Month: April 2014

The Human Scale, Agile and UX

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Last night, I saw the movie The Human Scale outside, in a park in downtown Dallas. It is about cities and how they were designed for cars and not people. Well, not entirely true and I take that back. Early cities (up through the 1950s) were designed for people; cities in the 50's and beyond were designed for cars. And that design is clearly not working well for cities or the happiness of people in the cities. Most people now live in the suburbs and work in the cities; and people who live in the cities don't usually associate with their neighbors because they are disconnected from life and don't socialize with them.

Jan Gehl, founder of Gehl Architects in Denmark, is the innovative force of this movement to design cities for people. He has influenced countless leaders and urban planners to change the focus of a city to make it more social and friendly to people – not a place for cars.

He got his start: 

As a "young architect working in the suburbs," Gehl married a psychologist and "had many discussions about why the human side of architecture was not more carefully looked after by the architects, landscape architects, and planners… My wife and I set out to study the borderland between sociology, psychology, architecture, and planning."[1]

His team has done great research about people in cities, watching how they move, what they like and don't like, and have influenced other activists and researchers to do the same. It was truly inspiring.

And the changes that can be made to a city to make it more people-friendly don't have to be huge, sweeping changes. They can be small things, like adding a square with tables and chairs for people to sit, socialize and have impromptu exchanges. Or by creating larger walkways quickly, by creating artifical boundaries that uses some street space for pedestrian sidewalks. Change comes in smaller iterations rather than big projects.

For the Agile and UX practioners out there – this should all sound familiar. 

I think what I liked best about the movie was seeing how the Agile movement of small changes quickly in iterations is expanding into other fields, as well as a focus on the user/customer/people rather than machines and systems. 

Computer systems have always been designed by engineers for engineers. They are designed to do what is easy for the system – not reflect how people think or work. We have been taught to think a certain way by using these devices – and one has to wonder if this is the best way. This is why the UX world is changing the focus of technologists to think more about the people using devices rather than the technology to create the devices. 

Change is more effective in small doses. A new feature here or there can make a system more usable. Add up those changes over time, and you have a new system that is better for the user all around. If a feature doesn't work for people, then just remove it and continue with trying new things until you get it right.

I felt hopeful for the future watching this movie about cities, change and the focus being on people and their needs. We are the ones living in cities (or suburbs) and using devices and applications – we should be the ones dictating how they should work to help us in our daily lives be happier and healthier.

The Human Scale, Agile and UX

Customers need to feel trust during a DDOS attack

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Typepad experienced a severe, multi-day DDOS attack this past weekend thru today. I know, Happy Easter, right? Or Passover? Either way, it made for a rough blogging weekend. I took Friday off so I could get some blog posts lined up for the upcoming week, but the attack had Typepad down all day Friday. Then part of Sunday. Then most of Monday and Tuesday. Oh – and I forgot that this all started Thursday night when I originally wanted to post: Before kicking off an Agile project, there needs to be a vision, which didn't get posted until Friday night. 

Yes, I posted a blog entry on Good Friday at 4pm CT. It shows I'm an overachiever (riiiiight!).

Typepad is pretty much up all the time. I think this is the first time I've experienced this problem with them. Ever. They do a fantastic job managing their systems.

I did experience an interesting mix of emotions during the DDOS attack - uncertainty, anxiety, and frustration.

The problem during the attack is that you as a user have ZERO control of what is going on in the server room to get your account back. Short of someone installing a Webcam in there, there is no way for you to know what is really happening. Are people running around like there is a fire? Are people madly typing solutions on a keyboard? Is there a manager yelling? Are people just calmly working? Are they taking a nap?

You have to rely on Facebook and Twitter for somewhat regular status communications. Typepad did a great job keeping everyone informed. However, I had to trust that Typepad was honestly communicating with us about what was happening. I am not sure everyone felt they were being honest. (I did!)

