User-centered design is a philosophy and a process in which the needs, wants, and limitations of the end user of an interface or document are given extensive attention at each stage of the design process. It is often seen as an offshoot of the usability movement, and a progenitor of the experience design and interaction design movements.
#21054
Engineers Make Obvious Design Mistakes
The engineers who build the products people use every day are not experts in user behaviour, and they frequently make mistakes that cause lost time and immeasurable frustration. Interaction designers could improve thousands upon thousands of products, leaving engineers to deal with the areas of their interest and experience.
Baker, Adam. Merges.net (2001). Design>User Interface>Engineering>User Centered Design
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Enhancing Customer Satisfaction by Assuring Documentation Quality 
From the customer's perspective, an important and visible part of a product or service is its documentation. Bellcore's Technical Publications (Tech Pubs) organization uses a Quality Assurance (QA) program that focuses on enhancing customer satisfaction through delivering high-quality documentation. This program emphasizes a 'network' approach to documentation development, whereby technical writers can most efficiently use the support network of QA reviewers and management available to them. The Tech Pubs QA program draws on the needs of clients and the expertise of technical writers to strive to achieve the highest level of quality possible in producing documentation.
Dolese, Cathy and Tara Durkin. STC Proceedings (1993). Articles>Documentation>Quality>User Centered Design
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Ensuring A Successful CMS Implementation
The single most important factor in a successful CMS implementation lies with you and your people. Your staff members are the principal users of the system, and the SMEs in your organization are the secondary users. It is their adoption of the new processes and governance structures that makes or breaks a CMS implementation. According to some, process and cultural change accounts for 90%, while technology contributes only 10% to the success of a CMS.
Hamer, Emma C. Rockley Bulletin (2007). Articles>Content Management>User Centered Design>Collaboration
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Envisioning the Whole Digital Person
As a human society, we're quite possibly looking at the largest surge of recorded information that has ever taken place, and at this point, we have only the most rudimentary tools for managing all this information--in part because we cannot predict what standards will be in place in 10, 50, or 100 years.
Follett, Jonathan. UXmatters (2007). Articles>User Centered Design>Information Design>Databases
#26095
Ergonomics As Customer Focused Risk Management
We often see investment in new working environments, expensive software and equipment wasted, because the real needs of the user and their tasks are not taken into account when the purchase or change is made.
System Concepts (2005). Articles>User Centered Design>Ergonomics
#23509
Ethnographic Methods: What Anthropology Teaches Us About Effective Usability Research 
When it comes to usability testing, the field of anthropology is offering new insight into effective research methodologies. Ethnography is a form of research that anthropologists developed to observe how people behave in their own environments — and it's catching on in product development.
Rosenbaum, Stephanie L. IBM (2001). Articles>User Centered Design>Methods>Usability
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Evangelize with Usability: Using Invalid Users to Sell User Centered Design to a large organization
In larger technology companies it can often be difficult to develop an understanding of the advantages of doing good product design early. As Alan Cooper told us, 'The word 'design' is toxic in the world of business'. More so with Interaction Design and User Centered Design processes which require to be done early, close to the beginning of a project while the product is being defined and the requirements written. It is not unusual to find a number of very skeptical people around, who question, the time, budget and effort which must go into these activities. So how do you overcome this skepticism? How do you sell Interaction Design to a skeptical audience? The answer is to use Usability Testing as your early option for evangelizing your new principles and approach. By carefully selecting a set of 'invalid' test participants, you can sow the seeds for future success. This strategy is not without it's risks and it could easily backfire if your design is not good. This short paper seeks to advise you how to select the candidate evangelists and how to manage the risks of showing them the product early, so that you get the desired result - an influential band of company evangelists to your User Centered Design cause. People who will go forth and spread the word that your efforts, the budget and the time are not only necessary but essential for the future success of the business.
UIdesign (2000). Design>Usability>User Centered Design>Interaction Design
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Ever Wondered What Your Users Looked at First?
