Innovation Frameworks; Remote Usability: User Experience professionals meet-up in Hyderabad

Satyam organized a meet up for the HCI Hyderabad group on the 30Th of October at our Cyberspace office, Hyderabad. It was a very lively event with a lot of participation from the audience. Deepak Namboodri from CA gave a presentation on remote usability testing with a case study. Ashish Tiwari from Cordys had an interesting point on the challenges in "variables" to be considered in remote usability testing. Raman Saxena from CA had an interesting take on different usability methods and combining these techniques for optimal results. Kaladhar Bapu of the Microsoft User Experience group joined in with interesting queries.

I gave a presentation on Innovation Frameworks. The topic was about how teams/organizations can envisage, motivate and sustain innovation. Innovation is not a fiefdom of a few and most of all not only a "eureka" moment. Innovation can be planned and "frameworked". User Experience/Usability professionals can and must innovate for our professionals to move up the value chain. Ashish Tiwari had interesting views on organization culture and its effect on innovation. Kaladhar Bapu made some interesting points on the democratization of innovation. Raman Saxena made an emphatic statement on taking control at the appropriate time in discussions. I completely agree on this point as I have also sat in innumerable meetings where due to a large audience and the inherent need of people to voice their opinion, a lot of time has been wasted. Will upload the presentation soon.

All in all the presentation was interesting and I did not get beaten up/stoned or jeered :). I think this was mostly because I reminded the folks that it was my campus they were in. Another faux pas has to be mentioned. Sorry Diya Sur! Called up Subhashish Karmarkar of Convergys just before the meeting and he was shocked. Apparently Diya told him that the meet was cancelled and he and the Convergys team were heading home! Well, methinks the motive was to take the left-over food home. But I beat her to that!

There was a mushaira (poetry recitation) after the presentations and it ruined my reputation as a poet. Kaladhar Bapu refused to take heed of Diya Sur’s suggestion to give me a platform for my shairi (poetry) at the world usability day 2006 to be held at the ISB (Indian school of Business, Hyderabad). Kaladhar Bapu and his colleagues would appreciate all the help that they can get for this. Get involved!

Will upload the Innovation Frameworks presentation soon. Keep watching this space.

Brand "u"

A brand in today's world has extended from being a mere recognizing factor of a product or service, it is an extension of the persona itself. Here I am talking about a brand in a very holistic way. As a professional, every touch point with my team/client/work is an extension of the brand that is me. What is it that your brand conveys?

You cannot ever fake or put a spin on your personal brand. What you are and where you want to be is reflected in every action of yours. A mask does not work well, it will slip anytime. Your true self will show up. You are a leader by your actions, not by your "title". Your team will respect you, follow you for what values you stand for, and not anything else. Your clients will respect you not for your sweet talking or ego flattering behavior, or how well you "like their way of working", it is for the legacy that you bring.

That legacy is the value that you give them, the integrity in which they trust, knowing that you measure your successes by their success.

Brand "u" is not a "spin". It is a natural extension of your personality.

Cheers!

The "wow" factor in Customer Experience

As a follow up to the previous post about customer experience and wow!

• Wow, Finally I have a life: no more calling the IT folks
• Wow, that was fast!
• Wow, that did not take much doing!
• Wow, that was a fast response!
• Wow, this is too cool
• Wow, this really makes sense!
• Wow, now even grandma can use this

The "Experience Economy"

Am quoting Robin Sharma verbatim from his book " The Greatness Guide"

In this " experience economy" we now live in , the customers
must be taken from a journey from start to finish that makes them
go "wow"

Robin has beautifully articulated what every User Experience or Customer Experience professional should strive for. The wow factor. Will write more about it in my next post. And soon. Promise! Scout's honor!

Entrepreneurs/ Product Managers – Realizing the importance of ease of use in increasing customer adoption

Happened to meet an entrepreneur on a recent flight. We got talking about work and the topic went on to his business. He gave some information on his product which was basically storage solutions. After which I asked him as to how he would differentiate it from the other products in the market.

This was his reply: The average time taken for data recovery using his product would be a whopping 400% less than the market product. How: Ease of use?

