Improving the user experience incrementally?

[William Pietri]

Hi, folks. Every day, people sign up for this group, often mentioning
things that they are hoping to learn more about. But few of them ask
directly. That's only natural, but it leaves me suspecting that a lot of
people aren't getting all they want out of this group.

To see if we can change that, I'm going to start going back through
subscription requests, starting discussions around common themes.
Novices, consider this an invitation to speak up with specific
questions. Everybody else, please chime in, especially if you feel
you've got experience or advice that would help those new to the topic.

First up: In theory, agile processes, with their frequent releases and
even-more-frequent iterations, provide a lot of opportunity to
continuously improve the user experience. When is that promise
fulfilled? How can designers best take advantage of that? And when
things fall short, what steps have people taken to remedy that?


Curiously,

William

[leina elgohari]

Hello William
 
Thanks. A very nice topic to start off with.
 
I have another burning question:
How do you measure each incremental improvement? Is it possible to do that?
 
Many Thanks
Lee


--- On Sat, 2/14/09, William Pietri <william@...> wrote:


From: William Pietri <william@...>
Subject: [agile-usability] Improving the user experience incrementally?
To: agile-usability@...
Date: Saturday, February 14, 2009, 11:06 PM







Hi, folks. Every day, people sign up for this group, often mentioning
things that they are hoping to learn more about. But few of them ask
directly. That's only natural, but it leaves me suspecting that a lot of
people aren't getting all they want out of this group.

To see if we can change that, I'm going to start going back through
subscription requests, starting discussions around common themes.
Novices, consider this an invitation to speak up with specific
questions. Everybody else, please chime in, especially if you feel
you've got experience or advice that would help those new to the topic.

First up: In theory, agile processes, with their frequent releases and
even-more-frequent iterations, provide a lot of opportunity to
continuously improve the user experience. When is that promise
fulfilled? How can designers best take advantage of that? And when
things fall short, what steps have people taken to remedy that?

Curiously,

William

[Mike Dwyer-2]

Questions like this need to be carefully examined.  I read the word
'incremental' but the conversation sounds more like iterative questions.  I
know picky, picky, picky.  But these two words follow significantly
different paths in Agile workframes.   Incremental is working on chinks of a
large well defined and measurably verifiable delivery.  If you do not have
all of these items then it might be advisable to first decide what the gap
is from what you have to work with and this ideal.  At the other end of the
spectrum is iterative.  Iterative work contains more exploration,
experimentation, and research and therefore values the lessons learned
through failure as much if not more than success.  In fact success may be
viewed as a lucky accident by those who are valuing the learning more than
the creation of something.

 

So to answer the measure question you need to make sure what you have to
work with and how you are going to do it aligns with your measures.  Poorly
defined, vague and inexact goals are best served by iterative work while
highly defined, quantitatively measurable work is best measured through
incremental.   The secret to the sauce is the mixing of the two and the
secret to success is making it clear what you are doing and how you are
doing it.  You might find a blog on this interesting.

http://www.bigvisible.com/mdwyer/incremental-or-iterative-an-agile-fork-in-t
he-road/

\

 

Mike Dwyer
Principal, Agile Coach

BigVisible Solutions
url:    http://www.bigvisible.com <http://www.bigvisible.com/>

cell:   [phone]

email: mdwyer@... <mailto:asingh@...>

 

 

From: leina elgohari [mailto:leina_elgohari@...]
Sent: Monday, February 16, 2009 9:04 AM
To: agile-usability@...
Subject: Re: [agile-usability] Improving the user experience incrementally?

 


Hello William

 

Thanks. A very nice topic to start off with.

 

I have another burning question:

How do you measure each incremental improvement? Is it possible to do that?

 

Many Thanks

Lee



--- On Sat, 2/14/09, William Pietri <william@...> wrote:


From: William Pietri <william@...>
Subject: [agile-usability] Improving the user experience incrementally?
To: agile-usability@...
Date: Saturday, February 14, 2009, 11:06 PM


Hi, folks. Every day, people sign up for this group, often mentioning
things that they are hoping to learn more about. But few of them ask
directly. That's only natural, but it leaves me suspecting that a lot of
people aren't getting all they want out of this group.

To see if we can change that, I'm going to start going back through
subscription requests, starting discussions around common themes.
Novices, consider this an invitation to speak up with specific
questions. Everybody else, please chime in, especially if you feel
you've got experience or advice that would help those new to the topic.

First up: In theory, agile processes, with their frequent releases and
even-more-frequent iterations, provide a lot of opportunity to
continuously improve the user experience. When is that promise
fulfilled? How can designers best take advantage of that? And when
things fall short, what steps have people taken to remedy that?

Curiously,

William




 
 

[Anders Ramsay]

Mike -

I think you raise an important issue here, regarding the distinction
between iterative and incremental.  I constantly encounter people
using these very different concepts interchangeably.  Cockburn is
probably the most prominent crusader when it comes to preaching the
difference between these two.  I like his most recent way of
clarifying how they are different: "Incremental means adding,
iterative means reworking" http://is.gd/jHCU

He also phrases it nicely in his "Agile Software Development" book,
describing iterating as "learning by completing."  I think what's most
important in that statement is what is implied: taking what you learn
and possibly **revising your design based on what you learned from
your previous iteration.** Iterating, then, is about evolving through
creating, while incrementing simply is, as Cockburn describes it,
"developing pieces of the system at different rates or times and
integrating as they are developed."

