Culture eats UX teams for breakfast

CULTURE EATS UX FOR
BREAKFAST
Are you swimming with sharks or minnows?
UXPA Boston | May 2015
Sarah Bloomer
SarahBloomer & Co | UXPA Boston 2015 1
@boolie
@boolie

SarahBloomer & Co | UXPA Boston 2015 @boolie 2
Drucker did say “Company cultures are
like country cultures. Never try to
change one. Try, instead, to work with
what you’ve got.”

You are here
Culture Capability Maturity
@boolie

CULTURE
SarahBloomer & Co | UXIndia 2014 4@boolie

What is culture?

What is culture?
corporate
© 2009 Scott Adams Inc. Dilbert

Visible
Invisible
Beliefs
Assumptions
Myths
Behaviors
Dress
Habits
Traditions
Procedures
Goals
Management
External brand
Perceptions
Values
Culture are the values and norms
that drive actions

Flickr: Clayton Parker

Flickr: Clayton Parker
Figure out what’s down there..

Here’s an ideal culture
Cultures that deliver great experiences are:
• Adaptive
• Accepting of (reasonable) risk
• Accepting of (reasonable) failure
• Committed to quality
• Willing to prioritize
• Other-focused
K. Goodwin: Leading UX
UX London, April 2011
@boolie

Cultural values and myths
Actual company values are the behaviors, attitudes and skills that are
valued in fellow employees.
Myths are beliefs that reveal those values
Users don’t know what they want, we can design for ourselves
Companies create corporate values that they aspire to
1. Deliver WOW Through Service
2. Embrace and Drive Change
3. Create Fun and A Little Weirdness
4. Be Adventurous, Creative, and Open-Minded
5. Pursue Growth and Learning
6. Build Open and Honest Relationships With Communication
7. Build a Positive Team and Family Spirit
8. Do More With Less
9. Be Passionate and Determined
10.Be Humble
Zappos.com
@boolie

Strategy doesn’t always match culture
http://www.torbenrick.eu/blog/strategy/corporate-culture-
is-driving-the-strategy-or-undermining-it/

Look for mismatches
Strategic goals Behaviors
Improve NPS
by building customer
centered applications
Sales won’t let UX talk
directly to customers
What you observeWhat you’re told
I must control my relationships
to meet my renewal targets
Why?
Users are stupid
Why?
Product managers believe
users don’t know what
they want and we can design
for ourselves
What you observe

Look for mismatches
Strategic goals Behaviors
Our company
doesn’t tolerate failure
What you observe
Become more innovative
What you’re told
I’ll get fired if I fail and look like I
don’t know what I’m doing
Why?
Sales and Dev allow key client
requests to trump roadmap items
What you observe
We’ll lose their business if we
don’t give them what they want
Why?

FINDING YOUR CULTURE
4 ways to identify culture

Culture is created by people
“Rules were meant to be broken”
“People with passion can
change the world for the better”
“Tough but fair”
“…enthusiasm for healthy living
and lifestyle”
but
“stuck in the past”

Culture is created by people

SarahBloomer & Co | UXPA Boston 2015
A simple view of culture
Engineering centric
Paul Sherman. Changing Processes and Cultures. Nov ‘07
Creative approach to design
Tend to design for designers—visually oriented
Technology driven
Have always owned the user interface
Believe they know their customers
Features over usability or user experience
Sales &
Marketing centric
23@boolie
Design centric
Method 1

SarahBloomer & Co | UXPA Boston 2015
A simple view of culture
Engineering centric
Paul Sherman. Changing Processes and Cultures. Nov ‘07
Wireframes without major restrictions
Opportunities to be creative
Technology driven
Have owned the user interface
Feature lists
Facilitated design
Sales &
Marketing centric
Find ways to collaborate that match the values of your culture
24@boolie
Design centric
Rules, standards and patterns
Deadlines
Creative approach to design
Tend to design for designers
—visually oriented
Believe they know their customers
Features over usability or user experience
Method 1

Competing Values Framework
Lead Strategic, 2013
Method 2

CVF plots cultures across 2 dimensions
http://www.tobyelwin.com/competing-values-drives-your-organization-
out-of-business/
Method 2

Adhocracies like to innovate
© Kim Goodwin – UI19
Flexible
Adaptable
Fast
Responsive
Risk takers
Little central authority
Works best when small
Startups
UX practice:
“whiteboard ninja”
Listen and sketch
Reactive, not process
driven
Adhocracy
Flexible
External
www.tobyelwin.com
leadstrategic.com
Method 2

Markets like to win
Doers
Results-oriented
Customer driven
Productivity & profit
Values achievement
Competitive
Undervalue employees
Rewards results
UX practice:
“scientist”
Get quantitative data
Be quick
Be sure
Market
Stable
External
© Kim Goodwin – UI19
www.tobyelwin.com
leadstrategic.com
Method 2

Barriers, Opportunities, Myths & Values
Method 3

Barriers & Opportunities point the way
A barrier may prevent or undermine the adoption of UX
• UX is new to the organization
• No skilled people
• Design research is under valued
An opportunity may help with acceptance of UX activities
• New senior manager with previous UX experience
• Initiative to reduce the calls to technical support
• Developers don’t have time to design and code
Method 3

