TOWARDS CORPORATE UX

MATURITY24/02/2011

CHRISTOPHER KHALIL,

DIRECTOR OF USER EXPERIENCE

NEWS DIGITAL MEDIA

MATURITY

� A framework for determining your organisational maturity

Neilsen 2006

http://www.useit.com/alertbox/maturity.html

� Goal is to become a User Driven Organisation

– User data helps determines projects that are funded

INTRO…

– User research helps determines company direction

– Experience design extended beyond IxD into Customer

Experience

� Stage 1: Hostility toward UX. This stage can last decades.

� Stage 2: Developer-centred UX. Two to three years.

� Stage 3: Skunkworks UX. Two to three years.

� Stage 4: Dedicated UX budget. Two to three years.

� Stage 5: Managed UX. Six to seven years.

STAGES OF MATURITY

� Stage 5: Managed UX. Six to seven years.

� Stage 6: A Systematic UX process. Six to seven years.

� Stage 7: Integrated user-centred design. Insufficient data.

� Stage 8: User-driven corporation.

� In this mindset, humans are irrelevant—they're told to

use the system, regardless of whether doing so is easy or

pleasant.

� Throwback to early days of computing where hardware

costs etc meant it made sense to subjugate people to

computers needs.

STAGE 1: HOSTILITY TOWARD UX

computers needs.

� Hard to change behaviour.

� Timescale: This stage can last decades.

� Team relies on its own intuition about what constitutes

good UX

� Works ok if mental model matches audience – i.e.

developing tools such as IDE’s etc

� For every other case this is a bad idea

STAGE 2: DEVELOPER-CENTRED UX

� We know too much about the problem space

� BUT executives generally responsive to the idea of UX

� Logic, flattery, persuasion, analytics

� Timescale: Two to three years.

� No official recognition of UX, nor is there an approved

budget

� Organization realises need to be customer focused

� Guerrilla testing prevalent

� Activities are ad hoc and driven by UX advocates

STAGE 3: SKUNKWORKS UX.

� Activities are ad hoc and driven by UX advocates

� Primitive but effective skunkwork techniques employed

� Rely on results to progress: analytics, AB test, survey

� To prevent being overlooked, save the initial design ideas,

clumsy as they may seem, and show before/after

comparisons to document the UX advances.

� Timescale: Two to three years.

� Someone higher up makes the UX aspects of product quality a

higher priority.

� A dedicated budget for UX allows UX activities to be planned

� There are dedicated UX staff

� Main UX method is User Testing (but usually happens late in

process)

STAGE 4: DEDICATED UX BUDGET

process)

� A budget to recruit participants

� The team spends most of its time fixing individual design mistakes,

and no time at increasing organisational maturity.

� To move to next stage: Collect ammunition, higher conversion

rates, fewer calls to call centre, increasedproductivty - involve

senior stakeholders in sessions

� Timescale: Two to three years.

� Official UX group, led by Manager

� Studies are conducted more consistently as the UX group refines its

methodology

� The group archives and compiles the findings of UX reports.

� The company has a person whose job it is to think about UX across

the organization, in order to increase organisational maturity and

STAGE 5: MANAGED UX.

the organization, in order to increase organisational maturity and

leverage existing UX staff for more strategic purposes

� To move to next stage: Use budget on high profile projects aim for

spectacular wins, evangelise, participatory design, involve senior

stakeholders in sessions

� Timescale: Six to seven years

� The company has recognized the need for an actual user-centred design process, with

multiple activities and milestones

� Iterative design is more common because the company realizes that the best UI quality

requires several rounds of UX

� Projects are prioritized according to the business value of their user experience.

� Even projects that don't get a lot of UX resources go through at least some form of UX

review before they're approved for release

� The UX budget large enough that key projects receive sufficient resources

STAGE 6: A SYSTEMATIC UX PROCESS.

� The UX budget large enough that key projects receive sufficient resources

� The company starts doing field studies

� To move to the next stage

� Use participatory & iterative design to bring stakeholders on the journey.

� Lobby for Field Studies

� Timescale: Six to seven years

� Field studies, as a form of very early user research is in the DNA.

� Each step in the development process is infused with user data,

including the project definition and the requirements phase.

� Beyond simply estimating user experience quality, the company

tracks quality through quantitative UX metrics.

� Each project has defined UX goals that these measurements must

STAGE 7: INTEGRATED USER-CENTRED DESIGN.

� Each project has defined UX goals that these measurements must

surpass for the design to be greenlighted for release.

� The company begins to employ UX data to determine what it

should build.

� User data now determines the type of projects that are funded.

� User research determines the company’s overall direction and

priorities. The concept of total user experience is extended beyond

the screen to other customer-company interaction.

� The company uses the same UX methods, but these now affect

corporate strategy & activities beyond interaction design.

STAGE 8: USER-DRIVEN CORPORATION.

corporate strategy & activities beyond interaction design.

� Corporate decision-making takes a mixed methody approach

including data from behavioural observation of real users—data

about what customers do.

� The timing obviously differs among organizations

� Start-ups are lucky and can begin the maturity process at

stage 3 or stage 4

� Steps must be addressed in order, hard to skip a stage

� Too many simultaneous changes are likely to result in

CONCLUSION

� Too many simultaneous changes are likely to result in

failure

� Find the best ‘buttons’ in your organisation to press and

keep punching them.