 

I experienced a similar event a couple of week ago, when my email service provider was attacked. Email was down for over 6 hours – a service disruption previously unheard of with my provider. I got my updates through Twitter and Facebook, and I was habitually checking both every 2-5 minutes. My email addiction was getting the best of me – I was anxious, uncertain, insecure about missing a message or an email getting lost in cyberspace. I had no control for how this was being fixed and I had to trust who I hired to get it fixed quickly.

Sure, there were some nasty Tweets and Facebook posts about email being down, but what could the provider do, really? It was up to us, the customers, to have faith in who we hired to get the systems back to normal.

 

During the Typepad DDOS, the tweets were interesting. Some people got angry at Typepad for being attacked, as if they planned it. Of course, some people threatened to move their service; others felt sympathy and empathy that Typepad was attacked.

I understand that some of these people make their money from their blogs. However, if you want to be sure that your site is always up, then host your blog yourself and maintain your control over your environment. Even then – what happens if your hosting provider gets a DDOS attack? What happens if you are managing your server yourself? Yes – it is the same problem. You have to trust who you hired to address the problem.

 

Although customers need to trust who they hired to fix a problem, that doesn't stop them from feeling uncertainty, anxiety or frustration. I could list a bunch of customer service ideas to mitigate those negative customer emotions, but that feels trite – we all know how to do those things.

These companies balanced my anxiety and frustration by appealing not only to my trust in them to fix the problem, but how I trust myself and my decision making abilities to choose them as a service provider in the first place.

Trust will stop the uncertainty feelings and reduce the anxiety and frustration.  And that trust can only be built over the course of the entire customer relationship – including after you fix the problem. The more you trust your vendor choice, the more you trust yourself and your decisions.

I bet Typepad will have very loyal customers after this ordeal. I know I'm impressed with how they handled this multi-day attack.

Customers need to feel trust during a DDOS attack

Before kicking off an Agile project, there needs to be a vision

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Agile Methodologies have revolutionized application development AND influenced how business operates today. 

Day-to-day marketing, product management, finance and other activities can be overwhelming because there are so many competing priorities. The introduction of Agile principles such as prioritization, iterations, and sprints (moving planning to be quarter-to-quarter rather than an inflexible year-to-year) has helped businesses choose which opportunities to pursue and nimbly respond to market shifts and changes. Adopting Agile approaches has been a game changer for businesses worldwide.

However, there is little guidance in the Agile methodology for helping the business gain a clear vision and goals for a proposed product or project.

Iteration 1 typically starts with setting up the dev environment and writing infrastructure/core functionality stories, but if the business hasn't figured out what they want to do or what they need – nevermind what the priorities are – how can they get to Iteration 1 and write a story?

New projects aren't "born" neatly scoped with a clear strategy, goals and ROI. From my experience, new projects come from 4 places:

  • Most common: An executive tells the team that there is a market need for a new site or app and the team needs to figure it out. Often, that's all the direction the team is given – they really do need to figure out what the project/product should be.
  • The team or a team member realizes that there is a market need for a new product – and this needs to be defined further. The project needs to be sold internally, so the vision is developed during the buy-in process with the larger organization and other teams. 
  • Organic creation – the team realized that the super-product should be broken into two (or more) parts. Sometimes, a product gets so big, it just makes sense to split it up. But where does that split happen? That often needs to be defined and scoping typically happens during the buy-in process with the larger organization and other teams. 
  • Start-up case: A visionary has an idea, knows the market really well and knows what needs to happen next. This is the dream case for Agile – the project can kick-off right away. However, a lot of behind-the-scenes activities happens for the visionary to know his market and what they need. He has done his research and has a lot of data to support what needs to happen. 

Scoping a project and defining its goals is a unique activity that can take a month or two. However, it's not a project with tangible results; it is a project that results in an organizationally accepted PowerPoint presentation, site maps/wireframes/sketches, a few projection spreadsheets, and defined target metrics. 