On Mon, Feb 16, 2009 at 11:23 AM, Mike Dwyer <mdwyer@...> wrote:

> Questions like this need to be carefully examined.  I read the word
> 'incremental' but the conversation sounds more like iterative questions.  I
> know picky, picky, picky.  But these two words follow significantly
> different paths in Agile workframes.   Incremental is working on chinks of a
> large well defined and measurably verifiable delivery.  If you do not have
> all of these items then it might be advisable to first decide what the gap
> is from what you have to work with and this ideal.  At the other end of the
> spectrum is iterative.  Iterative work contains more exploration,
> experimentation, and research and therefore values the lessons learned
> through failure as much if not more than success.  In fact success may be
> viewed as a lucky accident by those who are valuing the learning more than
> the creation of something.
>
>
>
> So to answer the measure question you need to make sure what you have to
> work with and how you are going to do it aligns with your measures.  Poorly
> defined, vague and inexact goals are best served by iterative work while
> highly defined, quantitatively measurable work is best measured through
> incremental.   The secret to the sauce is the mixing of the two and the
> secret to success is making it clear what you are doing and how you are
> doing it.  You might find a blog on this interesting.
>
> http://www.bigvisible.com/mdwyer/incremental-or-iterative-an-agile-fork-in-the-road/
>
> \
>
>
>
> Mike Dwyer
> Principal, Agile Coach
>
> BigVisible Solutions
> url:    http://www.bigvisible.com
>
> cell:   [phone]
>
> email: mdwyer@...
>
>
>
>
>
> From: leina elgohari [mailto:leina_elgohari@...]
> Sent: Monday, February 16, 2009 9:04 AM
> To: agile-usability@...
> Subject: Re: [agile-usability] Improving the user experience incrementally?
>
>
>
> Hello William
>
>
>
> Thanks. A very nice topic to start off with.
>
>
>
> I have another burning question:
>
> How do you measure each incremental improvement? Is it possible to do that?
>
>
>
> Many Thanks
>
> Lee
>
> --- On Sat, 2/14/09, William Pietri <william@...> wrote:
>
> From: William Pietri <william@...>
> Subject: [agile-usability] Improving the user experience incrementally?
> To: agile-usability@...
> Date: Saturday, February 14, 2009, 11:06 PM
>
> Hi, folks. Every day, people sign up for this group, often mentioning
> things that they are hoping to learn more about. But few of them ask
> directly. That's only natural, but it leaves me suspecting that a lot of
> people aren't getting all they want out of this group.
>
> To see if we can change that, I'm going to start going back through
> subscription requests, starting discussions around common themes.
> Novices, consider this an invitation to speak up with specific
> questions. Everybody else, please chime in, especially if you feel
> you've got experience or advice that would help those new to the topic.
>
> First up: In theory, agile processes, with their frequent releases and
> even-more-frequent iterations, provide a lot of opportunity to
> continuously improve the user experience. When is that promise
> fulfilled? How can designers best take advantage of that? And when
> things fall short, what steps have people taken to remedy that?
>
> Curiously,
>
> William
>
>

[William Pietri]

Hi, Mike! Great point. I agree.

Mike Dwyer wrote:
>
> [...] I read the word 'incremental' but the conversation sounds more
> like iterative questions.  I know picky, picky, picky.  But these two
> words follow significantly different paths in Agile workframes.
>   Incremental is working on chinks of a large well defined and
> measurably verifiable delivery. [...]
>


Just to be clear, I meant frequent iteration with incremental
improvement, rather than incremental delivery. In other words, the user
experience would get a bit better every iteration, but the particular
changes made would be chosen over the course of time, rather than all up
front.

A number of people joining the list are clearly concerned about how one
achieves that in practice. Designers, any tips?

William

[Dan Harrelson-2]

Hi William,

At Adaptive Path we often speak to improving the UX over time as "The  
Long Wow". It's a phrase coined by my colleague, Brandon. The idea is  
to look at your product over time and plan to impress customers again  
and again. This fosters loyalty and sets expectations in customers'  
minds that if they keep using your product, it'll just keep getting  
better.

In practice, I find that clients often want to chunk work into phases  
based on operational constraints. They push off feature X because the  
new database will be online for phase 2.

Instead, I try to get them to think about the phases of the customer  
experience. At launch, what features will give customers a taste of  
your product's potential? How can you hint at what's to come? What  
features do you add three months later to wow current users and to  
show appreciation to early adopters? What feature do you turn on just  
before Christmas as a special gift? Here's a hint.... it's rarely  
performance improvement that makes customers say wow.

Here's Brandon's essay and slides on the topic:
http://www.adaptivepath.com/ideas/essays/archives/000858.php
http://www.slideshare.net/brandonschauer/the-long-wow-358486

...Dan


On Feb 16, 2009, at 9:48 AM, William Pietri wrote:

> Hi, Mike! Great point. I agree.
>
> Mike Dwyer wrote:
>>
>> [...] I read the word ‘incremental’ but the conversation sounds  
>> more like iterative questions.  I know picky, picky, picky.  But  
>> these two words follow significantly different paths in Agile  
>> workframes.   Incremental is working on chinks of a large well  
>> defined and measurably verifiable delivery. [...]
>
>
> Just to be clear, I meant frequent iteration with incremental  
> improvement, rather than incremental delivery. In other words, the  
> user experience would get a bit better every iteration, but the  
> particular changes made would be chosen over the course of time,  
> rather than all up front.
>
> A number of people joining the list are clearly concerned about how  
> one achieves that in practice. Designers, any tips?
>
> William
>
>
>