Re: A failure to communicate...

On Thu, 3 Apr 2003 11:52:40 +0100, Anu Gupta wrote:

>However, the line above about ROI, resonates with me - I'm currently trying
>to sell [inspire !] the need for UCD / User Experience into a mainly
>tech-focused team, who, understandably, want proof that trying this out will
>be worth it.

Just as a simple exercise could you do something like this ...?

Pick something where you predict that the opinion of the tech guys would
diverge what would emerge through customer testing (but don't let them
know that's how you made the choice). An example might be the naming of
the main subject categories on a site. Then informally get some feedback
from people representative of your customers.

It can often be instructive to demonstrate to people that however sure
they were that they could think for the customer, they couldn't. Showing
a discrepancy in results between the two should at least get some of the
less entrenched thinking a bit more seriously that perhaps you do need
to check with the customer.

It's not exactly ROI, but it helps to have allies.

*    Nick Gassman - eCommerce Manager - [email protected]     *
              * http://ba.com *

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