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16 September 2002
Human-Centred Design - Stress-free Products for People
By Nancy Perlman
This article serves as an introduction to Human-Centred Design. It will outline the rationale behind the process and provide initial guidelines for a human-centred process. The focus will be on web services but the process can and should apply to all product development. As a rule of thumb for web services, the process can be broken down into seven stages:
| | 1. | Define the Audience |
| | 2. | Analyse User Tasks |
| | 3. | Analyse Related Products and Processes |
| | 4. | Finalise Product Goals |
| | 5. | Prototype and Test |
| | 6. | Build |
| | 7. | Support / Refinement / Upgrade |
A Human-Centred Design Cycle
Why Human-Centred Design?
Whether making a telephone call, recording a programme from TV to video or paying Council Tax online, these daily experiences should not become "merely tolerated" in their functionality and the annoyance they cause to complete. These day-to-day tasks should not propel technology into our face; rather technology should augment the experience and contribute a positive note. The experience should be stress-free and have a reasonable learning curve.
But how many times have you rung a number only to be put through two minutes of picking and choosing numbers from a voice menu before you have the option of speaking to a human because you couldn't hear your particular choice in the various menus? And how many times do you have to go hunting for the VCR instructions to recall how to set the device to record a program at 7pm every Wednesday for the two weeks you will be working the late shift? And how many times have you visited a website and left in frustration, information-less?
There is a way out of this product aggravation: Human-Centred Design.
What is Human-Centred Design?
Human-Centred Design applies to all products - be it a telephone ordering system, a brochure or a website service. A human-centred outlook to product development sounds obvious - humans use products so products ought to be designed for humans to use in a stress-free, non-intimidating manner. A human-centred approach is holistic, encompassing the entire product experience from inception to launch to refinement to re-launch, in an iterative cycle. Humans permeate and inform the entire product lifecycle. Product development constantly listens and learns from people. The concern is with people using the product or service rather than hardware performance or capability. It is the opposite of a technology-centred process. People's needs come first.
The process works on many levels. It includes all sorts of objects and systems that people encounter: a software interface, a city map, or an office design.
To satisfy humans and keep them stress-free, all elements of a product should of one, consistent in their ease-of-use, quality and presentation. Visual styling and technology alone cannot achieve this goal. A Human-Centred process requires extensive collaboration. The process must begin with an interdisciplinary team: Marketing, Business Development, Visual Design and Communication, Technology, Editorial/Writing, Usability, Behavioural Sciences, Management and so on. Members of the team will check in and out as required throughout the development, launch and refinement of the product. One of the most important things to learn: How to work in a team and share knowledge.
Rules of Thumb for a Human-Centred Process to Web Services
1. Define Your Audience
Start at the beginning to determine what is needed and who will be using it. Uncover this by looking into historical data, conducting focus groups to identify trends, surveying customers, watching people. And welcome eureka moments.
Visit the library (or internet). Interact with people interacting with products.
2. Analyse User Tasks
What do people want to do with the product?
How do they do it?
What do people do with similar products currently on the market?
Where will people be using the product?
What functions and features of the product will be used frequently? Infrequently?
Methods of going about this phase include visiting people in their homes and workplaces to see how they actually use things and how products fit into their lifestyle. How do they sit? How many electrical outlets are nearby? What's the light like? Does the ongoing cost and maintenance of the service appeal to people?
3. Analyse Related Products and Processes
How do people go about tasks today? What products or service do they use?
How have they gone about tasks in the past?
What do they like or dislike about how they have to do things today?
Directly ask members of the proposed audience about their likes and dislikes of current products in the field.
Watch people use your product to complete a task then watch them complete the task with another's product.
Record people providing a running commentary of what they are doing, later observing the video to see where the words and actions intersect or contradict each other.
4. Finalise Product Goals
Set objectives to support perceived user tasks and critical experiences necessary to satisfy people's needs. Without a clear vision of what people want to achieve (functionality) with your product and ways of achieving it in a stress-free manner (usability and ergonomics), it is not possible to produce a world-class, human-centred product. Form should develop through functional, usability, ergonomic and environmental concerns.
It would also be a good idea at this point to develop personas and scenarios. Literally flesh out a typical customer - give them a name, a job, a lifestyle, a face, a favourite colour, a level of technical expertise. Keep the person in mind, even on the walls, throughout the product development.
