moving ux into a position of corporate influence: whose advice really works?

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Whose Advice Really Works?

Moving User Experience into a Position of Corporate Influence

management track

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“CHI 99 posed the questions: What are the limiting factors to success…? How can we … overcome those limits? What techniques and methodologies do we have for identifying and transcending limitations? And just how far can we push those limits?”

http://sigchi.org/chi99/

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Methodological Limits to HCI

Human Limits to HCI

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Human Limits to HCI

Web and Web Design Limits to HCI

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Organizational Limits to HCI

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“some disciplines that need to be involved in web design are not necessarily prone to collaboration”

“old habits are holding us back”

the roles and responsibilities of designers

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whether the CHI community understands design

Human Limits to HCI

why it is difficult for people to trust the expertise of others

our lack of respect for human capability

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Organizational Limits to HCI

“companies that are proud of their usability labs are companies in trouble”

“we need more people from the CHI community in executive roles”

“you have to learn how to understand what motivates a company and speak that language”

“we should partner with marketing and make up numbers like they do”

“you have to be cocky and arrogant and sure of yourself”

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Moving User Experience into a Position of Corporate Influence


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• documenting and evangelizing user experience work

• ownership of user experience

• organizational positioning

• calculating return on investment

• conducting “ethnographic” research

• all of the above

• a subset of the above

• other things instead or as well

• being cocky, arrogant, and sure of yourself

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Richard Anderson

User Experience Practice, Management,and Organizational Development Consultant

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Jeremy Ashley

Vice President of Applications User Experience, Oracle

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Justin Miller

Senior Director of Product -- Europe, eBay

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Jim Nieters

Senior Manager of User Experience Design, Cisco

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Shauna Sampson Eves

Director of User Experience,Blue Shield of California

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Manfred Tscheligi

representing Tobias Herrmann

Head of Team User Experience,mobilkom austria

Managing Director ofUSECON

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Secil Tabli Watson

Senior Vice President of Internet Channel Strategy, Wells Fargo

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“Teams need to avoid the role of evangelist for user-centered design.”

Bloomer, S. & Wolfe, S., in Building and managing a successful user experience team, July 2006.

“Do NOT evangelize.”Tobias Herrmann & Manfred Tscheligi, MobileHCI’06, September 2006.

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Is documenting and evangelizing user experience work critical to moving user experience into a position of corporate influence?

YES?

AUDIENCE

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Is documenting and evangelizing user experience work critical to moving user experience into a position of corporate influence?

NO?

AUDIENCE

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Has documenting and evangelizing user experience work played a critical role in moving user experience into a position of corporate influence where you work?

YES NO

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“Generic” ROI arguments• 10 – 100x ROI for UCD. "Usability is Good for Business,” by Dr. Susan

Weinschenk et al, 2001. Published on IBM’s and SUN’S ease-of-use sites

• Usability engineering has demonstrated reductions in the product-development cycle by over 33-50% [Bosert 1991]

• “ease of use can … advance a product’s release date. … those who skip ease of use in the design phase can … spend 80% of service costs down the road.” Karat, C. In Cost-justifying Usability Engineering In The Software Life Cycle. (1997)

• More than 30% of software development projects are canceled before completion, primarily because of inadequate user design input. Standish Group, 1995

• “The top two reasons projects fail are a lack of user involvement and a lack of requirements.” Standish Group, 1995

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Documenting and Evangelizing • no full scale evangelizing

– not all steps at once – introducing first successful pilot projects– effect on product quality/ customer satisfaction was shown

• striving to be mandatory– efficient and flexible support– competence centre

• internal pr– communicate existence of support structure

• different parts in the company need different forms of envangelizing– different motivations to take on ux

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"...product management doesn't build or design products: their job is to own product vision and strategy (naturally with the other stakeholders' input). Engineers own code development and code quality, with a wide range of specialties (architecture, code design, QA, and release management, to name a few). Product marketers take clear ownership of marketing communications and product campaigns, keeping the pulse of the marketplace, and trying to detect what it will buy. Therefore, it's only logical that human-computer interaction professionals take ownership of the user experience. We are, after all, user experience experts, despite the fact that we depend on other development participants to meet user and business needs."

editors of interactions, It’s mine…May+June 2005

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"Why should any particular organization own it? The company should own it. ... I think a successful company is one where everybody owns the same mission. Out of necessity, we divide ourselves up into discipline groups. But the goal when you are actually doing the work is to somehow forget what discipline group you are in and come together. So in that sense, nobody should own user experience; everybody should own it."

