August 2012

Future of Work: Interview with Hugh Dubberly

Hugh has great vision, knowledge and focus.

"(...) it is imperative that companies focus on service design to gain competitive advantage."

(Wilder Voices)

Posted by PJB on August 30, 2012 | Classification: Interviews - Service design | Permalink

Designing Solutions to Wicked Problems: A Manifesto for Transdisciplinary Research and Design

Impressed by the deep thinking behind this manifesto from 2009.

"Proceedings from the Designing Solutions to Wicked Problems symposium held on the 9th and 10th November 2009 at the Melbourne Town Hall with a compendium of provocations and commentaries. (...) We can aspire to design that contributes to a more sustainable future that delights the eye and the soul, and that transforms the everyday as much as it does the uncommon. Design at its essence is focused on the creation of meaning and solutions. To focus on those problems for which no easy solutions have yet been found is the true challenge which great design should meet."

(Terry Cutler editor ~ DRI Research Institute)

Posted by PJB on August 30, 2012 | Classification: Information design | Permalink

Achieve Product-Market Fit with our Brand-New Value Proposition Designer

Seeing how business modelling integrates with design for experiences.

"I'm a big fan of the Lean Startup movement and love the underlying principle of testing, learning, and pivoting by experimenting with the most basic product prototypes imaginable - so-called Minimal Viable Products (MVP) - during the search for product-market fit. It helps companies avoid building stuff that customers don't want. Yet, there is no underlying conceptual tool that accompanies this process. There is no practical tool that helps business people map, think through, discuss, test, and pivot their company's value proposition in relationship to their customers' needs. So I came up with the Value Proposition Designer (...)"

(Alexander Osterwalder a.k.a. @AlexOsterwalder ~ Business Model Alchemist)

Posted by PJB on August 30, 2012 | Classification: Information design | Permalink

Beyond Wireframing: The Real-Life UX Design Process

Following the UCD process in any form is no guarantee for success. No process is.

"We all know basic tenets of user-centered design. We recognize different research methods, the prototyping stage, as well as the process of documenting techniques in our rich methodological environment. The question you probably often ask yourself, though, is how it all works in practice?"

(Marcin Treder ~ Smashing Magazine)

Posted by PJB on August 30, 2012 | Classification: User experience - Wireframes | Permalink

How to Bake Content Strategy into Your Web Design Process

How can 'developing content' be a part of 'content development'? Self-referencing.

"Let's face it, content development is still a massively frustrating process."

(James Deer a.k.a. @jamesdeer ~ Six Revisions)

Posted by PJB on August 29, 2012 | Classification: Content strategy - Writing | Permalink

How Transmedia Storytelling will Transform the Role of the Content Strategist

But... what's The Story to tell.

"This report provides clear foundations for the future of content strategy. It means Content Strategists can no longer afford to specialise in just Digital or even Social Media. You will need to expand your skill set to include a deep understanding of above the line, mobile, games and offline experiences. Transmedia Storytelling is not a fad; it's the convergence of media channels to meet the need of the user."

(Kohlben Vodden a.k.a. @kohlben ~ WhatWorksWhere)

Posted by PJB on August 29, 2012 | Classification: Content strategy | Permalink

The 6 Disciplines Behind Consistently Great Customer Experiences

Congrats with the Forrester book on CX.

"The practices in the design discipline help organizations envision and then implement customer interactions that meet or exceed customer needs. It spans the complex systems of people, products, interfaces, services, and spaces that your customers encounter in retail locations, over the phone, or through digital media like websites and mobile apps. Design weeds out bad ideas early and focuses your customer experience efforts on changes that really matter to customers. By leveraging expertise and ideas from customers, employees, and partners, it encourages creative solutions--and helps avoid missteps by grounding those solutions in reality. "

(Harley Manning and Kerry Bodine ~ Fast.Co)

Posted by PJB on August 28, 2012 | Classification: Customer experience - User experience | Permalink

We Must Develop Topic-Based Information Design

Always remarkable how people perceive InfoDesign.

"(...) in the age of the Web, and particularly of the mobile Web, topic-based information design is essential."

(Mark Baker ~ Every Page is Page One)

Posted by PJB on August 28, 2012 | Classification: Content strategy - Information design | Permalink

What is Digital Service Design?

Think system, not discrete nodes a.k.a. site, app or shop.

