Change Management : A Catch-22

The catch-22

The levels at which impacts of change are major are not understood while the levels at which impacts are minor are easily understood.

Why?

Human Error Part 2: Management Error

You arrive at home after a long day and you rush to prepare food. You turn-on the burner but oups !, you realize that you activated the wrong burner. You feel frustrated and tell yourself “I should have paid more attention”. If it is a new stove, you might tell to yourself “I should have look at the instructions”. Some might even blame themselves for this error.

Human Error Part 1: De la Concorde Overpass

In September 2006, a bridge collapsed in Laval (a Montreal suburb), resulting in 5 deaths. An inquiry, the Johnson commission, is trying to understand this event and prior incidents.

As always, multiple factors are involved in this accident: bad design, shoddy construction, poor repairs and substandard construction materials. These factors are always boiled down to human errors: a design, planning, executions or maintenance errors.

Apple, Steve Jobs, Innovation and Iphone

Apple is as hot topic in the business these days because of the Iphone. Apple’s innovation success is on the front page of The Economist July 9^th edition.

The Economist retains 4 lessons from apple:

1. Innovation can come from outside. In the case of Apple, the GUI (graphical user interface) was invented at the Xerox Park by a group that included Larry Tesler who later went to Apple to work on the Apple Lisa and the Mac. The Ipod OS (operating system) was designed by Pixo, an external firm. To do so, making a

Sketching User Experience

I just finished the book « Sketching User Experience » by Bill Buxton. This book in my view is an important book. It will have a profound impact on the designer community. They will say:

“WOW, I should have used this or that sketching technique and I would have saved huge amounts of time and money instead of building those expensive prototypes”.

It broadens the concept of sketching to the user interaction or in other words user experience.

In Wikipedia, a sketch is defined as a rapidly executed freehand drawing that is not intended as a finished work.

The objective of a sketch is to verify an idea rapidly and cheaply. Bill extends the concept to user experience. He describes a multitude of sketching techniques such as Wizard of Oz, Video, and paper mockup as a way to test user experience rapidly and cheaply.

Michel Leblanc Conference

I recently assisted at a speech given by Michel Leblanc at the Big Bang on may 17, 2007. This is certainly one of the best speeches I have ever attended. I can assure you I have seen some, I have just arrived from the CHI 2007 conference in San Jose.

Usability versus Usefulness

You have to provide your friend with driving directions to come to your home. All of a sudden, your are struggling. Is it two or three stops before turning right? Providing a direction can be very difficult even if you take that route everyday.

Cognition is distributed. Because our memory is optimized, our knowledge is ingrained within our

What is Usability?

Usability expresses the ease with which people can employ a particular tool or object in order to achieve a particular goal. Usability can also refer to the methods of measuring usability and the study of the principles behind an object’s perceived efficiency.

In human-computer interaction and computer science, usability usually refers to the efficiency or ease of learning with which the interaction with a computer program or a web site is designed.

Usability can be extended to multiple contexts such as consumer electronics, written instruction or mechanical objects.

Usability metrics are essentially:

What is Distributed Cognition?

Distributed cognition proposes that human knowledge and cognition are not confined to the individual. Instead, they are distributed by placing memories, facts, or knowledge on the objects, individuals, and tools in our environment.

Distributed cognition puts emphasis on the individual and his environment. In essence, when observing a user in real work setting, we take into account how knowledge is distributed among other users, tools, documents, and information systems.

Having the right information on time.

The primary ingredient for making right decisions is having the right information on time. Information is often gathered through meetings, interviews, focus group or surveys. Unfortunately, these techniques do not always provide all the insight and facts.