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“Treat customer experience as a competence, not a function. Delivering great customer experiences isn’t something that a small group of people can do on their own -- everyone in the company needs to be fully engaged in the effort.”

Forrester Research, Experience-Based Differentiation, January 2, 2007.

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"Who owns user experience (UX)? This is the wrong question to ask. We don't believe any single group can own UX. What's the alternative?

In our view, a useful focus is collaboration, not ownership. The best successes come from collaboration. Whatever type of product, service, or document you are creating, whether it's a Web site, an application program, an MP3 player, or a financial form, user experience encompasses so many diverse aspects of your product that 'ownership' just isn't a useful perspective. UX is about providing value to your customer and the business serving that customer. The best user experience is the product of many different disciplines working together.”

UXnet Board of Directors, May+June 2005 special issue of interactions entitled, "Whose profession is it anyway?")

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obstacles to collaboration• ego• not knowing that others are doing the same or related work elsewhere

in the company• different interpretations of the same terms• language & time zone differences• hidden agendas• divergent interests (i.e., little interest in collaborating)• differing priorities• unclear work process• lack of time• "the more people involved, the less efficient..."• tendencies for people to engage in the same discussions over and over• inability to assess level of participants' understanding of UCD• discrimination (of many types)• lack of respect (sometimes justified)• conflicts of interest• territoriality• some feel threatened by UCD• environments in which collaboration is considered to be optional• prior negative experience with UX personnel

from “Managing User Experience Groups” students, 2/15/2006

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obstacles to collaboration - geography; time zones - unfamiliar or misunderstood terminology/vernacular - different world views / domains - different work processes - power relationships - individuals' defensiveness & desire for job security - poorly focused facilitation - excessive workloads - team spirit ups and downs - tyranny of the urgent vs. exploration and reflection - deadlines - unclear decision criteria - hidden agendas / politics - past poor experiences with attempts at collaborating - people not getting along with each other - distrust / disrespect - incentive systems promote individual contributions rather than team contributions - organizational silos - nature of the physical work environment - unclear goals - unclear roles and responsibilities - bad management/leadership - the cost (e.g., in time) of building new relationships is high - difficulties determining who to involve - difficulties converging on a solution when there are lots of ideas - "Microsoft did it that way, so we should as well"

from “Managing User Experience Groups” students, 11/1/2006

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collaboration

White, N. Surfing the second wave of online collaboration, 2006.

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"We want to make customer experience everyone's business by making the process of creating experience intuitive and repeatable.”

Secil Watson, Wells Fargo

“The UCD tools enable designers, researchers, and business people to make meaning together and this meaning is co-constructed such that no one functional area holds all, or even most, of the knowledge on a project. (These) are key factors that continue to push the Wells Fargo culture to become increasingly customer-centric.”

Beers, R. & Whitney, P. From ethnographic insight to user-centered design tools, EPIC 2006.

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Should “user experience personnel” own the user experience?

YES?

AUDIENCE

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NO?

Should “user experience personnel” own the user experience?

AUDIENCE

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Are “user experience personnel” the owners of the user experience where you work?

YES NO

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Phases

Expenses

Resources

Duration

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UX competencies (in addition to UX)

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Customer experience - a discipline of problem solving that is directly related to success

“By some measures, we’re already a great company. How do we become known as great in all measures? It requires a total focus on the customer... It requires extraordinary execution — the key to success.”

