Problems while interfacing with development or management organization:
Engaging with development / management 

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Problems engaging with development/management

Respondents indicated that they met with some type of general resistance (45 instances) to the concept of usability testing during the early stages of involvement with developers, designers, managers, etc. 

Accompanying resistance is general unawareness (32 instances) of the usability process, its benefits, and value for users.  An opportunity for selling usability in an organization and maintaining support throughout the process is providing business, information technology, designers, marketing, and project management with a better understanding of the usability process from test preparation through the implementation of changes.

Resistance Comments:

• "General resistance to having a non-member of their team provide direction that they did not ask for."
• "Tendency to believe design is finished when production is complete."
• "Resistance is sometimes encountered when something designed in another department is found to have user problems."
• "Some resistance to the idea at first in that it was viewed as a threat to creativity."
• "Marketing was a challenge. They felt the web site was their product."
• "Marketing tries to come between us and drive the process too quickly or in the wrong direction"
• "In general, development teams believe they've already created a usable tool, so they don't see the point. Management usually comes to me for validation -- which isn't really what I have to offer."
• "Perceived increase in development time."
• "When the executive summary of a usability report focuses solely on the negative, we've found it turns off the development team."
• "Internal problems in development department resulting in loss of attention."
• "It is difficult to engage a team that is constrained by tight schedules and pressure from management to get to market quickly."
• "They think they know what the user wants and try to guess and try to bypass usability involvement  They try to make things easier for themselves which may make it harder for users."
• "Politics - who should do what, is usability worthwhile, who can we take time from, etc. Procurement - the procurer does not know what they want or they don't care what the users want."
• "They don't HAVE to do usability (not in the dev cycle) so they don't do it."
• "Ease of use, etc. are not part of the release criteria."
• "Developers and their managers don't know how to fit usability into the dev cycle and don't want input from other groups (usability) on how to do this. However, they all say they know it is important."  
• "Not wanting to accept users' responses to our product"
• "Market pressures are always the greatest problem. Time to market cycles for our hardware and software are so short now that usability testing is viewed as an impediment to getting the product out."
• "Only at the beginning of a project do developers deny the need of usability assistance."
• "Clients often don't believe they have the money to incorporate usability testing in the process, and it becomes secondary to other activities."
• "Some product managers will not even speak with us and actively avoid us."
• "Defensiveness..."
• "Getting buy-in."
• "It is hard to get clients to pay to have graphic artists and site developers in on the usability process, though this is clearly most desirable."
• "Many clients do not want to pay for usability testing at all, or it does not fit into their time frame."
• "No incentive to engage us."
• "Some development teams are not sold on the idea of usability testing." 
• "Mainly, the obstacle is getting the project lead to ask for my help. After that, even if I'm involved early enough to make recommendations, I have a credibility problem because I'm new to this development shop within my organization." 
• "To get buy-in without threatening the team."
• "Constructive criticism is not accepted from the developers at times..."
• "My proposed changes are unimportant and a matter of opinion (and why is your opinion better than my opinion?). We don't have time for (whatever it is). Implementing this new functionality is much more important (than whatever you're proposing)."
• "Initially it was that developers thought they could design applications just fine without our help or testing."
• "Some customers do not want to pay for the 40 hours it usually takes to run one set of tests start to finish (developing, writing, and getting approval for scenarios; finding and scheduling participants; running the test; analyzing the and writing up the results), let alone multiple tests.
• "Some project leaders or developers still do not think usability testing is necessary."
• "Initially, there's always resistance because they feel you are taking away the 'fun' part of their job."
• "Teams are sometimes resistant because they think we will eat up budget and schedule, or that we will dictate what changes must be made."
• "Perception that this is an extra thing to do, rather than a more effective way of doing what they do already."
• "Teams have resisted showing users prototypes or partial development."
• "That's not a high priority for us right now...maybe next release."
• "There are too many high-level (read "exciting functionality') changes requested by the client in a very limited time, with many parallel deliveries, so usability gets pushed to the rear." 
• "They feel it adds too much time to the process."
• "Development team is wary of anything 'new' that they haven't seen somewhere else."
• "Typical stuff...developers are really busy writing code and usability often takes a back seat to actually implementing the product."
• "What do we need a team for? Just create it and put it out there."
• "Getting past the amount of time/money/resources that must be spent for many usability activities."
   

