Improving the Design of Business and Interactive System Concepts in a Digital Business Consultancy

摘要

It is commonly acknowledged that the design of interactive systems requires involvement of multiple disciplines [e.g., 1,13], and firms galore claim to employ a multidisciplinary process. Though there is increasing similarity among the nature of the disciplines different firms involve in the process, the extent of integration of those multiple disciplines in the work - the extent to which they work together - varies greatly in practice. It is also increasingly acknowledged that the design of interactive systems should be "user-centered" (or some variation on that term, e.g., human-centered, goal-directed,...), and firms galore claim to employ a "user-centered" process. But the extent to which that claim is true varies greatly in practice, and numerous attempts have been made in numerous organizations at increasing the extent to which it is true - attempts often perceived to be hindered by claims for a need for the process to be both faster and cheaper. This paper describes two efforts at significantly increasing the extent to which design was user-centered via thorough involvement of multiple disciplines in early user research and in the synthesis of the findings and their application to design activities, including the design of business strategy. In one case, involved parties were all employees of an e-business consultancy attempting to develop a business venture in-house involving the management and use of personal media by both consumers and businesses. In a second case (which followed the first), involved parties also included members of a client organization - a FORTUNE 100 business - for which the consultancy was working to develop initial strategies and designs for improving internal collaboration and knowledge management. In both cases, little time and money existed for the work, and most participants had never before employed the introduced activities. We describe what we did and why, and how well what we did worked. Particularly interesting were the affects of organizational culture and politics on success, both during the projects and on long-term adoption of a more collaborative, user-centered process.