Dick Kovacevich

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Customer experience is everyone’s business; a good

execution requires finding optimal solutions based on all

enablers and constraints.

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Ownership of UX• has many facets

– process/process parts– methods/tools – design/innovation– stage-gate monitoring

• own some part of UX– methods and tools to support ux– competence to apply it– synergy of qualitative/quantitative approaches

• design oriented creation happens elsewhere– product lines / external design partners

• product design and innovation owned by product departments– some of ux activity budget also comes from there

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Where should “User Experience” be positioned in the corporate structure?

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Merholz, P. The frozen middle, August 17, 2006.

“The people we worked with were deep within ‘interactive marketing.’ Their lives were the website. They didn’t really know the people who worked on the monthly statements or at the call center. And even if they did,they didn’t have the time to collaborate with them -- they had too much on their plates already. …our contacts understood the need for addressing the customer’s experience across multiple channels and media. But they couldn’t move on it.”

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corporate UX positioning/relationships

Norman, D. Want Human-Centered Development? Reorganize the Company, 1998.

Korman, J. Where Do Product Managers Fit?, 2004.

Berkun, S. How to figure out what to do, 2005.

Merholz, P. The frozen middle, August 17, 2006.

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“… there are two kinds of people in organizations -- there are peers, and there are resources. Resources are like usability consultants -- we go out, and we hire them. We’ll hire a consultant, or we’ll have a little section that does usability and think of it as a service organization. We call upon them when we need them to do their thing, and then we go off and do the important stuff. That’s very different than peers, where a peer is somebody I talk to and discuss my problems with, and who helps to decide upon the course of action. As you get higher and higher in the organization, this becomes more of an issue. The executive staff talks to the executive staff, and they have beneath them all this organization, which are their resources that they deploy. But the big decisions are being made among peers. And it’s really important, to advance in the world, to be thought of as peers.”

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Randy Pausch, CHI 2005 Opening Plenary

“Neither side can be there ‘in service of’ the other”

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"Companies place a high priority on improving customer experience -- and they cite a lack of organizational alignment as their top obstacle to making improvements. But our interviews with experts show that there is no single organizational structure that paves the way for delivering better customer experiences.”

“Cultural factors and internal processes matter far more than organization.”

Forrester Research, Culture and Process Drive Better Customer Experiences, March 31, 2006.

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Is organizational positioning of user experience personnel critical to moving user experience into a position of corporate influence?

YES?

AUDIENCE

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NO?

Is organizational positioning of user experience personnel critical to moving user experience into a position of corporate influence?

AUDIENCE

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Has organizational positioning of user experience personnel been critical to moving user experience into a position of corporate influence where you work?

YES NO

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"a tailored ROI model was the key to success"Tobias Herrmann, Corporate UX -- Bringing value to the mobile industry, July+August 2006.

“The UXD group seeks projects on which they anticipate a minimum revenue increase of $25 million in the first year.”

Jim Nieters et al., The internal consultancy model for strategic UXD relevance, CHI 2007

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“…in my 20 plus years of experience, I have never been asked to produce an ROI analysis. Why has this never been necessary? Have I just been lucky in my choice of employers? Did these companies all have CEOs so enlightened about usability that no such analysis was necessary? I suspect not.”

Rosenberg, D. The myths of usability ROI, interactions, September+October 2004 (& BayCHI October 2003 & CHI 2005 & …)

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"Our field has been overly preoccupied with ROI as the basis for making the business case for user centered design (UCD). However, experience has shown that the most brilliant ROI analysis may often not win the day in the real world of business. Cost justification and ROI is often not persuasive, especially when we are talking to strategic level decision makers. At a certain point in the evolution of UCD, ROI arguments may have helped us gain credibility and get 'a foot in the door.' However, excessive dependence on ROI arguments can have some destructive effects. ... It can work against our field’s efforts to get involved earlier in the product planning process where we can have a more decisive impact and potentially contribute to strategic risk reduction."

