Screaming users considered good

We all know our users can have really strong opinions about our stuff.  And we all know we need to listen carefully.

My very favorite user comment of all time came from a young woman who had been using this cool design tool (something I’d built) for about 12 weeks.  At the end of the project, I was doing the standard debriefing of the users, asking what they liked and didn’t like, what worked, what didn’t work, what was frustrating… the usual sort of post mortem on a project. 

She told me that my software, my baby, the thing I’d been working on for the past 2 years was “..the most white male fascist tool I’ve ever had the misfortune to use…”

I was somewhat taken aback.

“Ah, yes…”  I stalled for time, desperately trying to hold it together.  “And what made you feel this way?”

The conversation went on for some time after that (as you can imagine).  And while it was a painful episode, it was a really valuable learning experience. 

Although I knew intellectually that not everyone would see my system as I did, I was floored by her reaction.  But it made the point: as a designer, you really have to be aware of other folks opinions (even when they don’t jibe with yours), and you have to know what it is you’re building.  Sometimes, your product is going to passionately piss people off.  Sometimes, that’s okay.  In many cases, you simply can’t design a product that will make everyone sing your praises and want to send you roses.  I love my iPod, but I know there are some people who think it’s devil spawn.  If Steve can’t get everyone to love his things, I’m not sure I can. 

So I’d succeeded in creating a passionate user.  Sadly, it was passion in the wrong direction. 

After I recovered my composure a few weeks later, I realized I was really glad she’d told me.  The ten users I’d interviewed before her were all pretty nice and even-keeled.  “Oh yeah… it worked well…”  or even the sweetly positive comment  “I could do things with it that I could never have done before.” 

But in retrospect, I didn’t learn much from the nice folks who told me everything was fine and ducky.  I did learn a great deal from the ones who struggled, my users that just didn’t get it, had really strong reactions or failures. 

As Henry Petroski writes in To Engineer Is Human: The Role of Failure in Successful Design, we learn more from our failures than our successes.  But only if we pay attention to the failures and figure out what to do right the next time. 

The trick is to figure out what the message is from the user.  I did have the presence of mind to ask her what “fascist” meant.  Sure, I know the dictionary definition, but I couldn’t figure out what it meant in the context of the tool I’d built. 

My question opened up the sluice gates and I heard an awful lot about “not letting the user have a choice” and how our design tool “forced the user to do things in a particular order.”

Gee.  We did it that way because we knew it was more efficient.  But provably correct didn’t win the heart and mind of this user—she did things in a different way, and the tool was forcing her to go along a different path.  It felt fascist to her. 

Okay.  Got it.  So it wasn’t the Gestapo of all software, but it really was at variance with her approach.  In an instant it became clear what we could do differently the next time around. 

Bottom line:  Every product evolves.  It’s the rare (or trivial) that gets it right the first time and sticks with it for the rest of time.  Listen to the screamers and whiners and people writing nasty blog posts.  It’s painful and tough, but worth it. The screamers may not know it, but they’re really helping you out with the next release.