Susan Reale has watched the jobs of usability engineer and usability tester
grow and cross into the mainstream right alongside the Internet. She was working
in market research in the 1980s. She was moderating focus groups to gather
the public's thoughts about services, products and ideas. She applied these
skills to do usability testing of websites when the general public began using
the Internet in the mid-1990s.
"I came in at the beginning when the Internet was being developed. I gained
experience when no one else was doing this," she says.
Reale is a qualitative and usability research consultant with her own company
REALeResearch. Her job is a cycle of communication, which starts with the
client. She needs to find out what the client needs to know from users. Next
she needs to develop interview questions and other methods to test the user's
experience with the client's product.
Testing and interviewing users keep her on her toes.
"An [improvisation] acting class I took has helped me more than any other
class!" says Reale half-jokingly. She has a bachelor of arts in broadcast
and electronic communication arts. "It taught me how to go with the flow with
people. You have to be really good with people and think on your feet."
Once she has gathered the information from users of the product, she must
bring all the information together in a report. She also includes her own
recommendations for improvement based on what she discovered.
"You have to be a good writer," she says.
Reale loves her job. She says it can be very social at times. She adds
that there are also positions for behind-the-scenes development that involve
less human interaction. So there's a place for people with all types of skills.
Jerome Nadel agrees that there are different levels for professionals in
this career. He is the chief experience officer at Human Factors International
in Boston.
One level is the technical practitioner who does testing work. At a higher
level, the strategist embraces business and can turn effective design into
profits.
Nadel says there is a key difference between the two types of roles. The
technical worker tests to make sure a user can do something, such as
buy a product online. They ask, "Does this screen work?"
At higher levels, usability professionals ask if a user will do
something. They use the design of the website to influence the user to buy.
For usability engineers to be able to influence users, they do not evaluate
a single screen or web page. They look at the big picture and the company's
"digital strategy."
For example, Nadel worked with a resort company. It wanted to increase
its online bookings for travel packages. The company found that users were
looking at the web page and then phoning a travel agent -- even though they
could book online.
The company makes less money when packages are booked through a travel
agent. So, it is in their best interest to encourage customers to book online.
However, Nadel found that people weren't able to make decisions online.
All the packages looked equally good. Users needed advice and reassurance
from a travel agent to make them feel confident that they were choosing the
right vacation.
The solution was to make the website more intelligent and centered around
the needs of the customer. This way the interaction between the user and the
site would be more like the experience with a call center representative.
With every click, something is learned about the customer's interests.
The website then builds a profile of the customer. The profile is used to
better serve the customer. For example, if a user clicked on snorkeling activities,
the site could suggest other vacations with great snorkeling.
Nadel says even big banks are embracing user experience as a valuable business
strategy. People are now believers, and Nadel no longer has to prove that
embracing usability will bring profits.
John Hossack works to help clients understand the value and benefits of
the user experience. He is a vice-president of usability and business development.
He wants clients to know usability testing is a worthwhile exercise.
"I love solving people's problems and seeing the benefits of our work,"
says Hossack. He works with project managers and user experience analysts.
He also coordinates with clients. That means creating proposals, setting
fees and making contracts.
Hossack enjoys working with many different clients.
"We're always looking at something new. There are always new challenges,"
he says. Sometimes it takes a long time for the client to make the changes
that his team suggests. Waiting can be frustrating for usability professionals.
But changing the structure of a website is not as simple as fixing a spelling
mistake.
Hossack recommends starting your own project to gain experience in the
industry. Whether it's a website, a blog or a small business, it can help
you learn the ropes.
"It will speak volumes to an employer about you and show that you're a
self-starter and a self-learner," he says.
He suggests starting a business with your friends. You can each take on
a different responsibility.
"You'll all go off and get different jobs, but hopefully you'll keep up
your small business and even make some money," he says. Gaining experience
is a great way to break into this field.
Paul Sherman has been working in usability for 10 years. He is also the
president of the Usability Professionals' Association. He has
a PhD, but he says he only uses his background in psychology about 10 percent
of the time.
"A lot of what we do doesn't require skills you learn at school. It's the
soft skills that you gain through experience," he says.
When he looks at a project, he begins by gathering information.
For example, developers want to build a site for people over 50 to upload
and share photos. Sherman studies this group of people. He thinks about their
skill levels with software. He thinks about what they might want to do with
the photos. The users' motivations and goals are important to consider when
targeting a service to them. He builds a persona or profile of the target
user.
The second stage -- design -- is informed by the profile.
The third stage is validation. He brings in people from the profile group
and tests to see if the design works for them.
Sherman says many companies start at stage three and "crawl back to stage
one." But user experience is becoming more and more valued by companies. Usability
engineers are helping companies get it right the first time.