This is also the phase where you should be concerned with the design of the total experience, every interaction a person has with the product:
| | . | Pre-launch buzz to the investors and users of the product |
| | . | Advertising |
| | . | Ordering/Purchase Workflow |
| | . | Packaging |
| | . | Guarantee/Warranty |
| | . | Support and Post-sales service |
| | . | Refinement and Upgrading. |
In this stage, set benchmarks, measurable goals to evaluate the product's success.
5. Prototyping and Testing
Begin modelling the product. This prototyping can be on paper, sketching items that will appear on a screen or be something that looks like a finished product. In any case, the prototyping stage will lead you to the optimal media solution so it's not necessary to be in the product's medium.
The prototype should have enough functionality in it to test the design. Testing on people should occur frequently and it goes without saying that these people should be members of the audience defined in "Finalise Product Goals". Listen, gather and incorporate feedback so the designers can improve and amend the product. The prototyping and testing cycle continues in an iterative manner until the functional and usability criteria defined in the product goals are met. At this point, the design, content and technology solutions will be coming together in optimal format.
6. Build
Construct the product using optimal technical, interaction, visual and content design. And continue to monitor people feedback. Be prepared during this phase to be building in support mechanisms. Keep a log of any new and desirable features discovered for release in Version 2.
7. Support and Refine
Your product and service is out there. Monitor usage. Share the knowledge gained from customer feedback. Check the desirable features log from the build stage. Stay in touch with people. Let them know when a new feature has been added, ask them what they would like. Return to stage 1 and work toward releasing Version 2.
Human-Centred Design, or not, in action
If you don't yet believe that un-human-centred design can be harmful, you should read this article by Bruce Tognazzini about the cockpit controls of an aircraft in which the American singer John Denver died. In short, the location of a fuel shutoff valve and its interface combined with a quirky way of measuring fuel in the plane's tanks (something one couldn't hope to figure out without consulting the manual and other pilots for undocumented knowledge) made this an accident waiting to happen. On this experimental aircraft, the fuel shutoff valve is located behind the pilot. In order for the pilot to reach the valve, he has to take his hands off the control and turn around. And it is difficult to find something to brace himself on when turning around (and not hit a pedal, as well as the fact that one can no longer see where one's going). Thankfully, 737 cockpits fare somewhat better at meshing with human needs.
Towards a Human-Centred Cycle in Your Organisation
In an organisation's culture, creating great products must come first. Office politics, bleeding-edge technology and prescribed implementation models receive lower priority. Information - from colleagues, from the experience of interacting with the world, from customers - must be listened to, gathered and shared. Don't plan too much, don't agonise over crossing 't's and dotting 'i's before you begin the development cycle. Do act on quick prototypes, tested often on users.
While there are no solid rules for getting the job done, there are a number flexible of problem-solving stages. Each project will require a little of this and a little of that. The people, the place and the thing might differ but the goal never does - make it stress-free and accessible for humans to use.
Motivating principle: Ask and inquire amongst people. Never presume you have the only or the best answer. People large and small of many abilities have to use the damn thing.
Getting Started
The Human-Centred design cycle should be implemented over time. Call in some outsiders, people who can share their experiences with you and provide an objective outlook on how to integrate Human-Centred design. Familiarise yourself with the HCD way of problem-solving, be reading, observing, interacting, asking questions to which you do not know the answers. Get management agreement and pick a small sample project. Learn from the project and begin to build up a process/method that works with your organisation. Talk it up amongst your colleagues. The process will evolve and refine. One day, the entire organisation will be human-centred and you'll wonder why it wasn't always so.
On a micro-level, an introductory HCD approach might be for the development team to devise a system for collecting and collating customer research and distributing the knowledge to the team. On a macro-level, it could be how the organisation sees itself contributing and taking from the global supply chain. Once you start, it's hard to stop. Once you notice the details, you may find that HCD is just one of the components in putting together a sustainable production practice - encompassing humans and the environment, production and recycling, health and longevity.
As you may have detected, we've only touched the tip of the iceberg here. Start simply, observe your surroundings.
Further information on developing Human-Centred Digital Products:
Other articles by Nancy Perlman:
Independent Consultant Nancy Perlman's areas of expertise include: Human-Centred Product Design, Market Research, Knowledge Management, Scenario Writing and Creative Development. She frequently collaborates with Naturalogica, a creative services company. Nancy would like to thank Julian Poyata, director of Naturalogica, for the extensive discussions on this subject.
Nancy Perlman's independent opinion appears courtesy of Prospect - a recruitment consultancy committed to 'enabling better futures' and sourcing the people to drive eGovernment. For further information go http://www.prospectmsl.com/ or e-mail info@prospectmsl.com
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