From here to Usability is a presentation by Greg Ralph, Principal, Hiser Group, 19 October 2009 to the Victoria Online Seminar series.

1. From Here to Usability: Victorian Government presentation
From Here to Usability
Greg Ralph
Principal
19 October 2009
Overview
About The Hiser Group
Bad designs
General introduction to “usability”
– What is it?
– Why should you care?
– How do you get it?
Usability strategy
– How much does my project need? 90 mins
– A few words about “institutionalising” usability
(c) The Hiser Group 2009 1

2. From Here to Usability: Victorian Government presentation
Who is The Hiser Group?
Leaders in user-centred
design & education
(since 1991)
• Usability & customer experience
– Over 5,000 sessions for more than 1,800 projects
• Breadth of expertise
– Across technologies
• Websites, intranets, web/desktop applications, kiosks, forms, processes…
– Across industries
• Public, private & NFP sectors
– Around the world
• e.g. United Nations, Singapore Polytechnic
(c) The Hiser Group 2009 2

3. From Here to Usability: Victorian Government presentation
Teaching the industry
For more than 15 years
Information Architecture –
Designing with users
2 days Designing intuitive menus
1 day
Learn to design intuitive interfaces
collaboratively with users to achieve a Effective menu design to enable your
usable system. users to navigate easily and achieve
what they came to do.
Effective layout and design Writing for the web Usability evaluation
1 day 1 day 2 days
Practical techniques to create user-friendly Effectively convey messages Learn quick and inexpensive
page and screen designs. to your users – by writing in a methods to test whether your
style that suits the online site or application meets the
environment. needs of its users.
(c) The Hiser Group 2009 3

4. From Here to Usability: Victorian Government presentation
You’ll know when it’s not usable
World Usability Day (2006)
(c) The Hiser Group 2009 4

5. From Here to Usability: Victorian Government presentation
Hallmarks of poor usability
(not designed for use in the real world)
• Poor task model
– What’s the real workflow?
– Who’s in control of the interaction?
• Clumsy navigation
– Can’t find things
– Poor orientation
• Unclear labels or layout
– Confusing, missing or excessive instructions
– Not my language
• Inconsistent behaviour
• Poor feedback or error handling
Microsoft standard A more idiosyncratic design
warning message (and less predictable to the user)
“Yes” saves the document “Yes” loses the document
(c) The Hiser Group 2009 5

6. From Here to Usability: Victorian Government presentation
“I just wanted to make the text larger
so that the older voters could read it easily”
Wikipedia Commons
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Butterfly_Voters_View.jpg
(c) The Hiser Group 2009 6

7. From Here to Usability: Victorian Government presentation
Atlanta Olympics bomb threat
(July 1996)
• Call made to 911
“There is a bomb in Centennial Park – you have 30 minutes”
• Dispatchers
– Couldn’t dispatch till they had an address
– Were unable to find Centennial Park’s street address
• How many N’s in “Centennial”?
• Do I need to add “Park”?
• Can the phone number give me the address?
• It took 10 minutes to find the address
(by ringing the phone number & asking for the address)
• Bomb went off 22 minutes after call
– 1 killed + dozens injured
www.it.bton.ac.uk/staff/lp22/CP303/case/atlanta.html
Good interfaces are “invisible”
Learnable
“walk up and use”
Efficient to use
“don’t waste my time”
Prevent errors & help you recover
“don’t lead me into dumb mistakes”
User empowerment
“make me smart at my job (without slowing me down)”
User acceptance & confidence
“I’ll be back”
(c) The Hiser Group 2009 7

8. From Here to Usability: Victorian Government presentation
Why does bad design happen?
We will fix it in
the next release...
Theoretical, untested assumptions
Pheasant’s fundamental fallacies (1986)
• An ‘average’ user & task structure
– Failing to support workflow
– Poor allocation of function
– “It works for me”
– “I think they will want…”
• Assumptions of user adaptability
– Memory overload
– Inconsistency of design
Other reasons
• Project pressures
• Unthinking-ness
(c) The Hiser Group 2009 8