The dude has completely concealed the technical complexity of the product and the interface is a ridiculously simple process that requires absolutely zilch in terms of effort spent by end users in learning the solution. Therefore, instead of the features lists/technologies, if Entrepreneurs / Product managers could focus on the learnability and ease of use of the product, their products would have a greater chance of customer adoption.

Bank-visit causes pain in the neck(Importance of information design in physical spaces)

Information design is not only limited to the software screens that we design, it has to be designed keeping in mind the users, physical environment and ergonomics as well.

I recently visited a bank after a very long time. After ATM’s, visits to banks have become very rare. The cash withdrawal limit in ATM's forced me to do so.
Entered the bank and found a receptive amd smiling clerk who pointed out to a token dispenser. So far so good.

The token dispenser had approximately eight different buttons with pretty self descriptive labels against them. For e.g.: press here incase of cash withdrawal above 50,000.

Once you press the button, you get a token slip with a number. This experience is fine till here. Now the experience degrades and becomes a pain in the neck. Literally.

There are a row of chairs and one is expected to await your turn till a display TV panel placed very close to seating area, flashes your number. The only problem is that the TV panel is at a height of 12 feet. This is the most idiotic case of bad ergonomics you sit at a level of 2.5 feet and have to literally strain your neck to see whether your number has come. And to make things worse, the only indicator that the number has changed is a beep. So that means you will always look up whenever there is a sound regardless of the sequence of the numbers displayed.

This was very discomforting and left me with a pain in the neck. What does this say about the bank’s concern for giving the customer a pleasant experience? Or are they completely clueless? I wonder whether I could sue if I faced a similar experience in the US:-)

Bad usability affects self esteem!

What should companies know when they market poorly designed products is that bad usability goes beyond mere dissatisfaction n with your product. It affects your user’s self esteem.

Let me share an incident with you.

Our cable guy came to our house with a set-top gizmo. He installed and explained the operations and set up to my mother. Needless to say, she understood the procedures then, but the very next day when a procedure had to be repeated, she did not have a clue.

To add insult to the injury, the cable guy made a grandiose and a condescending statement there was no problem with the box, it was only a lack of understanding on her part. This got her, a normally docile lady, furious. This statement had an impact on her self esteem and that made her aggressive

The rule of usability s that if your user has problems with the learnability and the memorability of the product, there is something wrong with the product and not the user.

Monica-the Closet Information Architect

Love friends and never tire seeing re-runs of the same. The more I see Monica, the more I am convinced that she is a closet information architect.

Let’s start with her natural affinity (or fetish) for packing. Have you ever seen the way she lists items in categories. This goes on and on like this blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, and more blah! It is hilarious, and shows her compulsive obsessive behavior for listing and categorizing. Then comes the organizing items in their natural (to her) respective categories

Another re-run recently has Joey and chandler discussing about Monica’s categorization of towels of different textures, feels, etc. Soft, semi soft, hard, and so forth

But, the recent trends in IA would not have Monica happy at all. Yes, I am talking about Folksonomy (tagging, where users themselves categorize pages, or photos, etc, like flickr etc.)

Sacre blue, me myself and I (Monica) can be the only one who can categorize… this is a specialist’s job. Do not leave categorization to the plebeians. How can they even think of such a thing…who will love me if everyone does the same thing..:-(

This is a complete absurd post. Do not take it seriously. Chill!!

Any more points on the IA in Monica would be welcome

Cheers!!

Enterprise Information Management problems

Information is the key differentiator in today’s economy. The right information at the right time could make the competitive difference.

What are the biggest problems facing enterprise information management today?

Where could the impact of mis-management of information systems be felt. Planning to write something on this issue based on my past expereince...

Customer Behavior, Strategy & User Research

Today's customer has an amazing amount of choice of products and services at his/her fingertips. The wealth of information that they have is empowering them to call the shots.

Customer Behavior is becoming increasingly unpredictable today. Loyalty is at a premium. People are not hesitant to change brands at the slightest pretext/opportunity/benefit. There is a plethora of choices available. What is the differentiator? The Experience.

What does this mean for organizations/ Entrepreneurs?
It means that customer needs/ aspirations/have to be at the forefront of their business strategy. And the magic mantra for doing it is user research. Neglect it at your own peril.