To get to that vision, the business team often needs to get into the details and create a vision for what they want to do. Sure, we should be thinking about what we want to do as we go along in Agile ideology, but if the business team doesn't have a focus for what they want to do – the project will fail.

I have seen this happen too often. Technology decisions rather than business strategy starts to define the project if the business leaders don't have a strong vision. The business leads need to be focused on what they want this product to achieve.  

And what needs to exist for the business strategy and vision? A set of goals and ROI isn't enough. The business needs to:

  • Understand the market
  • Know who the customers will be and understand the market
  • Be able to quickly identify the competitors (and speak to their strengths and weaknesses)
  • Know what issues the product will solve (or does solve)
  • List the core functionality this product needs to have at launch – understand the nice-to-haves vs must-haves
  • Understand the general technical challenges to build the product – specifics happen during the process. But to make some initial scope decisions, the business team needs to be informed.
  • Have metric targets and goals to prove the product is a success – and have a general idea of what will happen if those goals aren't met.

Often, user or customer experience will invited to the discussion to be sure that user/customer needs are addressed. The development team will be invited so the business team can better understand scope and costs and the technical barriers to entry. It takes a team to scope a project. 

Often there are sketches of what this project could be. This helps the business team have a visual to better understand what they want. By the time a story is written, there were a number of sketches that the business team created with user experience to develop their plan. Their process to get to a vision is iterative.

Some may call this getting into the details; I call this research to understand what you want to get. It's like building a house. 

How do you figure out what you want in a house?

  • Visit a lot of houses
  • Create a list of what you want in it
  • Make sketches
  • Talk to architects and designers
  • Talk to builders
  • Make more sketches
  • Figure out how you want to feel in your house

You don't build a house as you go along with zero vision to guide it (or you can, but you may end up with a weird house!). The business needs to do a little research to understand what they want to "live in" before they start building anything. 

 

I'll be talking about this more at Agile 2014 in my session: Go From a Nebulous Vision to Iteration One in 3 Steps. Hope to see you! 

Feel free to contribute to the conversation about scoping Agile projects. I look forward to hearing from you.

Before kicking off an Agile project, there needs to be a vision

Sky Harbor International Airport in Phoenix needs a better Customer Experience

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I am fascinated by airport design. It is interesting that airports require so much walking to reach a plane. While waiting for my flight, I'll study how the travel flow in an airport is mapped – where you check in, where security is and its experience, which restaurants are available near the gate or outside security, and what it's like to wait for a flight. I think about the airport and air travel experience every single trip, always wondering if there is a better way to design it.

In my opinion, Sky Harbor Airport (PHX) Terminal 4 is laid out very similar to McCarren Terminal 1 in Las Vegas.

  1. You go to a general area to find the airline your are traveling on
  2. You check in (yourself and your luggage)
  3. You go up an escalator to a concourse with restaurants and stores
  4. You go through security in various wings of the airport
  5. You then go on another concourse with restaurants and stores, but there are gates in-between

It is a very different approach for an airport – it requires a lot of walking, but there is always somewhere to eat or a way to pick up something you forgot.

It is a little more convenient than this more traditional design:

  1. You enter the appropriate terminal door that has ticket counters for your airline 
  2. You check in (yourself and your luggage)
  3. You go through the security screening for that part of the terminal, near your airline's ticket counters
  4. You access a plethora of restaurants and stores inside the terminal or the area of the terminal you are in, near the gates

Examples of this: Boston's Logan Airport, SFO and DFW. So to compare PHX to other airports is a little silly – its equal is Vegas or Denver. But Denver is massive – it has a train, some really cool restaurants, and is probably more comparable to Atlanta's airport. Yes, Vegas has a train, but not like Denver or Atlanta. I think Vegas and PHX are about the same size – PHX a little smaller – but they share more similarities than differences.

 

Generally, Vegas succeeds when it comes to lines. I don't think I have waited in any line in Vegas for more than 15-20 minutes – even TSA lines with scores of people. Vegas lines are managed in an incredibly efficient way and optimized for peak times. It's pretty amazing to see.