9. From Here to Usability: Victorian Government presentation
Why should you care?
IT
value
Predicts
User understanding
& satisfaction
Task quality
Predicts
High ease of use
Improved uptake / sales Improved productivity
Allianz intranet UCD approach typically increases
Over 85% of staff rated it as user productivity by 25%
Very Good or Excellent The Gartner Group (1992)
(up from 10%)
Amex bank authorisation system
Wizard, Westpac & GSR websites Task time fell from 17 to 4 minutes
Online sales doubled
Telstra intranet
Productivity targets in 3 months (not 9)
Less support needed
Melbourne Water approvals
Usability principles typically reduces Task time fell from <30 days to 1 day
training costs by 25%
Landauer (1995)
Redesign of insurance system Improved performance
Help desk calls dropped by 2/3
NY Stock Exchange
Redesign of Macquarie intranet primary trading systems
Error rates fell by a factor of 10
Usage Approval Average clicks (despite doubled workloads)
Very low 3% 12 Staples.com
Very high 96% 3 72% drop in registration drop-outs
(c) The Hiser Group 2009 9

10. From Here to Usability: Victorian Government presentation
Usage has business implications
I haven’t enjoyed trying to find what I wanted to find on
this website. It’s just annoying me.
I’d probably just go to the next site and have a look at
that one – and come back to this one only if I had to.
A customer trying to select health insurance
Sites lose approx.
• 50% potential sales – people can't find what they want
• 40% repeat visits – first one was negative experience
Repeat customers can spend almost twice as much
as new users of an e-commerce site
2006 study confirmed that consumers stop dealings
when they have a negative service experience
• 80% US
• 65% UK
Usage has business implications
In 2003, an Internet booking cost an airline 50 cents
(but $6 through a travel agent or phone operator)
Gartner Group estimate:
Average call cost is >20 times more expensive
than a web self-service enquiry
The Net’s supposed to be quick, accessible and very
simple – that wasn’t and I was getting grumpy with it.
Sooner or later, I would actually stop all this,
close it down and ring them up.
If customers make one call, they are 90% more likely
to make repeat calls
This often becomes part of the corporate cost structure
(eating away at profit)
Over the long term, this is a no-win strategy
Mauro (2001)
(c) The Hiser Group 2009 10

11. From Here to Usability: Victorian Government presentation
More credible websites
It’s usable when
it’s “fit for purpose”
Donald Norman
“The Design of Everyday Things”
(c) The Hiser Group 2009 11

12. From Here to Usability: Victorian Government presentation
usable
useful
engaging
effective
efficient
Users achieve their goals
without the tools getting in the way
Businesses achieve their desired outcomes
Broadening our focus
User Experience Honeycomb
These approaches are
being applied to other things
– New technologies
– Customer experience
– Service design
– Process design
Peter Morville
www.semanticstudios.com/publications/semantics/000029.php
(c) The Hiser Group 2009 12

13. From Here to Usability: Victorian Government presentation
Some aspects are easier to design
• Terminology
– “Use my language”
• Predictability
– Consistent appearance & behaviour
– Feedback
• Orientation
– “Where am I?”
– “What can I do here?”
• Readable & clear layout
Some aspects are harder
• Obvious, efficient structure and navigation
– Match workflow
• Support different user types/needs
– Match expectations
– Understand their motivation
• User control
• Subjective user satisfaction
– “The user experience”
(c) The Hiser Group 2009 13

14. From Here to Usability: Victorian Government presentation
How do you “do” Usability?
You are not your user
Don’t assume people:
• Work like you work
• Think like you think
• Talk like you talk
• Like what you like
• Understand the technology
• Understand your organisation
(c) The Hiser Group 2009 14

15. From Here to Usability: Victorian Government presentation
Usability through user-centred design (UCD)
• Users’ needs predominantly drive the design
– Creates better products
– Focus on usage & context
– Developers & designers are not suitable user representatives
• Empirical and cyclic (iterative)
Collaboration
&
Context
Involve Usability as early as possible
80% of software costs occur
No
. after release (maintenance)
es
Po
ng
Al ssi • 80% of that work is due to
ha
te bl
rn e
fC
unmet / unforeseen
at De
to
ive s user requirements
s ig
s
Co
n
Requirements Development Deployment
Phase Phase Phase
$1 $6 – $10 $80 – $100
(c) The Hiser Group 2009 15

16. From Here to Usability: Victorian Government presentation
Potential
activities
Stakeholder workshops Field studies
Focus groups Card sorting Scenarios
Mock-ups Collaborative design Usability testing
Usability goals
Set the focus
(c) The Hiser Group 2009 16

17. From Here to Usability: Victorian Government presentation
Visual design
Buttons ‘look like’ buttons
Effective & clean layout
Users
Visual appeal & Branding
(fonts, colours, icons, etc.)
Business
Information design Interaction design
Structure of information Navigation & Flow
& controls
(“information architecture”) Style of ‘conversation’
(“the experience”)
Orientation & Feedback
Language & Style
(labelling; online reading)
Creative Commons
Mitchell Library, State Library of New South Wales
Call centre system design
Not just about the agent
Customer Business
Agent
(c) The Hiser Group 2009 17

