Other than the facilitator comments at the end, I'm in agreement with Mark. Plus, all the talk about names and titles demonstrates some real incompetency in design skills: it's like redesigning a product by only changing the labels. Sure, you can improve the product, but only in a very trivial way.

Posted by: Ron Zeno on August 8, 2003 04:04 PM

---

 

Yea. Another "What is art?" rehash.

I don't subscribe to Mark Hurst's point of view. Become facilitators?! We're designers, not therapists. Therefore we must be advocates. And until such time excellence is the norm, rather than the exception, we must be chew iron ore and spit nails.

As for titles, I don't care one bit. My only care is that my product's help my users succeed in their endeavors. Grant me that and I'll let you call me anything you want.

Posted by: on August 8, 2003 08:36 PM

---

 

I think we do need a consistent term to represent what we do. Also think there is still much work to do on helping business improve the usability of their products and educating them on the core benefits of usability, without venturing too far into the total "customer experience" thing.

However, can also see why this is becoming more important as business/product marketing folks are now expecting products not only to be usable but to satisfy, please, excite and also re-enforce the customer's "brand experience" (depending on the product of course :) Can see this happening in the mobile space, but unfortunately at the expense of usability.

Do agree that like any job, we need to demonstrate value and a positive impact on the product development.

Posted by: Daniel Szuc on August 9, 2003 01:53 AM

---

 

"I think we do need a consistent term to represent what we do."

But you're assuming that what we do is consisent (or consistent performance doesn't matter). As long as we don't have some minimal, consistent performance, attaching a label to it is a con.

Posted by: Ron Zeno on August 9, 2003 11:41 AM

---

 

Tell me more. How do we aim for more consistency?

Posted by: Daniel Szuc on August 9, 2003 11:49 AM

---

 

"How do we aim for more consistency?"

There needs to be a common set of knowledge, skills, beliefs, etc. The easiest way (still very hard) is for everyone to have the same education and training - a standard curriculum.

Searching for an existing, common set of knowledge etc is a waste of time unless you're willing to exclude people right away. This is the downside of having such a diverse group of people, having no entry requirements, and much of the work being low-skill.

Posted by: Ron Zeno on August 10, 2003 11:23 AM

---