Quieting the Outcry over Software User Interface Redesigns

Focus and Make Trade-offs

No single user interface design is ideal for every user. You need to make some hard choices and understand that you won’t be able to improve everything across the board for each and every user. The key, however, is to ensure that you make these choices based on evidence, not just gut feelings or personal opinions. Perform user research to identify the most important tasks and the areas of your user interface that you should focus on improving, then conduct usability tests on new features to make sure they function properly.

Weigh the Short-Term and Long-Term Impacts

Sometimes a design change results in short-term user pain, but users’ long-term gain. Let’s say Product Management realizes that an automated data-entry feature would help users to complete a key task more quickly. When the feature first gets rolled out, your users may object to it. They’re used to entering data in a certain way—even if that way is more time consuming and inefficient—and they may be upset that they now need to relearn how to do something with which they are already familiar. After two or three days, however, they’ll realize that they can now complete the form in half the time and begin to appreciate the change.

Facebook may have had this principle in mind when they changed their Web site. Yes, there was an initial backlash, but how much are you hearing about it now? You may even have been one of those users who were initially upset, but are you still annoyed about the changes?

Identify the Actual Impact of Users’ Reactions

Design changes typically impact two main aspects of a product: the user interface design and user workflows. You’ll find that users react very differently to a visual design change than to a user interface change that affects their workflow.

Visual design changes tend to provoke instantaneous, emotional reactions like “That’s gorgeous!” or “That’s hideous!” Reactions to workflow changes, however, take slightly longer to emerge, and it normally takes users longer to adapt to such changes.

When evaluating users’ reactions, try to analyze the impact of the feedback rather than the emotion behind it. For example, does “That’s hideous!” mean “Now I won’t renew my subscription”? Or does it simply mean “I wouldn’t have chosen those colors”? However, when evaluating a workflow complaint, be sure to weigh the short-term and long-term impacts and judge whether a user is simply experiencing short-term difficulty adjusting to the change or a deeper workflow issue is at work.

Consider Whether User Support or Training Would Be Necessary

If you’re creating a product that needs to have a walk-up-and-use interface, such as an ATM machine, its user interface should be instantly comprehensible, so it obviously should not require a manual or any form of training. However, if you are developing an ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) solution or software for managing complex electronic medical records, users may understand—and even expect—that they’ll need to spend some time learning how to use it properly. If that’s the case, you’ll probably have more leeway in implementing user interface changes that would be beneficial, but require a certain amount of training or hand-holding. During usability testing, observe users carefully, and note common areas of confusion to ensure that any necessary training addresses the most common and important user tasks.

Consider What Would Happen If You Don’t Make Changes

Sometimes, when a product is successful, companies feel that they shouldn’t mess with a good thing. But this kind of thinking can lull companies into complacency and cause products to fall behind in the marketplace. While there is always a certain amount of risk in updating a user interface, there’s usually a larger risk that your product would stagnate and become outdated if you don’t make changes. Plus, if you don’t take the risk of improving your user experience, chances are that a competitor will improve theirs.

It’s all too easy to take the conservative approach and maintain things the way they are, ensuring that you don’t negatively impact customer goodwill by making a bad user interface decision. However, the reality is that, through conscientious product management, user research, and UX design, your user interface updates can reliably produce results that keep your product ahead of the curve and win in the marketplace.