CN20: Working with an Agile Team: The User Feedback Two-Step

Wednesday, 8 April 2009, 16:30

1 unit

Instructors

Hugh Beyer, InContext Enterprises

Benefits

Attendees will gain the following skills and knowledge

• An understanding of the basics of the Agile approach to software development, and how that affects the UX participants;
• An understanding of how to leverage the rules and principles of Agile development to reinforce the UX position on the team;
• Knowledge of some common ways that the relationship between development and UX is disrupted when a project adopts Agile development, and strategies for recovering;
• Knowledge of how to handle the detailed interactions with a team: how to pass development new UI designs, the results of user research and usability tests, modifications to designs as a result of user testing and QA in the context of an Agile project;
• Internalize how the interaction with development works in practice through an interactive game simulating the key elements of an Agile project.

Origins

This is the first time this course has been offered at CHI. A variant using the same simulation game has been offered at the Agile 2008 conference.

Features

• Introduce Agile techniques and approach to development;
• Discuss Agile principles and how that affects their attitudes towards UX work;
• Introduce a way for development and UX people to work together over the course of an Agile project that fits with Agile principles and provides a powerful role for UX;
• Play a simulation game that allows participants to experience the process, practice handling typical disruptive incidents such as change in project priorities, user feedback, and bug fixes.

Audience

UX professionals who are working with (or will work with) Agile development teams.

Presentation

Lecture; game playing with guidance; discussion.

Instructors' background

Hugh Beyer is co-founder and CTO of InContext. He has pioneered user-centered design techniques for 20 years, co-developing Contextual Design and the integration of Contextual Inquiry into the overall software development process. He has been working with Agile approaches and integrating user-centered design with Agile teams since 2004.