Re: Usability Assessment: A Common Sense Activity

[TechComm Dood <techcommdood -at- gmail -dot- com>]

I apologize in advance for not copying in the relevent potions of
Steven's post, but I would have exceeded the allowed limit of
repeated/quoted text in my message.

I disagree wholeheartedly with Steven's assertion that technical
writers and anyone who uses a product are usability experts.

They *can* be, but more than not, they are not usability experts.

You can get good usability feedback from a technical writer and a user
of a product, but you need to seriously weigh that information against
a ton of factors (the very last being feasibility of implementation).

Everyone uses a product differently, and everyone has a unique
conception of what a product should be used for and how it fits into
their workflow. You cannot accept feedback from a small number of
sources where the use of the product and gathering of information
happens in an uncontrolled setting.

A usability expert needs to be in tune with the purpose for the
product, the market it serves, the targeted user persona for the
product, the environment in which the product will most commonly be
used, and a myriad of other factors. Most technical writers, and
certainly most users, are not in tune with this level of product and
market detail. And nor do they need to be in order to use the product
to get their jobs done.

I unfortunately don't have the time to go into legthy detail on this
subject, but I encourage others to jump in with their thoughts on
this.

But, IMO, the thought that a tech writer by default is a good
usability expert is no different than the thought that anyone can be a
good technical writer. To make that assumption indicates, at least to
me, that not nearly enough research was done into what usability is
and how it should be measured and acted on.

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