[IxDA Discuss] ROI

[Katie Albers]

Well, speaking of biases, here come mine....

I am entertained by the idea that hiring a UCD or IxD
Professional , implementing a process that includes
those things or any other such nod in the direction of
the user, indicates that the company (especially such
entrenched companies as IBM and Microsoft) actually
pays attention to the teachings of the field. I find
that the larger the company, the more likely I am to
either (a) be ignored or (b) some small, relatively
unimportant aspect of my recommendations will be
implemented. In the latter case, all failures of the
products in question will be laid squarely at my feet,
and used to "demonstrate" that UCD is either
unimportant or a negative. 

Numbers of staff with appropriate titles has
absolutely no bearing on whether or not UCD is
actually practiced and integrated into the company.
And I would remind us all that in the years during
which computers were being integrated into business,
we usually saw a slow down after a new system was
brought in. Not because computers are slower than
people, but because the users were put off by the
electronic incursion into their own space.

I know that "we did what they said and it made things
worse" is a popular refrain among companies that have
called in consultants on these issues. I have
invariably found that either the consultant was *not*
a specialist in the field or that the company didn't
*really* do as they were told ["We figured it didn't
really matter if the button was in a different place
on this page."]

And since lack of human-centered design has killed at
least 3 people that I know of and is probably largely
responsible for a major election being questioned, I
am unmoved by stories of its failure to make a
sufficient difference in other instances.

Katie


--- Donna Maurer <donnam at maadmob.net> wrote:

> But what about the negative stories. We hired a UCD
> consultant. They 
> said we should change the structure of the site. We
> did what they said 
> and our sales dropped by 50%.
> 
> Stories of good ROI are not directly related to the
> presence of UCD 
> ideas in a project. There are so many factors.
> 
> In fact, Jared Spool, in this interview 
>
(http://www.informationdesign.org/special/spool_interview.php)
> said:
> 
> "We ignore the evidence that, in the last 10 years,
> there has been no 
> discernable relationship between corporate
> investment in user-centered 
> design practices and the regular production of
> usable products from 
> those corporations. The companies that spend the
> most on UCD, such as 
> Microsoft and IBM, are notorious for regularly
> producing unusable 
> products, while companies that are wowing us, such
> as Amazon, Dell and 
> eBay have very small UCD investments. To put things
> in perspective, 
> Microsoft has more than 120 UCD professionals on
> staff, IBM has more 
> than 200, Amazon has five and Dell has two, last we
> checked. One of 
> Amazon's UCD people just went on maternity leave, so
> they are actually 
> running at 20% less than normal for now."
> 
> On the positive side, there was a good talk at Web
> Visions two years ago 
> that highlighted the process and changes. I can't
> remember whether it 
> was inherently due to UCD or just to having some
> smart, hard-working folks:
>
http://webvisionsevent.com/podcasts/2005/WV05_Chris_Bond.mp3?PHPSESSID=0f3612b77def4ccea87f3d8ffd4da5fb
> 
> Oh, don't my biases show ;)
> 
> Donna
> 
> johan.dermaut at belgacom.be wrote:
> > Hi all,
> >
> > Can someone please, p l e a s e, PLEASE help me.
> I'm looking for
> > exisiting, actual, examples of ROI related to
> usability (and/or UCD).
> > When I do a search on ROI and usability, most of
> the examples are from
> > the previous century or the beginning of this one
> and are rather vague.
> >
> >
> > So, what I'm looking for is something along these
> lines: we had 100
> > visitors on our homepage, we adapted the
> navigation and now we have 200.
> > Or, we sold 10 items a day, we changed the
> ordering process and now we
> > are selling 15 items a day. If at all possible
> with the screen shots
> > before and after, showing the changes and the
> price that was paid for
> > the implemented changes. 
> >
> > Thanks in advance. 
> >
> > Johan
> >
> >   
> 
> 
> -- 
> Donna Maurer
> Maadmob Interaction Design
> e: donna at maadmob.net
> web: http://maadmob.net/maadmob_id/
> book: http://rosenfeldmedia.com/books/cardsorting/
> 
>
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