If the hat fits–do you wear it?

Elyse Sanchez, Tuesday, June 27, 2006 @ 6:57 pm

I've just completed the first of three days of usability testing for a new educational online subscription product.  The multiple sessions are stacked consecutively; the 45-minute breaks I thought were ample in theory seemed to last as long as a single gasp today, as our team fought--not always successfully--an unfolding series of unfortunate technology events.

Still, I love the opportunity to do usability testing. I've been very fortunate in my career in UXD to have always worked in environments that did not create an unscalable wall between Information Architects and Usability Specialists. 

If research, including usability testing, can be defined as "diagnosis," and creation, including wireframes, site maps, taskflows, and the like, comprise "design," these two complementary, yin-yang aspects support, validate and enrich each other. I love the opportunity to play both of these roles, to wear both hats. I think it's made me better in each, and takes me back to my early education in arithmetic, where we "proved" the accuracy of any single answer through the complementary operation--the division problem was proved through multiplication, the subtraction problem through addition.

Usability testing diagnoses design. It's the analysis of user reaction as opposed to the creation of user action. Diagnosis looks outward to the users, acting upon the design; design looks inward, to the designers acting in lieu of the users.

Related posts:

1. Rethinking the Help System in an Ajax World
2. Unanswered Questions of User Research
3. Designers on Joel
4. Usability testing in the agile environment: an overview
5. Virtual Usability Testing

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