Understanding user experience design among community of practice : Malaysian experiences

Abstract

Despite the growing numbers of Technology savvies ascribed to the massive digitisation in many forms, sizes and context of use; the user experience frustrations are still mushrooming as a consequence of difficult interactions and poorly design user interfaces. Nevertheless, the origin of poorly designed features on systems, products or services has largely unexamined. Not that significant principles or practical methods have never been tested and refined to accommodate industry settings, but it is a matter of execution practice. User experience stipulates an empirical evidence of successful interactions and good user interfaces through the process of User Experience Design (UXD). However, there are few reports on the current practice of the professionals who create design to be marketed locally. In this study, the descriptions of both practices were presented in two ways: (1) Phase 1 (2) Phase 2. In Phase 1, Information Technology (IT) professionals and practitioners were identified through a series of surveys, followed by a field study. A total of 23 respondents in pre – study 1 and 82 respondents in pre – study 2 participated in Phase 1. Two case studies has been included as pre – study 3 to comprehend the development process culture. In Phase 2, a participatory action research (PAR), which included netnography (N=7), observation (N=19), survey (N=35), focus group (N=12) and on-site interviews (4 companies, N=9), was conducted. A total of 82 participants involved in Phase 2. PAR was applied to discover the communities of practice (CoP) and understand the motivational gaps across development teams who are committed to incorporating UXD in practice. An assessment framework is developed to evaluate the current-state-analysis of user experience to effectively incorporate UXD in the current process. In order to determine the next methods of data inquiry, grounded theory is applied where data analysis began as soon as the first data was collected. The results showed that the usability element has received a lack of attention among IT professionals? practices, although user experience has emerging as a buzzword among the user experience CoP. Among them, the constraints of practising UXD included the attitude of clients who disrespects designers and a tremendous disparity between front-end designer and back-end developer. Still, the hope to bridge the gap can be done by the role of design decision authority as Malaysia is considered as the highest rank in Power Distance culture. The contribution of this study is to describe the nature of the development process and explicate human-computer interaction (HCI) knowledge in UXD practice. The framework is able to identify areas in existing development processes where research input might have the greatest impact, avoiding repetition of mistakes and learning curves in IT that have been experienced in the West. It also allows the incorporation of UXD efforts to suit the individual country, Malaysia, and its culture. In summary, this study is significant in informing HCI researchers that grounded theory and participatory action research can be considered a viable UXD approach with which to assess the explicit and implicit practices of user experience professionals towards producing high quality experience-designed digital products.