Sky Harbor Airport is a little different. I was able to move through the airport pretty easily, except for the TSA line. I thought I was thrown back to 2002, when you had to get to the airport more than 2 hours before your flight because the line would take forever to get screened. Then, the TSA was still figuring out how to best run screenings and determine the staffing requirements. Recently at most airports, I haven't waited longer than 20-30 minutes in peak travel times to get through security with a number of lines open. It's really not that bad.

However, it took me an hour to go through the TSA line at PHX. 

What made this customer experience so bad?

  • The stress of the wait. Waiting in a TSA line puts everyone at risk of missing their flight if they didn't plan. Again, lines haven't been like that in a while in other airports across America – so to expect a traveler to plan for that is a little unreasonable. It should be expected that such a long line would cause extreme anxiety. 
  • The wait occurred around lunchtime. When I'm hungry, time passes very slowly. Lines feel longer because I'm not just waiting to get through the checkpoint – I'm waiting for the checkpoint AND lunch…which could be eaten like right now if the line wasn't so long…or maybe I should have eaten somewhere on the concourse before the wait…but then would I have missed my flight with this line?  When is lunch? (I'm sure I'm not alone here.)
  • Tired and stressed TSA people. How can someone be effective looking at dozens of bag scans without a break, knowing how many people need to get through the line to make a flight? I'm sure those people were exhausted. The agent checking our IDs and tickets already seemed a little cranky and unfriendly – and he just started his shift (the guy before him was obviously beat). Tired staff isn't effective staff. 
  • Travelers realizing that the line wasn't being managed properly. I overheard a number of people comment that only 1 TSA station with 2 bag scanners was being used for us. There was 1 TSA station being used for the more select group first class and pre-screened group. Typically, +60% travelers are in standard coach; 20-30% maybe are in first class or pre-screened categories. Of course their line will be faster! If there were double or triple the number of people in the regular line, why not open a couple of more stations to support us and allow our lines to flow better?

 

What I think Sky Harbor Airport (PHX) should do:

  • Obviously – activate more TSA lines – maybe 2 more bag scanning stations and another ticket/ID scanner. That should help keep things moving and help people feel better about being in a line. If TSA was trying to be more customer-centric, I bet travelers would be more likely to have patience and not mind the line. And I'm sure the TSA staff would feel like they could do a better job and not be so overwhelmed.
  • Charge travelers coming to PHX to add these new lines. I'm sure they wouldn't complain once noticing how fast it is to get through PHX. It would be worth the fee. And it could be baked into airfare so no one would notice the $25 ticket increase.
  • Even better – charge the airlines for these new lines. I'm sure it wouldn't cost that much more money to support another set of lines each day – and split between 10 airlines, what's a couple of thousand dollars per day if there are happy customers?

 

What disturbed me the most about the entire flight experience was listening to colleagues saying that air travel has become such a commodity that the airlines don't care how a customer is treated. In other words – there is no customer experience for flights (Virgin America and other Virgin airlines excluded – they are in a class of their own). And the airlines wonder why people don't like to fly!

Airlines also wonder why customers give them a hard time. What do the airlines and airports give their customers? Air travel isn't a privilege; individuals pay for a ticket. Once someone pays for something – that person becomes a customer. Giving customers a hard time won't win them over. A hard time includes fees for luggage, food, snacks, needlessly long lines, and being nit-picked about something small. Why not charge a price that covers 1 checked-in piece of luggage and a sandwich and maybe a movie? Why do airlines allow TSA lines to be so long? Why not fund more lines to make the process easier? That may make the experience a little more elegant. Air travel is a necessity for long-distances – it would be nice if it was a treat rather than a chore.

 

After the TSA screening, I finally made it to lunch. After I ravenously attacked my food like I haven't eaten in a year, I asked the person sitting next to me about the line. He said that it was probably due to spring break. Unfortunately, I remember long lines at Sky Harbor 3-4 years ago, so I'm not too sure about his assessment with the line being unique to that day. I think it is time for PHX to change.