"Digital service design incorporates many existing disciplines – like web design, information architecture, user experience and content strategy. It is, if you like, an organising umbrella principle, in which all these disciplines can work together to build something that meets – and surpasses – user expectation. Perhaps most fundamentally, it's about letting go of the website as the core idea of digital development, and thinking about service as something that can be delivered through any number of channels – some of them digital. Instead of fretting over your mobile strategy, you figure out how to express your service principles through a mobile device."

(Adam Tinworth a.k.a. @adders ~ Next Berlin)

Posted by PJB on August 28, 2012 | Classification: Information design - Service design - User experience | Permalink

UX amateurism and why I'm not a UX designer anymore

In the end, honesty always prevails.

"But somehow, it's not enough. Nor will it ever be. And where I'm aiming to go, unicorns and one-size-fits-all don’t seem to make sense. Maybe someday, I'll find something I can identify with. But for now, I don't think I can quite call myself a UX designer, because it's getting harder to identify what I do as wholly UX. For what it's worth, I am doing bits within UX – but I can't claim fame to all of it."

(Boon Yew Chew a.k.a. @boonych ~ GlueThink) ~ courtesy if petermorville

Posted by PJB on August 27, 2012 | Classification: User experience | Permalink

Tunnel Vision and Selective Attention

The more you know, the more you see.

"Users don't see stuff that's right on the screen. Selective attention makes people overlook things outside their focus of interest."

(Jakob Nielsen ~ Alertbox)

Posted by PJB on August 27, 2012 | Classification: Information design - Usability | Permalink

The First Design Hardly Ever Wins: The Iterative Approach to UX Design

Keep making it better, all the time.

"Since the rise of the Agile movement iteration became one of the hot words in the whole New Technologies industry. We're encouraged to iterate, we should close iterations of our work every week or two. Iterations are simply everywhere."

(Marcin Treder a.k.a. @marcintreder ~ DesignModo)

Posted by PJB on August 23, 2012 | Classification: Information design - User experience | Permalink

What Can SEO Learn From UX?

Or what algorithms can learn from heuristics.

"User Experience plays an early, fundamental role in guiding basic decisions that shape websites and digital products, and is increasingly afforded a seat at the table, so to speak. The reason UX is such a juggernaut is because of the multiple disciplines it encompasses—design, information architecture, usability engineering, interface design, content strategy, and research. In spite of its relative youth, UX as a discipline has grown exponentially in stature over the last few years."

(Jessica Greco a.k.a. @grecasaurus ~ iAcquire)

Posted by PJB on August 22, 2012 | Classification: Search - User experience | Permalink

The Difference Between Information Architecture and UX Design

Sigh.

"Information Architects work to create usable content structures out of complex sets of information. They do this using plenty of user-centered design methods: usability tests, persona research and creation, and user flow diagrams (to name only a few). That said, it still seems that UX design is in vogue. (...) UX builds on the foundation that IA provides, aiming to take that experience to the next level, both creatively and emotionally. This is the outstanding difference that defines how the apps, sites, and products of today are designed as opposed to those of yesterday."

(Darren Northcott a.k.a. @darrennorthcott ~ UX Booth)

Posted by PJB on August 21, 2012 | Classification: Information architecture - User experience | Permalink

Enterprise Content Strategy Comes Down To Governance and Workflow

Enterprises, the new hunting grounds for experience design.

"The problem today is that this bastion of the Industrial Revolution remains as businesses try to mobilize their human capital for the content demands of an always connected marketplace. Further complicating matters, workforce downsizing and the flattening of corporate hierarchies in the mid 1990's continues to cripple many organizations in their ability to deliver the content needed to be successful in the Information Age."

(Kris Mausser a.k.a. @krismausser ~ Follow the UX leader)

Posted by PJB on August 21, 2012 | Classification: Content management - Content strategy | Permalink

Designing Screens Using Cores and Paths: Designing from the inside out

Patterns are the designer's best friend.

"Typically in web design, the opposite approach is the rule: designers begin with the homepage. They then work out a navigation scheme, which pages at the bottom of the site hierarchy automatically inherit whether it's appropriate or not. The goal - or the primary content people are looking for or tasks they are trying to get done - turns out to be the last thing that gets attention in the design process."

(James Kalbach a.k.a. @JamesKalbach ~ Boxes and Arrows)

Posted by PJB on August 21, 2012 | Classification: Information design - Patterns | Permalink

Recent Research in User Experience

Research, the most important activity in user experience.

"In this column, let's take a look at some recent technology developments that promise to change the landscape of user experience in the months and years to come (...)"