18. From Here to Usability: Victorian Government presentation
Agent
Goals Issues
Provide good customer service Cognitive load in high-pressure
environment
Meet targets for performance
Unclear or rigid workflows
Design strategies
Build workflow into design (support)
Provide workflow flexibility
Use consistent language
In-built coaching
Business
Goals Issues
Reduce cost by 30% Calls take too long to complete
Reduce training: 3 weeks to 2 days Agents need significant systems training
Capture customer intelligence System doesn’t encourage data capture
Design strategies
Reduce task time
(support workflow & reduce errors)
More intuitive screens
with in-built coaching
Support easy information capture
(c) The Hiser Group 2009 18

19. From Here to Usability: Victorian Government presentation
Customer
Goals Issues
Personalised experience “I’ve already explained this!”
(remember me) “I’m not being treated like
Have confidence in organisation a valued customer”
(you know what you’re doing) Call does not flow naturally
Design strategies
Customer snapshot
Flexible workflows
Customer-centric view of the world
(e.g. time & location)
Interaction design to support flow
(e-commerce website)
(c) The Hiser Group 2009 19

20. From Here to Usability: Victorian Government presentation
Activity scenarios
Provide the vision for the user experience (and why it’s like that)
Card sorting
Helps to identify a user-centred information structure
(c) The Hiser Group 2009 20

21. From Here to Usability: Victorian Government presentation
Information architecture Lateral relationships
(structure) (between topics)
Commentary & rationale
(e.g. changed labels, new content identified by users)
© The Hiser Group 2009
Mock-ups
(a.k.a. “wireframes”)
Make the design “real”
(early & cheaply)
(c) The Hiser Group 2009 21

22. From Here to Usability: Victorian Government presentation
Make sure it works for its intended audience
Collaborative design
Usability testing
Example Hiser
style guide
© The Hiser Group 2009
(c) The Hiser Group 2009 22

23. From Here to Usability: Victorian Government presentation
Example Hiser style guide
Select screen controls based on the user’s task
© The Hiser Group 2009
Visual design
Lead the user through each window or page
• Reading & chunking
– Group boxes & separators
• Placement & spacing
– Alignment & designing
with grids
– Assists with layout
– Aids readability
• Visual weight
(c) The Hiser Group 2009 23

24. From Here to Usability: Victorian Government presentation
How much usability do I need?
Do you need lots & lots?
(c) The Hiser Group 2009 24

25. From Here to Usability: Victorian Government presentation
Not necessarily…
Usability will need more attention,
the more that…
• The system matters to your business
• Interactions are complex or new
• The user audience is large and/or diverse
• Users are outside your organisation
Should it be the same for all projects?
(c) The Hiser Group 2009 25

26. From Here to Usability: Victorian Government presentation
Prioritise projects for Usability input
• Apply your resources where you have the greatest need
• Integrated & planned for
– As early as possible
– At key points (based on project need)
– Budget set aside
• Everyone does at least something
– “Some Usability is better than no Usability”
– If you can do more, even better!
Low-effort usability Medium-effort usability High-effort usability
Somewhat important Quite important
Mission-critical
to the organisation to the organisation
Fewer users Lots of users
OR Used relatively often OR
Less frequently used Very frequently used
Some (indirect?) use by
Only used by staff Targeted at external users
people external to the
(who’ll receive training & support) (affects the credibility)
organisation
(c) The Hiser Group 2009 26

27. From Here to Usability: Victorian Government presentation
Low Medium High
Planning
Analyst Analyst Analyst
Analysis
Analyst Usability Analyst Usability Analyst
Design
Developer Usability Usability
Construction
Testing
Developer Usability Usability
Deployment
Analyst Usability
Integration
(c) The Hiser Group 2009 27

28. From Here to Usability: Victorian Government presentation
Usability should be strategic
(not happenstance)
Beware the “Usability police” syndrome!
• Usability needs to be seen as helping
– Create successful systems
– A focus on adoption & outcomes
• Facilitators & supporters
(with a mandate)
– Not the “cop with a truncheon”
who beats you up at the gates…
(c) The Hiser Group 2009 28

29. From Here to Usability: Victorian Government presentation
The Hiser Group
18 / 535 Bourke Street
Melbourne Vic 3000
www.hiser.com.au
Greg Ralph Jeremy Lewison
Principal Consulting Manager
(03) 9648 4335 (03) 9648 4323
gregr@hiser.com.au jeremyl@hiser.com.au
(c) The Hiser Group 2009 29