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Ten ways to improve the usability of products that Agile teams build

Software development that uses a waterfall method is likely to deliver the wrong thing, too late. The intent of the Agile method is to deliver working software sooner, so the intended users—our clients and their customers—can provide feedback that steers us to deliver the right thing.

There’s a tension between delivering on time and delivering the right thing. In fact, the rush for on-time delivery can result in the wrong thing—an unusable product. There are ways to prevent this. User research is part of the solution. Continue reading “Ten ways to improve the usability of products that Agile teams build”

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Poor usability is a form of tech debt

If you’ve worked in software development for a while, you may have noticed that work to address poor usability gets postponed more often than work on new features and functions. But this need not be an either/or proposition.

Postponed usability work – whether it’s identified by your customers or your user researcher – can be seen as a form of tech debt. It typically accumulates with every release.

Bike-tire pumpWhat contributes to this accumulation?

  • Timing. Some usability issues aren’t identified until Alpha testing with customers begins, or until after the product is released.
  • Competition. There’s often pressure to leap ahead or catch up with competitors by adding new features and functions.
  • Budgeting. If multiple teams compete for a share of the development budget, something shiny and new may attract more funding than boring old maintenance, upgrades, and tech debt.

There is a path to a more usable product, at a low-to-moderate cost and with low-to-moderate risk. With every release, take some of the following actions.

Continue reading “Poor usability is a form of tech debt”
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Predict your “usable release” date by integrating user research

A question that stakeholders, project managers, and product owners ask in common, when it comes to shipping or releasing software products:

• When will it be done?

This question can be answered by using a burn-down chart. Such charts can also predict when the product will be usable, quality product. To predict this, add certain user research findings to the chart.

Continue reading “Predict your “usable release” date by integrating user research”
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If the user can’t use it, it’s broken

A few days ago, I tried to pump up my bicycle. I knew what to do: add air to inflate the inner-tubes. And I knew that I’d need a pump. I had to borrow one.

Bike-tire pumpThe connectors and attachments suggested this pump would fit two types of inner-tube valve as well as valves for air mattresses, footballs, and basketballs. So, an all-round useful pump.

But the thing is, neither the pump’s owner nor I were able to make it work. We couldn’t connect the pump to the valve. So I wondered, did the manufacturer test this product by putting it in the hands of first-time and occasional users, to see how it performed?

Continue reading “If the user can’t use it, it’s broken”

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The right mental model makes software easier

Recently, a client told me we needed to redesign the main data-entry form of their company’s flagship product. Customers said they didn’t like the form in our client’s SaaS or cloud-based software. Despite extra training, customers still felt apprehensive and intimidated by its complexity.

The online form was built a few years earlier, without a designer—as is typical of start-ups. But the product owner said customers wanted the software to be easier to learn and use.

We were tasked with simplifying the main data-entry form. We did this by simplifying the mental model from one we called “Surprise juggling” to one called “Got gossip? Fill me in”.

Our user research and analysis proved that the new mental model let users work faster with fewer errors. Continue reading “The right mental model makes software easier”

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A complicated interface is fixable

According to usability industry leader Jakob Nielsen, usability failures in software and apps are usually because the software:

  • solves the wrong problem.
  • has the wrong functions for the right problem.
  • makes the right functions too complicated to understand.

Nielsen’s last point reminds me of what a product manager once told me: many users of highly specialised software think of themselves as experts, but only few of them actually are. He believed elaborate sets of functions are too numerous or complex to learn fully. As user researchers and interface designers we can help solve that.
Continue reading “A complicated interface is fixable”

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User research to adjust to regional needs

When communicating with audiences around the world, the text in your software or service user interface is important. You’ll need to translate.

Translation is just one step. Delivering software in multiple languages takes more than that. Products and services need to be adjusted to regional expectations.

Even things you may assume are universal concepts—such as names or money—may need to be adapted. User research can uncover those regional differences. Here’s a quick look at:

  • names, specifically middle initials
  • money, in the form of bank loans
Continue reading “User research to adjust to regional needs”
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An expert review using heuristics versus a usability study

User researchers like to see products in the hands of users, and they like to analyse quantitative and qualitative data. But they also use heuristic methods, such as expert reviews, done without a user in sight.

A checklist of heuristicsExpert reviews are a shortcut that rely on a usability analyst’s expertise to identify gaps in a product when compared to a set of guidelines or heuristics.

You may have come across these heuristics:

  • Jakob Nielsen’s 10 general principles for interaction design.
  • The Agile manifesto’s principles, which also apply to software usability.
  • Jeremy Lyon’s five visual design principles that reinforce the software’s use and meaning.
  • A corporate style guide that sets out how to reinforce a brand’s visual presence.

I decided to use Lyon’s five visual-design principles to assess an online app that I worked on with a team of developers and user-interface designers. Would the expert review contradict or complement the findings of our usability research on the same product? Continue reading “An expert review using heuristics versus a usability study”

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Reduce spam without hindering usability

If your website lets visitors sign up, join in, or add comments and reviews, then—in addition to the legitimate details you want people to contribute—you’re getting some garbage. Some of this garbage is sent by spam bots.

Spam bots post content that detracts from your website. Spam lowers your site’s perceived quality. Spam posts may include links that pull traffic to competing sites or trick your visitors into a scam. The cost of spam is hard to quantify.

Plenty of experts recommend methods to avoid spam. But in a series of user research studies, I observed that anti-spam measures impose a cost of their own. They can add friction that causes visitor abandonment and attrition. The cost of this is easier to quantify.

Some anti-spam measures impose more pain than others. I decided to assess and compare them.

Continue reading “Reduce spam without hindering usability”
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The ease of user research goes in cycles

The tools of user research have evolved substantially over the past three decades, and need to evolve more.

Here’s a history from last century through today, based on my experience.

User researchers have had to learn to test

  • computer software using expensive usability labs,
  • desktop software by using other desktop computers,
  • smartphone apps by using apps,
  • household appliances and outdoor digital experiences the hard way.

Continue reading “The ease of user research goes in cycles”