Sky Harbor International Airport in Phoenix needs a better Customer Experience

Weekend unplugging and breaking for creativity

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I'm guilty of "taking my weekend" to re-cooperate from the week. I try to stay offline and not work – ok, maybe I will respond to some personal emails or read some articles, but I'm not producing anything new. I'm taking a break. 

By Friday afternoon, I'm either:

  • Overstimulated and just can't think rationally anymore.
  • Overwhelmed and can't organize my desk – nevermind a thought.
  • Stir crazy (looking at the same 4 walls for 4-5 days solid can be a little much).

When I look at the computer screen and all I see are pretty pictures, I know I need a change of pace.

That's when I know it is time to unplug, walk away from the computer and do something else. Anything else.
 
I do love my work. But to keep being creative, I need space to experience inspiration. Sometimes I can escape on a weeknight; often, I can’t. That’s what weekends are for.

I used to work faithfully all weekend and now that I look back, it didn't do me any favors. I was a freelancer working by the hour and it made me a lot of money, but I wasn’t working smarter because I never rested. It was hard to always be innovative because I wasn't making time to get new input or let myself be inspired – I was constantly pushing out thoughts and solutions. 

It wasn’t until I moved to Dallas that I started to unplug during the weekends and give myself time for inspiration. It was the best thing I ever did. I opened up to new experiences, got offline, experienced life, and lived at a slower pace. 
 
Recently at the Dallas Digital Conference, I heard a talk by Randi Zuckerberg where she noted that unplugging during the weekend was going to be a trend. She swears by it. And is working with an organization to encourage it. 
 
She does admit that one of the challenges with unplugging is how people respond to that. Many do expect that all responses should be immediate. That’s just not realistic – nor should it be expected. And when we keep doing it, frankly, we are allowing others to keep expecting that behavior from us, and the cycle continues. Life doesn't need to be at the pace others set for you.  
 
To experience the world, sometimes it is better to be offline anyway.
But I sensed it one night in November when I saw a photo of a beautiful Seattle sunset on Twitter, and realized I could have seen it myself that evening, if I had just bothered to look around. (Do you unplug? Making the case for ‘No-Tech Sundays, Monica Guzman)
That line “just bothered to look around” haunted me. So often we will shift our focus away from the present to look at people’s pictures, tag who is in them, and read about what others are doing that we are missing life around us. How many people have you observed so engaged in their phones and oblivious to the present life that they bump into poles? Or miss a curiosity around them? They lose touch with real life and start to devalue it. It's great to read about your friend's past and present, but your own present should also be treasured. 
 
And then there is the creativity factor. It's pretty well known that to be creative at work, you need to take a break. Even Forbes has an article about it – 8 Ways Goofing Off Can Make You More Productive. And there is a line in the article about why I unplug on the weekends:
Many of our most creative, productive thoughts come not while we’re trying to force them during long sessions at our desks, but at odd moments outside the office.
On the weekends, I make space to create and let my mind wander, which I can't do during the week because I'm either in meetings or on deadlines. But on a Saturday, even running errands has a leisurely, wandering quality to it. I may decide to change my routine and explore a new part of Dallas on a whim. I may explore a store that is new to me, take a walk in a park, or visit a museum I have wanted to go to but never found the time to visit before. There are plans but no plans at the same time. There is no clock telling me where to be or what to do. 
 
Being plugged in changes that because I feel that I need to respond to people's requests or be accountable to share what I'm doing ("document" as a friend of mine said). There are times where I just want to use my memory to record the experience and just enjoy it. Why do I need to share my experiences with others? It sounds selfish, but I wonder if the social media sharing is subconscious bragging or real sharing with the world? What’s my motive? And then I ask myself the larger question – Why do I care about what others think about my life?
 