Text-centric commercial websites are taking a pounding this year, with layoffs and closures affecting even the giants as advertising revenue streams slow. One result of this revenue squeeze shows in such widely read information sites as Forbes.com, The Economist, Salon.com and the Financial Times, all of which are experimenting with new web formats to better compete for readers.
Till, Francis. SitePoint (2001). Design>Web Design>User Centered Design
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Review: Everything and the Kitchen Sink
I've used personas for years (though some might regard my process as a slightly heretical perversion of the method). I always think about the big picture, and I was just thinking BIG about personas at work when The Persona Lifecycle landed on my desk. Given my review of what's out there, The Persona Lifecycle is the most comprehensive book on personas I've come across. If you're so inclined, it can taking you from novice to expert. The authors, Jonathan Pruit and Tamara Adlin, take advantage of extensive teaching experience and punctuate their discussion with lots of real-world examples, case studies, anecdotes, bright ideas and handy guidelines. That being said, it's not an easy read, and it's not for everybody.
Govella, Austin. Boxes and Arrows (2007). Articles>Reviews>User Centered Design>Personas
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The Evolving Homepage: The Growth of Three Booksellers
What lessons have we learned about how design improves the interface between customers and companies? Perhaps we can start by asking how websites have actually changed over time, and from that we can learn how websites should change in the future.
Lombardi, Victor. Boxes and Arrows (2002). Design>Web Design>User Centered Design
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Expanding the Approaches to User Experience
Jesse James Garrett’s 'The Elements of User Experience' diagram has become rightly famous as a clear and simple model for the sorts of things that user experience professionals do. But as a model of user experience it presents an incomplete picture with some serious omissions—omissions I’ll try address with a more holistic model.
Olsen, George. Boxes and Arrows (2003). Articles>Information Design>User Experience>User Centered Design
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Exploring the World of User-Centered Design
Gribbons discusses trends in the marketplace that challenge the traditional view of technical communication and offer valuable opportunities for technical communicators in user-centered design.
Gribbons, William M. Intercom (2002). Articles>User Centered Design
#13798
Extending FDD for UI: Implementing Feature Driven Development on Presentation Layer Projects
Feature Driven Development is a model-driven short-iteration process for managing the analysis, design and construction phases of a software project. Feature Driven Development was developed in 1998 by Jeff De Luca following on the back of work by Peter Coad on Feature Lists. I was fortunate to have worked on the team, together with Stephen Palmer, Phil Bradley and Paul Szego, as we developed the FDD method and used it to deliver a very large project. So far the published material on FDD focuses on its use with the business layer piece of the system. Back in 1998 we also adapted the method to accommodate presentation and system interface layers. However, the early implementations for these other layers were never wholely satisfactory. Over the last 2 years I have continued to refine and develop FDD for use with presentation layers. This paper will set out my latest thinking on FDD for UI.
Anderson, David J. UIdesign (2001). Design>Web Design>User Centered Design
#31092
What is the biggest problem I face almost every time a client hires me to do something about a web project going awry? They don't know a thing about their users. They don't have a clue, whatsoever. Unbelievable but true!
Lafreniere, Daniel. Boxes and Arrows (2008). Articles>User Centered Design>Research>Usability
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Eyes Top Left: Lessons from Eyetrack III
Where do your eyes go when you read articles on the Web? What do you notice, and what do you miss? The upper left quarter of the screen gets the most attention, according to the Eyetrack III research of The Poynter Institute, the Estlow Center for Journalism & New Media, and Eyetools.
McAlpine, Rachel. Quality Web Content (2005). Articles>Web Design>User Centered Design>Eye Tracking
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The EZSort tool helps interface designers organize information based on users' expectations using statistical cluster analysis. This tool includes two packages -- USort and EZCalc. The USort program can be used by card sort participants to sort virtual cards with a simple GUI interface, instead of using physical cards. It can also be used by study administrators to generate card list and enter existing card sort result from individual participants. Once individual card sort results are captured by the USort package, test administrators can use the EZCalc package to manage card sort data from multiple participants, and perform cluster analyses. EZCalc generates tree diagrams that allow direct adjustment of the cluster thresholds. The packages can be used in designing Web sites, program interfaces, and many other information design applications.