Siegel, D. Making the business case for user-centered design strategically, CHIFOO, February 7, 2007

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Is calculating/estimating ROI critical to moving user experience into a position of corporate influence?

YES?

AUDIENCE

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NO?

Is calculating/estimating ROI critical to moving user experience into a position of corporate influence?

AUDIENCE

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Has calculating/estimating ROI been critical to moving user experience into a position of influence where you work?

YES NO

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Prioritization Scorecard

Task model - the backbone on which other strategic views of the customer are layered

Satisfaction and Loyalty Tracking

Customer Segmentation

Channel Preferences

User Centered Design Tools

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Financial Impact Score

Demand Index

Prioritization scorecard – a simple system that takes frequency and importance of customer activities from the

task model and adds to each activity a financial impact score

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The ROI Issue

• showing that UX group is worth the money– ux is not an established part in a company– not a standard function in management text books and

management education

• tailored roi model– internal ux satisfaction / performance measurement– KPIs: UX key performance indicators– best practices– case studies showing revenue effects

• roi model supports common mindset– integration of roi model with corporate balanced scorecard

and bonus system for employees

• strong relation with corporate set up

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About, With & For, 2005

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“When Microsoft hired me eight years ago as the first official anthropologist, they weren’t sure what to do with me, so they had me design my own job. I soon realised that Microsoft had until then the tendency to come up with feature and product designs within the confines of its own walls. … What went on in the minds of Microsoft’s brilliant software engineers and of people outside the walls of Microsoft, was not always very congruent. So I created the Real People Real Data (RPRD) programme...

My work on the RPRD programme was in fact the start of a revolution within Microsoft, and (is helping) the company change from techno-driven to people-driven design.” Experientia interviews Anne Kirah,

October 2006

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"...a transition from a product- to a more customer-centric culture. This shift was becoming crucial as disconnects in customer experience increasingly arose not within the boundaries of the product and service platforms but in the transition and integration points between different areas..."

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“we created an online customer panel including more than 4,000 (non)customers that ‘revolutionized’ our everyday work”

Tobias Herrmann, Corporate UX -- Bringing value to the mobile industry, July+August 2006.

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Is conducting “ethnographic” research critical to moving user experience into a position of corporate influence?

YES?

AUDIENCE

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NO?

Is conducting “ethnographic” research critical to moving user experience into a position of corporate influence?

AUDIENCE

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Has conducting “ethnographic research” been critical to moving user experience into a position of influence where you work?

YES NO

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ImpactOffice of KathyHill (Cisco SVP)

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Ethnography - a great approach for uncovering what people do in their real lives, how they do it, and why they do it that way. It’s one of the primary steps to understanding customers.

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being cocky, arrogant, and sure of yourself


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Panelist Recommendationsfor the Audience

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Jeremy Ashley

Vice President of Applications User Experience, Oracle

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Justin Miller

Senior Director of Product -- Europe, eBay

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Nielsen’s Corporate Usability Maturity Stages

Stage 1 – Hostility towards usability

Stage 2 – Developer centered usability

Stage 3 – Skunkworks usability

Stage 4 – Dedicated usability budget

Stage 5 – Managed usability

Stage 6 – Systematic usability process

Stage 7 – Integrated user-centered design

Stage 8 – User driven corporation

Last sentence: “Once you learn how to tickle the organization sufficiently to make it move, you can start planning for your next upgrade as soon as you enter a new level.“

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Jim Nieters

Senior Manager of User Experience Design, Cisco

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Shauna Sampson Eves

Director of User Experience,Blue Shield of California

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Manfred Tscheligi

representing Tobias Herrmann

Head of Team User Experience,mobilkom austria

Managing Director ofUSECON

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Secil Tabli Watson

Senior Vice President of Internet Channel Strategy, Wells Fargo

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thank you

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end

moving ux into a position of corporate influence: whose advice really works?

Design

iandermoving user experience

iander documenting

doianderorganizational

iandermethodological

hcihuman limits

ofinadequate user design

scale evangelizing

web design