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These are great responses. Thank you all who have contributed (just
wanted to say). I've really appreciated reading them. Some years ago I
was privileged enough to have been employed and along with employment
came the ability to attend one of the international CHI conferences. I
took a class/workshop there that was completely focussed on this. We
learned how to take every change we wanted to propose and interpret it
in terms of COST as in $ - whether it was labor to make the changes
proposed or sales lost or $ spent in support.
I've been unemployed (or I should say "unpaid") for a very long time
now but from all of the responses below (and business in general
whatever the trade might be), not much has changed - money talks and $$
$ speak louder than words, pictures, advanced degrees, and sex.
I hope people keep posting.
Thanks again,
LjRose
On Jun 15, 2009, at 12:00 PM, [email protected] wrote:
> Send Discussions mailing list submissions to
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> Today's Topics:
>
> 1. Re: Making the Case for Usability (Jared Spool) (Laura Malone)
> 2. Re: Re: Making the Case for Usability
> (Jared Spool) (francois aubin)
>
> --__--__--
>
> Message: 1
> Date: Sun, 14 Jun 2009 14:06:50 -0700 (PDT)
> From: Laura Malone <[email protected]>
> To: [email protected]
> Subject: [BayCHI Discussions] Re: Making the Case for Usability
> (Jared Spool)
>
> I don't know if anyone has mentioned John Rhodes new book "Selling
> Usability." It's basically a handbook of Guerilla tactics for
> "usability infiltration tactics." I'm reading it now and I'm sure
> you would find lots of helpful insight there. He takes a practical,
> yet political approach. One of his primary messages is not to try to
> sell it head-on, but to adopt the language of your company's
> culture. For instance, don't use the term "users" but instead
> "customers" -- people the decision makers and influencers really
> care about. Also, figure out how usability contributed to the
> results of successful projects to usability, (even if it wasn't
> called that) and promote it vigorously.
>
> Laura Malone
>
>
>
>
>
> ----- Forwarded Message ----
> From: "[email protected]" <discussions-
> [email protected]>
> To: [email protected]
> Sent: Sunday, June 14, 2009 12:00:01 PM
> Subject: Discussions digest, Vol 1 #411 - 1 msg
>
> Send Discussions mailing list submissions to
> [email protected]
>
> To subscribe or unsubscribe via the World Wide Web, visit
> http://baychi.org/mailman/listinfo/discussions
> or, via email, send a message with subject or body 'help' to
> [email protected]
>
> You can reach the person managing the list at
> [email protected]
>
> When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific
> than "Re: Contents of Discussions digest..."
>
>
> Today's Topics:
>
> 1. Re: Making the Case for Usability (Jared Spool)
>
> -- __--__--
>
> Message: 1
> Cc: <[email protected]>
> From: Jared Spool <[email protected]>
> To: RH <[email protected]>
> Subject: Re: [BayCHI Discussions] Making the Case for Usability
> Date: Sat, 13 Jun 2009 13:49:44 -0700
>
> On Jun 10, 2009, at 11:29 AM, RH wrote:
>
>> Can anyone share any thoughts or studies around justifying usability
>> research within a large corporate environment? If so, it would be
>> greatly
>> appreciated. Specifically, I9m interested in ROI for performing
>> usability
>> and user experience work for Web sites or applications versus not
>> doing so.
>
> In my experience, ROI arguments never work. They are only
> justifications for already-made-decisions. If someone doesn't want to
> do something, the most persuasive ROI argument still won't convince
> them.
>
> The real trick is to follow the money. When there's poor usability or
> user experiences, it usually impacts the organization on its bottom
> line. (Lost sales, increased support costs, or extra development work
> from rework, for example.)
>
> When there's money that's being lost on the bottom line, there's
> usually someone in the organization already charged with recovering
> those losses. Find that person and you've got your champion.
>
> I wrote about this in more depth here:
> The Cost of Frustration
> http://www.uie.com/articles/cost_of_frustration/
>
> and here:
> A Recession Strategy for Web Apps
> http://www.uie.com/articles/recession_strategy_webapps/
>
> Hope that helps,
>
> Jared
>
> Jared M. Spool
> User Interface Engineering
> 510 Turnpike St., Suite 102, North Andover, MA 01845
> e: [email protected] p: +1 978 327 5561
> http://uie.com Blog: http://uie.com/brainsparks Twitter: @jmspool
> UIE Roadshow: Seattle, Denver, DC in June: http://is.gd/gxwe
>
>
> -- __--__--
>
> _______________________________________________
> This is the BayCHI Discussions mailing list digest, [email protected]
> To change your subscription options, or to unsubscribe, visit http://baychi.org/mailman/listinfo/discussions
>
>
> End of Discussions Digest
>
> --__--__--
>
> Message: 2
> Date: Sun, 14 Jun 2009 19:58:21 -0400
> Subject: Re: [BayCHI Discussions] Re: Making the Case for Usability
> (Jared Spool)
> From: francois aubin <[email protected]>
> To: Laura Malone <[email protected]>, [email protected]
>
> Laura,
> Following you comments
> I am doing both business consulting and usability for 20 years
>
> The approach I use is:
>
> after field studies, I list the problems found in two categories (in
> scope
> and out of scope).
>
> I call them facts (organization find the word problem a bit
> negative) and I
> make facts and finding session with executive . In large
> organization that
> may be 4,5 or more vp
>
> I express fact along the following example
>
> ex., "Risk manager (employees) flip to the third pages to get
> the repayment information to make their decision". I also avoid any
> abstraction (primary information. secondary information...)
