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I am putting together a proposal that outlines the need for a
cross-functional team that designs our software's GUI. I'd like to hear
from people who have experiences with this type of team, especially (but not
only) if there was a technical writer on the team. I am interested in things
like:
* What functional groups were represented on the team?
* Where does this team fit into the development process? Do they hand a
design over to the developers up front, or design while development goes on?
* Does anyone have any experiences where the software developers are not key
players in this team?
* What role does the technical writer play on the team?
* Is there a "trained" GUI designer or usability professional on the team?
* What processes are used by the team? (Customer research, prototyping
methodologies, use of personas, usability tests, customer checkpoints and
anything else that has proved to be important.)
* What are the benefits and liabilities of this type of team?
* Any anecdotal evidence about what has worked and hasn't.
I've been doing a lot of reading in this area (Allan Cooper, Jakob Nielson,
Joann Hackos, Donald Norman etc.) but I'd like to hear about what is really
happening in different companies and how well it is working.
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