Creating a User Experience “SWAT Team”

If you are a member of a user experience design team, you are probably very busy right now. UX design is in high demand many companies have finally realized that a focus on design and the user experience is the “secret sauce” that improves customer satisfaction, increase sales, and generally separates their offerings from the competition.

But with this increased demand often comes increased pressure – multiple projects and multiple stakeholders vying for the same limited resources. How to cope? Well, I have started to adopt some methods that will (hopefully) allow me to grow a UX “SWAT Team” that can better adapt and deal with such demands.

SWAT, as you may know. stands for special weapons and tactics, and SWAT teams perform high-risk operations normal police officers are not equipped to handle. Therefore, I think of UX “SWAT team” as one that can be pulled into any situation, execute quickly and affectively, and then quickly move on to another project. Here are the methods that I am applying to set my team up for success:

Know your limitations – and define the rules of engagement

I’ve seen many projects where the roles and responsibilities of the project were ill-defined, and the project went on and on and on…. Don’t let that happen. SWAT teams always have clear objectives and define who does what when – not having such coordination could cost lives. While a UX project usually doesn’t have such high stakes, not having the rules of engagement defined will usually lead to unneeded stress, missed deadlines and miscommunication.

Take the time to form your plan and define EXACTLY what your team will do to support the project. And don’t overdo it – find out exactly what deliverables the stakeholders need and provide them – don’t spend two weeks producing a findings document when developers need design specifications.

”Specialization is for insects”

The above is one of my favorite quotes, from author Robert A. Heinlein, and one that I have tried to apply in my own life. The idea behind it is simple – be good at many different disciplines instead of being great at only a handful of things. Having a UX team filled with people with varied skills allows you to react to the needs of any new project much better than if you have a team who only does one or two things well.

Get Things Done

I’m a big David Allen fan, and Allen’s Getting Things Done action management method has been incredibly useful to me and several of my colleagues. If only some of Allen’s approaches are applied across your UX team you will see a marked increase in productivity – and a significant reduction in stress.

Test quickly, and test often

If you are revising an existing design, do informal usability tests as soon as you can, even if it’s with friends and family – to get sense of the “baseline” of the system. It will give you much-needed context – or “intel” – to see what design challenges you may be facing. Then test again – even if it’s thin wireframes sketches. Finally, interview end users as soon as you can, even if its by phone, to understand their perceptions and needs.

Use the right tools (as applicable)

I’m a big fan of the Axure rapid prototyping tool, which allows you to both mockup UI designs and document them (in fact I wrote a case study on a project that successfully leveraged the software) – if you have not tried it, you can download a demo from axure.com (and thankfully a version for OS X is being developed). But you shouldn’t tie yourself to this (or any) tool if it doesn’t work for you – you should be focusing on the design problem, not the process of figuring out how to make things happen in a software program. Use paper, pencil, and whiteboards to iterate and ideate quickly.

(Speaking of whiteboards, take advantage of a great new service called Qipit, which allows you to send photos from your phone or computer which are then converted to PDFs. You can send several photos at once and they will be integrated into a single document. It’s free, so try it.)

Over-communication is key

Never operate in a vacuum – always keep project stakeholders in the loop, even if you don’t think they need to be. At worse, they will ignore your e-mail updates… but I have found that more often than not such constant communications increases confidence in the abilities of your team and whatever results they produce. Over-communicate internally as well, to make sure everyone knows who is doing what and that they are on the “same page.”

Use the Scotty method of estimation

NEVER underestimate how long it will take to do something… apply the Scotty method. Scotty (from Star Trek, of course) always overestimates and then… well, just read this chunk of dialogue:

Kirk: “How long to re-fit?”
Scotty: “Eight weeks. But you don’t have eight weeks, so I’ll do it for you in two.”
Kirk: “Do you always multiply your repair estimates by a factor of four?”
Scotty: “How else to maintain my reputation as a miracle worker?”
Kirk: “Your reputation is safe with me.”

Be Sociable, Share!

•