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The workshop will define a framework for the scope and content of the knowledge that underpins the usability profession. Source material will include the proposed usability curriculum, the roles of usability practitioners and the suggested competencies for usability certification. The workshop is part of the UPA body of knowledge project.

WORKSHOP DESCRIPTION

Background

The goal of creating a body of knowledge grew out of the project to investigate certification for usability professionals in 2001-2002. That project ended with a survey of almost 1000 people on their attitudes towards certification. There was no clear mandate expressed in that survey, but there were some clearly delineated issues that came out of the qualitative comments.

An article in the September 2002 issue of The UPA Voice reported on this project, and introduced the concept of a series of projects working towards a usability or user-centered design body of knowledge.

These projects built on a model that places a body of knowledge in the center of some related definitions, including defining a curriculum, identifying roles, creating a self-assessment tool, and, when all of the pieces are in place, a certification. Related to this, but seen as somewhat different is the concept of a code of conduct for practitioners.

A workshop held at the UPA 2002 Conference identified five initial projects related to the body of knowledge, all are seen as building blocks towards this goal.  The projects currently in progress are:

• Define a usability curriculum, and identify institutions that teach all or part of that curriculum
• Identify the roles for a user-centered design practitioner
• Create a Code of Conduct for practitioners
• Create an annotated bibliography of key texts -- books, articles and papers -- in the field
• Create a pamphlet about usability and user-centered design that will build on the UPA poster and ISO 13047 to set a scope for this work

Workshop Content

Requirements

What is the purpose of a usability body of knowledge? Who will stakeholders who will benefit or be affected by a usability body of knowledge? What type of information would they like, and what level of detail is needed? Brainstorm possible short- and long-term deliverables that would be useful.

Components of a Body of Knowledge

Review the types of information that could contribute to a body of knowledge, including:

• Subject domains: What are the boundaries of usability? For example, how does it relate to HCI, IA and software engineering?
• Factual information: What is the scope of subject areas? How could the key texts be identified? How important are international standard?
• Processes and activities: The proposed accreditation scheme listed a set of competencies based on demonstrated performance rather than knowledge.
• Job descriptions: how do current job roles relate to an overall body of knowledge?
• What is the scope of what is currently being taught? Should curricula cover the whole scope of the body of knowledge?

Scope and structure of a body of knowledge

The workshop will divide into 2 or more teams (depending on numbers) to develop an initial scope and structure for a body of knowledge from different perspectives depending on the skills and interests of the participants, for example from the perspective of knowledge, competencies or jobs.

Initial framework

The groups will report back, and the workshop develop an initial framework that takes account of the relationships between the approaches.

Deliverables and plans

The workshop will plan the outputs and activities for different audiences. Each team will elaborate and document their conclusions, and detail the planned outputs and future activities, and timetable for future actions.

These will be summarized in the final session.

PARTICIPANT SELECTION CRITERIA

Participants will be selected who can make a constructive contribution to one or more of the topics covered by the workshop.

W7– Usability Body of Knowledge: Nigel Bevan's Position Paper

Applying to Participate in This Workshop

The workshop is a closed session that requires an approved position paper. Send your position paper (which will typically be 2 to 3 pages) to Nigel Bevan, nbevan@usability.serco.com . Please contact Nigel in advance if you have any preliminary enquiries or would like to discuss a potential contribution.

Position papers received by March 24 will be accepted or rejected by March 31, in time for you to register before the early registration deadline on April 2. Position papers received by May 5 will be accepted or rejected by May 12, in time for the May 14 registration discount. Papers received after May 12 will be evaluated at the facilitator's discretion. If you want to register early for UPA and have not completed your position paper by these deadlines, you may register for the rest of the conference and add the workshop fee later.

PRE-WORKSHOP PARTICIPANT ACTIVITIES

Each participant will submit a position paper and attach or cite any relevant source material. Participants will review all submitted material in advance of the workshop.