IBM (1999). Resources>Software>User Centered Design>Card Sorting
#18938
Face to Face With Your Users: Running a Nondirected Interview
An interview is a funny situation. It's like a friendly conversation between strangers, but unlike the kind you may have on the bus. When chatting on the bus, people try very hard to agree with each other and to quickly communicate interesting information. Each person wants to be liked and adjusts the way they speak and what they say so as not to offend. This type of exchange is perfectly fine for maintaining civil society -- deeper exchanges can always happen as an acquaintance deepens -- but shallow banter isn't appropriate for an interview. You need to find out what someone is experiencing, what they're thinking, or what their real opinions are.
Kuniavsky, Mike. Adaptive Path (2003). Articles>User Centered Design>Interviewing>Usability
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Fancy Formatting, Fancy Words = Looks Like a Promotion = Ignored
One site did most things right, but still had a miserable 14% success rate for its most important task. The reason? Users ignored a key area because it resembled a promotion.
Nielsen, Jakob. Alertbox (2007). Design>Web Design>User Centered Design>Usability
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To explore information behavior from a psychological perspective by relating information seeking to personality traits and study approaches. Fast surfing could be related to a surface study approach and emotionality, as well as to low openness to experience and low conscientiousness. Broad scanning was linked to extraversion, openness, and competitiveness, whereas deep diving was a search pattern typical of analytical students with a deep and strategic study approach.
Heinström, Jannica. Journal of Documentation (2005). Articles>Web Design>User Centered Design>Cognitive Psychology
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Fast-Track User-Centered Design Techniques
The problem: we are being asked to do more UCD work, faster, and with smaller staffs. Sound familiar? Thirteen practitioners met in Asheville, N.C. at UPA 2000 to examine the questions of how we can reduce time and costs and still achieve good results. They developed many practical tips and considerations.
Bugental, J.O. 'Joe' and Kristin Travis. Usability Professionals Association (2001). Design>User Interface>User Centered Design
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Faster, Better, and Cheaper: The Software Development Life Cycle
Block shows how a technical writer's involvement in each stage of software development can lead to higher quality software products.
Block, Barbara M. Intercom (2001). Design>User Centered Design>Software
#23188
Faut-il Supprimer la Barre de Navigation?
Comment navigue un internaute? Qu'est ce qui le motive dans son parcours? Des études comportementales permettent de dégager des principes de base. Les façons d'agir ou de réagir des internautes sont désormais étudiées et testées. La navigation qui faisait la part belle à la structure technique du site se déplace vers une approche plus contextuelle. La barre de navigation va-t-elle donc disparaître?
Eminet, Bernard-Paul. Usabilis (2004). (French) Articles>Information Design>User Centered Design
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Ferrari or Fiesta, which do you prefer if price is not a consideration? What does go through our minds as we make such comparisons actually? Russell Beale presents us with his thoughts in user-centred design.
Beale, Russell. uiGarden (2005). Articles>User Centered Design
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Field Oriented Design Techniques: Case Studies and Organizing Dimensions
An article of faith among members of the CHI community is that successful design stems from the synthesis of a profound understanding of users' work and the capabilities offered by technology.
Wixon, Dennis and Judith A. Ramey. Microsoft (1995). Design>User Centered Design>Methods
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Field Studies: The Best Tool to Discover User Needs
The most valuable asset of a successful design team is the information they have about their users. When teams have the right information, the job of designing a powerful, intuitive, easy-to-use interface becomes tremendously easier. When they don't, every little design decision becomes a struggle. While techniques, such as focus groups, usability tests, and surveys, can lead to valuable insights, the most powerful tool in the toolbox is the 'field study'. Field studies get the team immersed in the environment of their users and allow them to observe critical details for which there is no other way of discovering.
Spool, Jared M. User Interface Engineering. Articles>User Centered Design>Methods>Usability
