Human-centered Design Process
September 14, 2015
- Planning: The most crucial and key point on HCD is the planning. It is important not to make the HCD extensive or expensive as well. The overall cost of the development of any system can be minimized in some greater range by taking some simple primitive initiatives. The planning of any program should be set as the requirements of the project should be fulfilled by the activities. The activities should also be done taking into account the significance of the project. The cost benefit analysis should be conducted in some proper way as such the demands of the project can be earned successfully at some lower or adequate cost.
- Analysis & requirements: If the usability supports the business objectives it can be said to be valuable only then. It is important to identify the user issues and also the business resources to ensure that the best design plans can be fit in. Another step is to identify the person who is going to use the system and how this is going to be used. This information can be collected by field research work if it is necessary. A system can achieve success if the following steps can be followed:
- At first defining the primary and most important goals to be performed by the users.
- Making a list of tasks the users need to perform.
- Arranging the tasks according to the sequences of priority.
- Define the characteristics of the task like goals, inputs, outputs, dependencies, time of operation, variability, flexibility etc.
- Analyzing of the tasks and sub-tasks and also identifying the obstacles to solve the tasks.
- Investigating different environmental characteristics.
- Designing: In HCD model, we can develop some models or prototypes of the main design or some parts of it. By using such prototypes we can easily make some comparative analysis with the main model. The designing can be started with the flow chart and navigation can be used as the supportive tasks.
- Evaluation: This process of evaluating the design solutions is said to be the most valuable form of feedback process. This helps to improve the design based on the feedback of the users. This process should start in the early stage of the development and should be carried out throughout the process frequently. By following the sequences of screen sketches it is easy to evaluate the tasks in primary stage. By walking through the designs it is also possible to evaluate with the results based on the users’ task goals. Evaluation helps to get the best possible design.