Usability Unawareness Comments:

• "Lack of knowledge of the value of usability."
• "Not exactly understanding what usability is or how it effects the customer experience."
• "Not fully understanding that usability doesn't necessarily equate to hard statistics."
• "The perception that usability takes them off critical path and usually is not that great a benefit."
• "Proving worth."
• "No perception of our utility."
• "Developers think they know how to develop in Windows, so why do they need usability's input?"
• "They are under no obligation to act on my recommendations, and they do not have to give me time to do any low-fidelity tests of the early concepts, so I can't 'prove' that my suggestions will work."
• "Convincing them that their product does not have to be finished in order to benefit from usability testing."
• "Having them realize the value of 3rd party, experienced designers being involved during the design phase (even if our knowledge of the domain is limited)."
• "Tendency for developers to see usability as a single, large, time and resource intensive effort aimed at evaluating a product, rather than the potential for a series of smaller, effective 'design-related' activities aimed at helping create an effective product."
• "Usability perceived to take too much time to follow through with improvements"
• "Designs that are more costly to implement even if they reduce feature set and more productively support user work."
• "Lack of understanding about what usability is and why they should do it." 
• "Understanding the value of usability - that it is far more than user acceptance testing to see if the product works."
• "Understanding that earlier testing is better."
• "Studies showing the new concept works is not enough to get buy-in."
• "They could not see the value in advance."
• "Concern that the management team that reviews the usability report will not understand how their 'usability fixes' will impact the developers. It is an ownership or territorial type of attitude for the developer.
• "Lack of knowledge of the value of usability."
• "Usability is not a priority it can be added in later."
• "Lack of awareness of what usability can contribute lack."
• "Lack of mgt communication/openness to the subject."
• "More of our problems are with our own management (new VP, doesn't get it)."
• "Completely ignorant to UID."
• "Trying to convince them of the value of usability, how it won't affect their deadlines."
• "What do we need a team for? Just create it and put it out there. We don't have the time or resources."
• "Communicating ROI."
• "Communicating need to provide proper testing facilities and support staff."
• "Communicating need for iterative testing and the unique value of each type of test."
• "Usability is new so it means a lot of explanation."
• "No one understands user centered design and is used to engineering or business driven design."
• "Lack of understanding about what usability is and why they should do it."
• "Perception that this is an extra thing to do, rather than a more effective way of doing what they do already."
• "Selling usability to them."

Time Constraints Comments:

• "Not enough time - I am a member of every feature team - a cross-functional team that focuses on the design, development, and deployment of key features for specific customers. Features are not added now unless driven by customer need."
• "Lack of time in the schedule."
• "It is difficult to engage a team that is constrained by tight schedules and pressure from management to get to market quickly."
• "Time--usability is always what gets cut."
• "Time lines, being able to justify the time to test."
• "Time involved to run a formal study."
• "We don't have the time or resources."
• "Given the need to meet deadlines, developers sometimes want to skip usability testing."
• "We don't have time for (whatever it is)."
• "Sometimes the amount of time that they have."
• "Usability perceived to take too much time to follow through with improvements."
• "Now the gripes focus on the cost and time to do usability testing."
• "Mostly in regard to time."

All Other Comments:

• "Aesthetic issues, targeting the right user type, field test recruiting."
• "There is no formal usability group where I work. The usability that we do occurs when development and marketing talk about how they want the product to look." 
• "Obtaining clear definition of what information is desired, i.e., what tasks to test, what criteria for success or failure are desirable."
• "Everyone except usability specialist works at home 3-5 days a week. Contact with developers often comes only through UE team designers. Internal communication is lousy!"

Developer Resource Constraints Comments:

• "My problem is too few resources. We are small, stretched too thin, all of us performing multiple roles. It only works because we are small, and all fully engaged in developing a quality product of which one component is usability."

"I Don't Have Any Problems" Comments:

• "I have not experienced any difficulties (as unusual as that may seem)."
• "Our development is quite good in taking our recommendations and following through; they do respect our skill set and will let our group define the interface of our products. We do however, will work with the development to to assess technical constraints and how it affects the usability and our group's proposed designs."
• "Our team is well-respected by most of our developers, so there are rarely problems engaging them."
• "We don't have a lot of problems with development!"
• "None, since I /am/ part of the development team."
• "No real problems."
• "Not really - usually eager at the prospect of getting feedback."
• "Is there one? Usability is considered an enhancement not necessary. Developers feel its an obligation to implement our recommendations."

Original Question

(7) Describe any problems or resistance you encounter while interfacing with development or management in your organization. 

Problems trying to engage a development team:

"