John S. Rhodes introduces his new book Selling Usability: User Experience Infiltration Tactics
I spent months and months taking the “frontal assault” approach where I crafted profit scenarios, generated literal ROI numbers, and fought hard to prove that usability was worth the investment. It was a struggle. It worked in the end, but it was a challenge.
It didn’t take long for me to realize that that I needed to find new ways to inject usability into an organization. So I developed strategies and specific tactics to get people to love usability. I turned my back on the frontal assault in my efforts to sell usability to other people. I basically stopped justifying usability but I started to get other people love it.
In plain terms, I suppose you could say that justifying usability is top down thinking. It’s playing their game, not mine. What I do now is work from the bottom up, person by person. I pick just the right opportunities. I fight the smart fights and my long term goals are clear in my mind.
By the way, I don’t really believe that I’m fighting a war. I do not believe that it’s us versus them. That would be disingenious. It’s also not productive or realistic. However, people outside of usability don’t understand it very well. Yes, there absolutely are some managers, developers, and executives who get it. (You know who you are. So thank you, ladies and gentlemen.)
So, let’s bring this full circle. I took all my tactics and poured them into Selling Usability. It’s not perfect, but I do think that pretty much any usability professional will want this book. I guarantee that you will learn something new about getting usability into your organization.
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