PRE-WORKSHOP FACILITATION ACTIVITIES

Existing literature and UPA project outputs that could contribute to a framework for a body of knowledge will be collated and summarized. The references and where possible the text will be circulated. Other people who have worked in this area will be specifically invited to attend the workshop. A co-facilitator will be selected.

POST-CONFERENCE DISSEMINATION OF RESULTS

Workshop outputs will include a conference poster, a paper for User Experience, a publicly available web site of resources, and a plan for activities to produce more detailed deliverables.

POST-CONFERENCE ACTIVITIES

The workshop will set up working groups to produce more detailed deliverables.

FACILITATORS

Nigel Bevan

Research Manager

Serco Usability Services

+44 77 18 19 49 00

Fax: +44 20 7421 6477

nbevan@usability.serco.com

Dr Nigel Bevan is Research Manager at Serco Usability Services. He has first degrees in physics and psychology, and a PhD in man-machine interaction. He provides consultancy and training in usability and user centred design.

Nigel was technical co-ordinator of the EU MUSiC (Measurement of Usability in Context) project that produced methods for usability measurement. These methods have since been widely applied commercially. He was manager of the INUSE and RESPECT projects that set up a network of Usability Support Centres around Europe, the TRUMP project that incorporated user centred design into the development processes of two large organisations. He also managed the UsabilityNet project that has established a web site of usability resources, including a comprehensive guide to usability methods.

Nigel was an active contributor to the usability accreditation initiative, and edited the proposed list of competencies which are one input to the body of knowledge.

He participates in several international standards groups where he has introduced the concept of quality in use. He contributed to ISO 13407 and the Common Industry Format, edited ISO 9241-11 (Guidance on usability), ISO/IEC 14598-1 (Evaluation of software quality - General guide), ISO/IEC 9126-1 (Software product quality model) and ISO/IEC 9126-4 (Quality in use metrics). He currently edits ISO/IEC25030 (Quality requirements) , ISO 20282-2 (Usability of everyday products), and the new Common Industry Format for usability requirements.

Nigel has given tutorials on usability, user centred design and requirements at international conferences including the Usability Professionals Association, CHI, Interact, HCI International and software quality and software engineering conferences.

He is a Board member of the Usability Professionals Association (UPA) and a council member of the UK UPA.

Lyle Kantrovich
User Experience Director
Cargill
+1 952 984 5330
Lyle_Kantrovich@cargill.com

Lyle Kantrovich is the User Experience Director at Cargill where he leads an internal team that provides consulting and training in usability and user centered design. He enjoys mentoring designers and developers on UCD methods and seeing business clients realize the value of user-centered design. His experiences include design for web, handheld, and client-server applications.

Lyle is President of the Minnesota UPA Chapter, a SIG-CHI member, and a regular contributor to Information Architecture discussions on SIGIA-L. He has written articles for SIG-CHIÅfs Interactions magazine, Boxes and Arrows, and his web site Croc OÅf Lyle.

Lyle has also worked as an IT Project Manager, Business Analyst and Product Manager in the past. He holds a Bachelor of Science degree from North Dakota State University in Management Information Systems.

Whitney Quesenbery
Whitney Interactive Design, LLC
whitneyq@wqusability.com

Whitney Quesenbery is a usability design consultant, and has worked with many companies to implement a user-centered design process. She has extensive user interface design experience and has produced award winning multimedia products, user interfaces, web sites, and software applications. She was one of the key developers of LUCID, the Logical User-Centered Interaction Design framework, which provides a basis for developing specific methodologies for usability.

She is the director of the UPA Voting and Usability project, working on usability standards for voting systems and advocating the need for user-centered design in this work. Whitney is active in the user experience community as a frequent author and presenter, President of UPA, a member of the UXNet Executive Committee, and the past-manager of the Society for Technical Communication (STC) Special Interest Group on Usability.