[IxDA Discuss] ACD (was ...companies actually using UCD)

[Oleh Kovalchuke]

Stimulating if meandering article by Donald Norman.


The starting postulate is simple: human centered design process is well
suited for incremental design improvements – it evaluates if and how design
idea conform current set of user expectations, current user goals, mental
models, practices. HCD process is less suitable for evaluation of disruptive
technologies, ideas. This is not limitation of process per se. This is due
to natural limitation of our human mental abilities (and, by the way,
relates to recent thread on cognitive load - http://tinyurl.com/gud4a ): we
have hard time imagining alternative outcomes.



According to Klein's book on decision making, when we construct mental
simulations we are limited to three changing objects interacting for six
consecutive steps. Disruptive ideas, technologies are disruptive precisely
because they don't fit with the rest of common expectations, they re-arrange
many more than three existing practices in novel ways. The corollary, born
in history, is that we, humans, are notoriously poor predictors of future
developments of disruptive technology ("The phonograph has no commercial
value at all." - Thomas Edison, 1880s; many books are filled with examples
of this phenomenon).



Robert Reimann writes: "I would argue that understanding human goals in the
context of products and systems provides the clear vision of the end result
that Norman finds elusive, while significantly mitigating the risk of
failure.  I believe that this understanding comes from well-developed user
models that capture the essence of human behaviors and motivations pertinent
to the design problem at hand."



----------------------------------------------------------

Given natural limitations of human mind, Norman's concerns about constraints
of evaluations used in HCD process appear to be well-justified. The crucial
questions, unarticulated in his article then are these: "Who is going to be
the judge of applicability of disruptive design idea?", and: "What is
his/her track record as far as disruptive ideas are concerned?"

----------------------------------------------------------



We know the answer at Apple (Steve Jobs). However the answer to these
questions doesn't mean that HCD process should be discarded (here is where
Norman went wrong), rather that HCD should be applied with gusto where there
is need for incremental improvements. There are many, many areas where this
is true. On the other hand, negative results of HCD user modeling and
evaluations should always be taken with doubt, and possibly dismissed by
stakeholders whenever disruptive technology is suspected (here is where
Norman went right).



Finally, activity centered design process should be encouraged as long as
it's own limitations are understood: it is not a magic bullet - ACD removes
focus on *current* user expectations, and thus might facilitate innovation,
however someone (human, not process) still has to dream up the crazy idea,
which may or may not be viable after the venture capital financing runs out.




Or as Norman states: "Great design, I contend, comes from breaking the
rules, by ignoring the generally accepted practices, by pushing forward with
a clear concept of the end result, no matter what. This ego-centric,
vision-directed design results in both great successes and great failures.
If you want great rather than good, this is what you must do."

-- 
Oleh Kovalchuke
Interaction Design is Design of Time
http://www.tangospring.com/IxDtopicWhatIsInteractionDesign.htm

PS As I said in the beginning, the article is meandering: there are
interesting observations on dynamic nature of interaction, and on error
handling, on system approach to design - all of these can and should be
addressed within framework of HCD process.



On 6/30/06, Bret Hekking <bhekking at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> [Please voluntarily trim replies to include only relevant quoted
> material.]
>
> > Apple
> >
> >
> > Didn't they get rid of their HCD team? I thought they were taking the
> ACD
> > approach discussed by Norman.
>
> ACD = Activity Centered Design
> http://www.jnd.org/dn.mss/human-centered.html
>
> I'm sure I've browsed Norman's article before, but I'll have to read up,
>
> Thanks,
> Bret
>
>
>
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