>
> The trick is there" the facts (problems ) must be presented without
> any
> adverb or adjective but as pure facts
>
> it is also important to eb aligned with the business objective (ex.,
> lending
> money...) selling more... forget the technical crap
>
> I then add quote from employees (also i don't use the
> usability terminology but the internal business terminology)
>
> I use screen shot or image to illustrate in addition to quotes
>
> Then I expose the impact of each facts
>
> For example:
>
> Impact: risk of omission or 10% of the employes don't read the
> second pages,
> etc
> Also provide best practice based on human factors
>
> I usually have about 50 to 80 problems after a field study
>
> I guaranty you that if you list problems in factual manner, express
> their
> impact and deliver a good story around them, things that were not
> supposed
> to move will move even in the most bureaucratic environment.
>
>
> Francois Aubin
> CEO
> CognitiveGroup
>
>
>
> On Sun, Jun 14, 2009 at 5:06 PM, Laura Malone <[email protected]>
> wrote:
>
>> I don't know if anyone has mentioned John Rhodes new book "Selling
>> Usability." It's basically a handbook of Guerilla tactics for
>> "usability
>> infiltration tactics." I'm reading it now and I'm sure you would
>> find lots
>> of helpful insight there. He takes a practical, yet political
>> approach. One
>> of his primary messages is not to try to sell it head-on, but to
>> adopt the
>> language of your company's culture. For instance, don't use the term
> "users"
>> but instead "customers" -- people the decision makers and influencers
> really
>> care about. Also, figure out how usability contributed to the
>> results of
>> successful projects to usability, (even if it wasn't called that) and
>> promote it vigorously.
>>
>> Laura Malone
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> ----- Forwarded Message ----
>> From: "[email protected]" <[email protected]
>> >
>> To: [email protected]
>> Sent: Sunday, June 14, 2009 12:00:01 PM
>> Subject: Discussions digest, Vol 1 #411 - 1 msg
>>
>> Send Discussions mailing list submissions to
>> [email protected]
>>
>> To subscribe or unsubscribe via the World Wide Web, visit
>> http://baychi.org/mailman/listinfo/discussions
>> or, via email, send a message with subject or body 'help' to
>> [email protected]
>>
>> You can reach the person managing the list at
>> [email protected]
>>
>> When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific
>> than "Re: Contents of Discussions digest..."
>>
>>
>> Today's Topics:
>>
>> 1. Re: Making the Case for Usability (Jared Spool)
>>
>> -- __--__--
>>
>> Message: 1
>> Cc: <[email protected]>
>> From: Jared Spool <[email protected]>
>> To: RH <[email protected]>
>> Subject: Re: [BayCHI Discussions] Making the Case for Usability
>> Date: Sat, 13 Jun 2009 13:49:44 -0700
>>
>> On Jun 10, 2009, at 11:29 AM, RH wrote:
>>
>>> Can anyone share any thoughts or studies around justifying usability
>>> research within a large corporate environment? If so, it would be
>>> greatly
>>> appreciated. Specifically, I9m interested in ROI for performing
>>> usability
>>> and user experience work for Web sites or applications versus not
>>> doing so.
>>
>> In my experience, ROI arguments never work. They are only
>> justifications for already-made-decisions. If someone doesn't want to
>> do something, the most persuasive ROI argument still won't convince
>> them.
>>
>> The real trick is to follow the money. When there's poor usability or
>> user experiences, it usually impacts the organization on its bottom
>> line. (Lost sales, increased support costs, or extra development work
>> from rework, for example.)
>>
>> When there's money that's being lost on the bottom line, there's
>> usually someone in the organization already charged with recovering
>> those losses. Find that person and you've got your champion.
>>
>> I wrote about this in more depth here:
>> The Cost of Frustration
>> http://www.uie.com/articles/cost_of_frustration/
>>
>> and here:
>> A Recession Strategy for Web Apps
>> http://www.uie.com/articles/recession_strategy_webapps/
>>
>> Hope that helps,
>>
>> Jared
>>
>> Jared M. Spool
>> User Interface Engineering
>> 510 Turnpike St., Suite 102, North Andover, MA 01845
>> e: [email protected] p: +1 978 327 5561
>> http://uie.com Blog: http://uie.com/brainsparks Twitter: @jmspool
>> UIE Roadshow: Seattle, Denver, DC in June: http://is.gd/gxwe
>>
>>
>> -- __--__--
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> This is the BayCHI Discussions mailing list digest, [email protected]
>> To change your subscription options, or to unsubscribe, visit
>> http://baychi.org/mailman/listinfo/discussions
>>
>>
>> End of Discussions Digest
>> _______________________________________________
>> This is the BayCHI Discussions mailing list, [email protected]
>> To change your subscription options, or to unsubscribe, visit
>> http://baychi.org/mailman/listinfo/discussions
>>
>
>
>
> --
>
> Francois Aubin
> Cell: (514) 707-8856
> Tel : (514) 861-1212
> -------------------------------------------------
> Cognitive Group Inc.
>
> 1155 Reni Livesque West - Suite 2500
> Montrial, Quibec
> Canada H3B 2K4
> -------------------------------------------------
> [email protected]
> www.cognitivegroup.com
>
>
> --__--__--
>
> _______________________________________________
> This is the BayCHI Discussions mailing list digest, [email protected]
> To change your subscription options, or to unsubscribe, visit http://baychi.org/mailman/listinfo/discussions
>
>
> End of Discussions Digest
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