Myths & values are potential landmines
A myth is a belief held by your stakeholders
• UI design is subjective and cannot be measured or engineered
• If we design for ourselves, it’ll be fine
• Design isn’t that complicated and can be done fast
A value is a belief that defines the culture through actions
• Developers are rewarded for rescuing failing projects
• Pleasing senior management is good regardless of solution
• We’re a consensus driven organization—everyone gets a say in the
design
• The business / client is king
Method 3

Acceptance of UX involves change
Skepticism
Curiosity
Acceptance
Partnership
Stop battling for acceptance
and get strategic
Ehrlich & Rohn, 1994
www.useit.com/alertbox/process_maturity.html

Five tactics for teams big and small
Communicate
Share, knowledge share, integrate
Educate
Enable others
Adapt
Change, try it out, improve
Leverage
Find allies and opportunities
Facilitate
Help others, integrate
Leverage
Find strategic opportunities

Case study
Barrier:
Small UX team
Design research is not valued
Myth:
If we design for ourselves,
it’ll work fine
Value:
We have to adopt Agile because
everyone else is
Communicate:
Start small design research activities
focusing on strategic design issues
Educate:
Demonstrations of effective designs
Usability testing
Facilitate:
Bring groups together, don’t work in
isolation
Provide tools and resources
Leverage:
Collect user experience evidence from
customer facing groups
Adapt:
Embed yourself with scrum teams
Opportunity:
Adopting a new approach
Method 3

Cross check your findings
0
2
4
6
8
10
12
14
16
18
20
False
True
UX team identified barriers, myths and values.
Then we checked our outcomes with development team via a survey.
Method 3
UX team believed
this to be true

Use field studies to learn culture
SarahBloomer & Co | UXPABoston 2015 36
• Interview and observe the people you work with:
product managers, analysts, quality engineers, scrum team
colleagues.
• Interview stakeholders to understand their goals
and beliefs.
• Be a product owner.
Collect their stories:
How do they feel? What do they say? What do they complain
about? What do they boast about? What are they proud of?
Who do they admire in the company?
@boolie
Method 4

Rich picture
SarahBloomer & Co | UXIndia 2014 37
Competitors
Product
Owner
Business Analyst
Testers
Architect /
Tech Designer
Developers
UX Architect
Enterprise
Architect
Business
Analyst
Senior
Leadership
Teams
Customers
Which
company
do I trust?
What are people
like me doing and
saying?
What do
customer
s want?
What are our
competitors
doing?
Will it be on
time and on
$$??
Gotta block
for my
team!!
Do they get
what I want?
What do I
want?
They want
what, when?
Scrum Master
External
Pressures
In-Group
Pressures
Internal
Pressures
Scrum
Team
The
Enterprise
PO Cabinet
LEGEND
Mental
Models
Ideas
Let’s visualize it
together!
Use rich pictures to
“reason about work”;
(Monk & Howard,
1998)
J. Fabrizi, 2013
@boolie

FINAL TIPS
SarahBloomer & Co | UXIndia 2014 38@boolie

Acceptance of UX involves change
Skepticism
Curiosity
Acceptance
Partnership
Stop battling for acceptance
• Get strategic
• Be a change agent
Ehrlich & Rohn, 1994
www.useit.com/alertbox/process_maturity.html
@boolie

Be a leader to drive change
• Communicate all the time
• Keep a learner’s mind
• Build trust in all directions
• Give credit where it’s due
• Stay out of the weeds
• Value your team
• Make time to mentor and coach
• Shut up and listen
SarahBloomer & Co | UXPA Boston 2015 40@boolie

Collaborate in all directions
Adjacent teams
Colleagues
Allied teams
Beneficiaries
Upper management
Stakeholders
Your UX team
Other beneficiaries
@boolie

Build communities of practice
Build relationships within your organization through Communities of
Practice. Promote cross-functional collaboration. Cross-functional teams
drive ongoing research, design and evaluation.
Customer research
Customer facing experience
Product Strategy
Branding
Marketing
UX Team
Product Strategy
Personas
Field studies
Analytics
Sales
Stores
Customer service
Tech support
Training
Personas
Stories
Customer feedback
Voice of the Customer
Sales
Marketing
UX Team
Tech Support
Product Development
Usability test results
Tech support issues
Release plans
@boolie

Tips to move up the maturity model
Learn about your
culture:
Build trust: within your team, with your peers and
your stakeholders
Show you value co-workers: support them, help
them succeed, give them the information they need
Get to know your co-workers: Spend time with
product managers, scrum team colleagues, senior
management.
Share: UX is most effective when it is influencing and
enabling other groups.
Find allies: Learn how other groups are measured.
Identify myths & values: Find what’s preventing you
from moving forward. Also barriers & opportunities.
Communicate in all directions: Within your team,
next to your team, above your team.
Be a leader:
Design your team: Be tactical: Choose activities that will be accepted
within your culture. Align your UX goals to bigger goals.
@boolie

You’ll get there
Culture Collaboration Capability Maturity
@boolie

Other sources
http://www.fastcompany.com/1810674/culture-eats-strategy-lunch
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Organizational_culture
http://www.tobyelwin.com/competing-values-drives-your-organization-out-
of-business/
http://Leadstrategic.com
http://www.creativebloq.com/netmag/kim-goodwin-designing-culture-
8135475

Culture eats UX teams for breakfast

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