The future of User Experience

Brighton BarCamp 2009Jason MesutExperience Director

The Team

Agency/consultancy

What kind of audience do we have here?

Commercial organisationCharity

Developers DesignersBusiness people UX Pros

Looking back

What i’ll talk about today

Pushing forwardLooking forward

Looking back

Looking back Pushing forwardLooking forward

Looking back

Products Software Web 1.0 Web 2.0 Desktop integrationConnected devicesDigital services

Mobile web 2.0

Ergonomics

Usability engineering

User Experience

Service Design

UX and analytics

Experience planning

Initial emergenceMainstream practice

Looking back

Customer satisfaction

Product functionality

Excitement

We need to compete in the ‘domain of delight’ where latent (unspoken) needs live

Basic

Usability is a hygiene factor

Performance

User Experience is becoming a performance factor

Kano model-

+

Looking forward

Looking back Pushing forwardLooking forward

Future forces, driving us forwards

A Z

Quests for happier lives

Higher customer expectation

Convergent technologies

Designing for austerity/sustainability

Future barriers, holding us back

Fickle talent

Invaders to the market

Organisational change

Poor quality in the industry

Reduced costs

Higher customer expectation

Convergent technologies

Designing for austerity/sustainability

A Z

Physical and digital products/services will get closer to each other and to our needs

PD

H

Digital Physical

Human

Closer feedback loops and better interaction with people

D

H

Digital

Human

‣ Perpetual beta

‣ Beyond gestural - even more natural

‣ Greater meaning from data

‣ Swing between more social, and going dark

‣ Website not your product

‣ Syndication and aggregation

‣ Beautiful seams over seamless utopia

‣ Desktop, mobile, web, other device

People are thinking about digital services over websites

NHS Pregnancy Desktop

PD

H

Single view of customer is nirvana, butCRM is failing

PD

HPersonal details

Financial history

Purchase behaviour

Product/service usage

Health record

Social behaviour

New concepts will turn CRM on its head

Personal details

Financial history

Purchase behaviour

Product/service usage

Health record

Social behaviour

VRM

PD

H

Concepts like Vendor Relationship Management turn CRM on its head by allowing the user to own and protect their data, releasing the right chunks to different vendors under their control

Physical and Digital talking the same language

PDDigital Physical

‣ Single devices, multiple platforms

‣ Greater open standards between physical and digital products or services

‣ Devices will become more connected to each other and to digital services

Physical devices are becoming more connected - converging

02 Joggler Frontier Silicon digital radio

PD

H

or diverging...

Baker tweet - tweets followers when pastries are ready

PD

H

A change to physical products

P

H

Physical

Human

‣ Hardware designed to last

‣ Modular physical updates

‣ Continual firmware updates

‣ Users making products themselves

‣ A counter-trend against screen UI

User-makersPD

H

Co-design your own object with Ucodo.com, from Digital Forminghttp://property.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/property/interiors/article6804468.ece

Different user interpretations of Monome - a musical interface based on Open Source hardware, software and protocols

Away from screen UIPD

H

Generic forms - LCD dominant devices, limited affordance

...to more tactile interfacesPD

H

Banks of knobs - Behringer Midi controller

Push button interfaces with LED feedback - Monome

We will need integrated and holistic thinking

PD

H

‣ Holistic around behaviours and product/service interactions

‣ Work closer with other disciplines

‣ Media and channel-neutral strategists

‣ Still striving for great user experience

‣ Co-design

‣ Amateurisation of design

‣ Crowdsourcing of ideas

‣ The democratisation of brand and design is rocking our foundations - can it really be sustained?

People are getting more powerPD

H

‣ Sometimes better than the User Experience specialists

‣ Designers of all types - product, graphic, architects

‣ Developers, engineers

‣ Marketers, brand strategists, management consultants

‣ Savvy clients

Everyone doing UX designPD

H

‣ ...Service design, or Multi-channel experience design

Like User Experience, but...

‣ Considers the experience across all touchpoints (web, call-centre, direct marketing, face-to-face)

‣ Enforces co-design between user and agent

‣ Fuelled through observational ethnographically-derived techniques

PD

H...calling it something else...

Pushing forward

Looking back Pushing forwardLooking forward

‣ Keep searching for that sweet spot between customers needs, and a company’s capabilities

‣ Embrace other disciplines and the ‘Big idea’

‣ Focus more on back of stage - broadening empathy to spread to staff and their processes

‣ Build on the foundations of User Experience and User-Centred Design

‣ Specialise more

User Experience industry needs to adapt

We’ll all still have to find that sweet spot

http://idea-sandbox.com/blog_images/strategic_sweet_spot.png

‘Big Ideas’ will help provide stronger foundations...

...to help us come up with great ideas, not just implement and optimise good ones...

...to filter, prioritise, defend and better engage

1

2

3

4

5

Filter Prioritise Defend Engage

Users Technology

Business

We will still need a balance of empathy...

Successful products and servicesGreat brand/user experienceGreat design

Users Technology

Business

...but we need to care more about staff

Staff

Users Technology

Business

...and their processes

Staff Process

...by focusing on back of stage as much as front

Stage

Sustainable and evolving processesBetter data People that care Intelligent systems

Need to build on UX foundations

Consulting, planning, client

services

Project management, close collaboration, efficient processes, design patterns

...teams will need the same tri-core of talent

Creative

Experience Architecture Technology

Creative

Experience Architecture Technology

DigitalPlanning

Change Mgt

Business Analysis

...potentially with more roles

...more observation to uncover latent needs

Observational research

...more collaborative sketching (scamping)

Collaborative scamping

...paper prototyping for early insights

Paper prototyping

...interactive prototyping for finessing

Interactive prototyping

...less detailed specification for basics

‣ Teach others the basics

‣ Specialise more

‣ Prove the value of their work more

‣ Open their minds to brand, marketing and strategy consulting

‣ Learn from enthusiastic designers, developers

UX pros. will need to raise their game

‣ Information Architecture

‣ Interaction Design

‣ Experience Strategy

‣ User Research

Do less better - specialise more

★ Service Design

★ Physical device interaction design

★ Digital interaction design

★ Experience planning

★ Multi-channel experience strategy

★ Product management

The world is continuing to change around User Experience:

‣ Physical, digital and human interactions are becoming more harmonious

‣ Digital service thinking is replacing ‘website redesign’ thinking

‣ More disciplines are getting involved in User Experience

Conclusion

The User Experience industry needs to:

‣ Embrace other disciplines

‣ Build on foundations of User Experience and User Centred Design (UCD)

‣ Specialise more - do less better

Thank youJason Mesut

Experience DirectorThe Team

jasonmesutjasonmesut@gmail.com