The Impact of Applied Usability:  A Case Study

The following example is an exploration of the impact of my applying a quantitative usability method that I developed, in tandem with known qualitative methods.  This design test provided a unique numerical measure of the effects of those methods, in terms of dollars saved by an organization for which a team had developed a daily use software application.  This particular measure was achieved and could be repeated through low cost, low fidelity empirical testing developed at ARL.  The results can be extended into a cost savings analysis that can demonstrate the benefits of your project team’s work.

The project was an experimental piece of software developed at a research laboratory for use by military analyst/trainers, who were already having to track multiple applications and information inputs in their daily work.  Early in the project, I and a usability team mate had performed heuristic evaluations of the design, identifying these problems and providing design feedback to the development team.  The development team believed the problems would be low impact on the user, and would take too much time to fix, so the design remained as it was.

I had previously developed the Optimal Path Test Method (OPT Method) as a way to conduct usability test sessions in a rapid, low cost, low fidelity, repeatable manner, that would capture user behaviors as numeric data which could be analyzed.  In testing the initial design of that software application, there were three areas identified by empirical user observation, where clusters of user errors were committed. 

Totals of 36, 54, and 23 errors, respectively, were committed by seven users.  These clusters of user errors indicated the potential for design changes, which were made during this last project cycle.  I demonstrated the impact of these errors by accounting for the amount of time required for each user to respond to the error, the number of times per day that the users would encounter the error, and the average salary plus benefits and overhead costs of the user population.  The results of those calculations are shown in Table 1.

These design flaws were repaired by the development team and retested by the usability team.  Retests on all three elements had a zero error rate.  Multiplied by the 100 users affected, these three small design changes saved the customer organization $248,645 per year for a product that would be used over a number of years.

My Teaching and Training Experiences

 Since the age of 15 when I taught 3^rd graders, solo, in Sunday School class, I have been a teacher in one capacity or another.  The student’s goals are the drivers behind how I approach classes as a whole, and each student as an individual.  The objective is always learning; to remain in integrity, my objective in the service role of teaching must not deteriorate to serving my own needs and wants, requiring the students to adjust to me.

Teaching has always come naturally to me, but as a scientist and professional I have honed it through training, disciplined practice, and structured methods. Following receipt of my Master’s degree, I was asked to teach more courses which were suited to detailed lesson planning and systematic approaches. I sought out a year of private tutoring in curriculum design and instruction.  Using the Gagne Systems Approach model, I developed detailed curricula for real-world courses and was observed and evaluated in teaching those courses, receiving active review and feedback of my work.  Since that time I have developed and taught multiple courses.

College students, adults, third graders, all have commonalities which I leverage, as well as differences which I enjoy and for which I am skilled at adapting.  My natural abilities stem from vigilant awareness and recognition of individual and group responses.  Those abilities, sharpened by skills acquired over more than twenty years, allow me to use those responses to advantage.  I instantly change tactics, approaches, or restate concepts to “get in” and to, as Socrates and Montessori stated, to find “the teachable moment.” Understanding the needs of the human body and mind are critical to the student’s success in learning, and to my success in mentoring them to completion. 

My special love and what energizes me most of any type of research are the studies or portions of studies that I have designed and mentored for students.  If that was the only research I did, I would be content.