Looking back, we did some things right, and we did some things wrong. One shortcoming was that there was not a process in place for the design phase other than a deadline of four weeks to get the designs completed. Most of that time was spent doing just that getting designs completed. What we did was really the engineering work of getting the design right. We performed some ideation of the designs on whiteboard, until we came up with something we thought could work. Then we moved straight on towards getting that design to a workable solution. I think that came from my mechanical engineering background, take the problem and solve it approach given broad guidelines.

Interestingly, we had two usability experts working on the design, but neither of them opened up the process to really explore various design concepts. I think this may have been a bit of an issue with the structure of the software, where we had one SME with a design in mind for how to present the information to the user. I think though the bigger issue was that the design process within my old company’s comprehensive process guidelines did not encourage the type of multiple branching and throw-away sketching that is critical to arriving at the best possible design. Instead, it’s a process much more focused on moving a single design toward completion.

One of the great things that I love about this book is the examples of design experiments in the field of user interfaces. I really enjoyed the one on “The Bifocal Display” The technique itself feels completely modern. In fact when viewing this website below, I recently had a colleague call it an Apple Copycat, but the concept predates the original Macintosh GUI.

http://beta.searchme.com/

The thing that kills me is that the concept was first displayed in a video in 1980 (I was 6 at that point in time, and it would be another 4 years before I got my hands on a third hand Tandy my grandfather had gotten me (with its rich user interface that featured some killer green characters on a monolithic black background). You gotta love the video below that accompanies it, to see how the design itself was put together.

Bill Buxton was able to give a great primer on the importance of structuring a products company on design, and I can’t wait to get back in front of my next design project with a new repertoire of tools and process thoughts. I highly recommend going to the books website, and checking out the other videos as well.