(Peter Hornsby ~ UXmatters)

Posted by PJB on August 20, 2012 | Classification: User experience | Permalink

The State of Design Practice

Follow the Money, but money isn't following the Experience.

"An overriding theme mentioned by many concerned the lack of understanding regarding the need for, execution of, and requisite resources required for User Experience Design. This resulted in insufficient importance given to design and inadequate resources being applied to it."

(Karel Vredenburg)

Posted by PJB on August 20, 2012 | Classification: UCD - User experience | Permalink

The gadfly of information architecture

Always a delight to have him speak.

Q&A with Richard Saul Wurman ~ "At a sprightly 77 years, Mr Wurman is the author of scores of books on technology and design, and is credited with having coined the term "information architect". During the interview, he was true to his eccentric, irascible self, which has inspried many to his causes. "We can't make use of success or failure from one place or another because we have no common language," he says metaphorically. "We also have no common language in medicine. We have very few common languages," he says. "You need common filters. In all this big data, you need filters, because often innovation comes from this filter, because you can see a pattern. And I'm interested in those patterns.""

(The Economist)

Posted by PJB on August 16, 2012 | Classification: Information architecture - Interviews | Permalink

Touch Targets for Application Design

Principles for touch-based user interfaces.

"(...) deeper dive into designing touch-based interactions. That is, how large we need to make our application controls and where should we place them on screen in order to optimize for touch. In addition to general guidelines, I also showcase a before and after design that converts a keyboard and mouse application to a touch-optimized interface by rethinking navigation, input controls, and more."

(Luke Wroblewski a.k.a. @LukeW)

Posted by PJB on August 16, 2012 | Classification: HCI - Mobile design - Tablet design | Permalink

Design for a Thriving UX Ecosystem

Products and services morphing into digital ecologies, ecosystems and habitats. No more spaces?

"As social media technologies and computer-supported, collaborative activities become more ubiquitous in people's work and everyday lives, UX professionals need to expand their skills and focus to take on broader experiences than just individual users engaged with single applications. It is crucial to understand people as social, cultural, and organizational components who are linked to other people, other technologies, and loads of information. The UX field is primed to step beyond just designing applications, and it's time to start thinking about the UX ecosystems in which these users and applications exist. The best way to begin that transition is to think in terms of biology."

(Dave Jones a.k.a. @Dave_L_Jones ~ UX Magazine)

Posted by PJB on August 15, 2012 | Classification: User experience | Permalink

Why Customer Experience Is The Only Thing That Matters

Business survival by going for the experiential of products, services and environments.

"The only source of competitive advantage is the one that can survive technology-fueled disruption: an obsession with customer experience."

(Harley Manning ~ Fast Company)

Posted by PJB on August 14, 2012 | Classification: Customer experience | Permalink

User Experience Design and Information Architecture: Centered and Bounded Sets

Experiential to the max.

"The ease and fluency with which designers and clients alike can move into and around the centered set of practices and concepts of UXD brings with it a marvelous opportunity to re-define a bounded set for the remnant of cats for whom the bucket of design is interesting but not the central thing drawing one in, and for which the place of beginning isn't end users and designing their experiences."

(Dan Klyn a.k.a. @danklyn ~ Wildly Appropriate)

Posted by PJB on August 14, 2012 | Classification: Information architecture - User experience | Permalink

Tablet Versus PC: A Creative Decision

Computers with a different form factor, but a computer.

"Both tablets and traditional PCs have strengths in content creation, but they are strengths of different types. And their different strengths have more to do with the creative process than the content itself. This assessment of the nature of these differences that I’ve outlined here is an intuition that needs further validation through research."

(Ryan Bell ~ UXmatters)

Posted by PJB on August 14, 2012 | Classification: Tablet design | Permalink

SEO and Usability

Designing for humans, not machines.

"What makes a website good will also give it a high SERP rank, but overly tricky search engine optimization can undermine the user experience."

(Jakob Nielsen ~ Alertbox)

Posted by PJB on August 14, 2012 | Classification: Usability | Permalink

Why Top Execs are Starting to Care About UX Design

Crossing the border to CX.

"Garrett shares how research, psychology, behavior and design can open the doors to meaningful creativity for design and product experience strategies. But more importantly, he shares how executives across the organization can learn from the UX team to improve services, business models and overall customer relationships."

(Brian Solis a.k.a. briansolis ~ Mashable)

Posted by PJB on August 14, 2012 | Classification: Interviews - User experience | Permalink