On the weekends, I stay offline to experience life on my own and be open to new adventures.
Bottom line, no-tech Sundays are helping me notice all the things that connected tech is changing about the ways we behave. It’s not about rejecting tech, or recovering a life without it. It’s about taking this power that’s appeared in our world and slowing it down just enough to look at it, understand it, and maybe, just maybe, take control. (Do you unplug? Making the case for ‘No-Tech Sundays, Monica Guzman)
I couldn't have said that better than Monica. She's right.
 
So if anyone thinks I'm ignoring them on a Saturday or Sunday, I probably am. I'm unplugging and being slightly irresponsible, refusing to live on a schedule, and taking a break from work and life to be open to new ideas and experiences. I'll be a better person for it on Monday, 
Weekend unplugging and breaking for creativity

Size doesn’t matter in this just-in-time world

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You can get online anywhere. Anywhere. From a coffee house to a bar to a plane. You can check your email from your phone or tablet – not just your computer. Sometimes it's free; sometimes there is a charge. But there are times that you can't get online and you need to BYOW – Bring Your Own WiFi. Or rather, get a hotspot device.

A few years ago before WiFi was ubiquitous, I got a little hotspot device for my computer. I could just plug it in and ta-da! I'm online and running, enabling my online addiction to continue.

This indulgence cost me $80/month for 10GB of data through Verizon. Later it cost me $50/month for 5GB. Expensive, especially when you use maybe 10% of what you pre-pay for that doesn't rollover into the next month, but when traveling to places with sketchy service, it was worth it. It saved me many times in business emergencies so I could have the flexibility to work where I wanted and maintain my freedom.

Then I learned about Karma. Karma is a just-in-time WiFi solution. You only pay for what you use. And multiple people can use your device in WiFi challenged places by getting an account and pre-paying for service. Rather than wasting $50/month for something I barely use, I can pay for what I do use and add on as needed. More economical and efficient.

No more overestimating to prevent overage fees. No more paying for something I don't use. Verizon still uses the model of estimating how much they need to support by having their customers estimate usage when choosing a plan. Karma doesn't make people work to figure out what they need – they just offer service at a fee. Verizon is focused on their own needs; Karma is focused on the customer's needs. 

Needless to say – I got Karma.

And I went to cancel my service with Verizon. 

I was thrilled to offload this $50/month bill for technically nothing. Of course, they tried to save my account. I told them that I was moving to Karma and didn't need the $50/month hotspot. Here is where I think they went wrong during the call:

  • They don't know their competitors. They never heard of Karma. To me, that's a huge problem for Verizon. They should know their competitors – even the tiny startups. Startups are deadly to a big corporation because they are nimble, agile and are willing to take a risk to gain market share. Big companies are typically complacent and believe that they will always have market share (just not true). Startups have nothing to lose, which makes them a true wildcard.
  • They don't have a just-in-time option. How can you compete with pay-as-you-go with a plan that's about estimating your worst case scenario where you don't keep overages? You can't. 
  • They aren't aware of the customer's needs and what they are experiencing. Arguments about coverage quality don't matter anymore when it comes to WiFi. 90% of the airports I have been in have WiFi. Cafes and bars have WiFi. Some hotels now have free WiFi. And the quality is pretty good for general business use. These arguments about quality and access become pointless. WiFi is becoming a requirement to offer anywhere – it's no longer an indulgence. Why charge indulgent prices for something so common?

I'm sure I'm not the only person leaving Verizon these reasons. They just aren't staying current.

To stay competitive, you have to keep up with what's going on in the world. Obviously, Verizon has lost touch with the ubiquitous nature of WiFi access. It's everywhere. And we are now in a just-in-time world – we don't overplan and overestimate anymore for anything. People have different needs than before for WiFi. Selling access to a "quality network" won't help you win; selling convenience and ease will.

Being the big company that's everywhere doesn't mean you will win. Winning today is about being agile and flexible to change and open to explore new models of business. 

Size doesn’t matter in this just-in-time world