways such situations can be handled better. How can these services be handled better?
Posters stating, 'all trains booked...' at the entrance of ticket counters; getting a special phone number to call only at the airport somehow makes me distrust such services.
Europe, like India has an extensive rail network. Thousands of people travel by train on a daily basis. Typically people tend to have more luggage while travelling by train (compared to travelling by air). Yet, so often, train stations do not offer simple facilities like, luggage trolleys; escalators/ elevators to move between levels;enough seating space; places to store luggage saftely for a few hours; an in-transit hotel to be able to sleep in...
Perhaps it is too much to expect such facilities in every train station in a country. However, I think it is important that the MAIN train station of BIG CITIES to have them.
While I have more questions than answers right now, I see a world of opportunity out there to better design services, spaces to handle abnormal situations better. Would love to hear and discuss ideas from you all too...
On Saturday I learnt that my Sunday evening flight to return to Frankfurt is cancelled.
Now starts the process of finding alternatives ways to get home.
- Step 1: Being a weekend, the office travel help line is not responding to calls.
- Step 2: Delta numbers stated on their websites have a minimum waiting time of 45 mintues
- Step 3: Delta website offers no UPFRONT information on the home page of volcano related updates. Click on 'Flight Information' > Itineraries > (Here there is a small one liners about flight schedule impact) > Enter confirmation number > Click on Find Alternatives > The date drop down only allows you to find an alternative for the 'next day' (tomorrow). Wow! Given the situation, isn't it obvious that the next day will not be available? What if I was willing to wait for 2 weeks and wanted an alternate flight?
- Step 4: Check general flight availability to somewhere in Europe via Delta's regular flight booking feature. ERROR! This facility is not available currently
A huge line waits in front of the Delta international counters. A Delta staff gives us a 'Service Advisory' post card with a number to call and tells us, either you wait in the line here or you call them and be prepared to be put on hold for a long time.
I got a new reservation for the following Sunday, 25th April.
Meanwhile, my office travel team helps me get on a flight to Rome on Tue evening instead of waiting untill Sunday.
Once in Rome, I figured there are no flights to Southern Germany available. So train was an option.
In the Rome train station ticket counter I am welcomed by posters stating, 'all trains to Northern Europe are booked untill 23rd April 2010.'
Service Design
I noticed, there seems to be some attempt to 'filter' the desperate versus the not so desperate passengers. I can understand the need to 'filter' to be able to manage the volume of impacted people, but I wonder if this is the best way to do so:
- Delta provided the 'Service Advisory' number on postcards handed out only at the airport. (A different number from those mentioned on their website). So did they assume, that the really desperate passengers will come to the airport? So they will hand this number to just them?
- In the Rome train station, these posters of trains booked untill 23rd April might have made many passengers go away without waiting in line. To me, the definition of Northern Europe was not clear. Was it UK/Scandinavia/northern France/northern Germany or did Frankfurt/Stuttgart/ etc also fall under this because they were towards the north from Rome. So I decided to check anyway. I was desperate indeed.
- I did manage to get a train ticket to Stuttgart, leaving the same evening.
Moreso, in abnormal situations, the design of such services need to be more 'comforting' to its consumers. But more often than not, systems fail to function efficiently, when they are needed the most.
Compared to a lot of other impacted people, I was fortunate enough to be relatively more comfortable. It however made me think, of ways such situations can be handled better. How can these services be handled better?
Posters stating, 'all trains booked...' at the entrance of ticket counters; getting a special phone number to call only at the airport somehow makes me distrust such services.
- Perhaps in such situations, some people are more comfortable talking to another 'human being' than interacting with some machines?
- Alternatively, can there be some 'self service' machines installed in airports/ train stations that lets you analyze your options - if you are willing to wait, what are your options...if you are desperate, what are your options...
- For those who can wait, perhaps there are some package deals of accomodation, pick up and drop to/from the airport/train station; combine this with a flight/train/bus tickets; local SIM card/ internet facility etc.
- For those who cannot wait, suggest alternate routes, pricing information etc.
- Essentially: some 'decision support' possibilities
- Many people were running out of money - can there be some ways to help them get some money on loan untill they get to their destinations? - in the days of huge bail outs, clearly, there can be some way to help people out
- Many international airports do not have a basic 'sleeping in' facilities - with stringent immigration regulations; visa time running out, cant there be a way to offer passengers a way to sleep in the airport in a more comfortable way? I know some airports - e.g. Schiphol made a lot of attempt towards such things. Even were flexible with their visa norms. However, not every airport and country did as much.
Europe, like India has an extensive rail network. Thousands of people travel by train on a daily basis. Typically people tend to have more luggage while travelling by train (compared to travelling by air). Yet, so often, train stations do not offer simple facilities like, luggage trolleys; escalators/ elevators to move between levels;enough seating space; places to store luggage saftely for a few hours; an in-transit hotel to be able to sleep in...
Perhaps it is too much to expect such facilities in every train station in a country. However, I think it is important that the MAIN train station of BIG CITIES to have them.
While I have more questions than answers right now, I see a world of opportunity out there to better design services, spaces to handle abnormal situations better. Would love to hear and discuss ideas from you all too...
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