Usability Discussion from Asilomar

This weekend the 2006 Digital Vision fellows had an off-site in lovely Asilomar. One of our first sessions was around the robust collobaration platform, Fellownies, developed by Carlos Miranda Levy.

It was interesting to see how lively and occassionally heated the discussions became. It was good opportunity to remind myself of certain principles in user-centered design.

• Users are very willing to give input. Almost all of the Digital Vision fellows had an opinion and were willing to share it. User input is a valuable resource as we iterate on the designs for our DV projects.
• Users have a wide variety of learning styles and backgrounds. In our group there is a varying degree of comfort with English and with web-based tools, and yet we are probably a  more homogenous group than many of the users the DV fellows want to reach with our projects. It's important to talk to lots of different users, and if possible, develop personas. (Read more about personas by the person who invented them, Alan Cooper.) .
• The designer is not the user. Even if a designer uses a tool, he or she ceases to "see" like a user once involved in the development of that tool. I see that happen all the time  in which a feature that I've worked on is so obvious to me, but completely baffling to someone else. At the Asilomar meeting, we decided to put together a small team to help identify ways to improve Fellownies, and I'm sure this group will loose our  user perspective over time and have to rely on the other fellows to help us identify what's working and what isn't.
• If people can't use something, they won't. The DV fellows are a special case because we are all here and are reminded of how important it is we use this tool. In many instances, the designer/developer isn't that close to the actual users. So making a tool as fool-proof as possible is important. And if it is a specific organization rather than the larger public who is the target audience, it may also be important to recognize and address any organizational or cultural issues that might slow adoption.  Getting buy-in from a user group is critical.
• Working with users to improve usability is a great way to develop a community. In my corporate job, I was sometimes asked to usability test or interview clients not just because we needed more data, but because clients loved being listened to and felt better about their relationship with us as a result. I hope that as we work together and incorporate everyone's ideas into Carlos's project, we'll form a more vibrant community. The tools are all there to help us meet our goals, we just need to use them!