| The Right Way to Beat the Rap |
| Here is an outline of the HFI GUI standardization process.
You can do it, too. We've helped beat the rap on standards. It works,
or we wouldn't have a company any more. Send us your experiences in
standards. We're looking for anecdotes and screen pictures for a book
on UI and Interactive Voice Response design standards. (We'll provide
anonymity for the modest!) |
| Steps to Beat the Rap |
Comments |
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1. Define the type(s) of standards you need. Keep
them separate.
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For example: Design; Methodology; Help; Error message; Interactive
Voice Response; Imaging.
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2. Get management commitment to follow through
on the standardization process.
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If necessary, get HFI's management briefing to "raise standards
consciousness," or take a GUI design class. Don't trust anyone
under 30. (Humor)
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3. Get 7-12 volunteers for committee membership.
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Get key opinion leaders. Volunteers work harder.
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4. Gather data
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Cover user characteristics, taskflows, work environments, software
usage, corporate strategies, etc. Conduct interviews at actual user
worksites. People love attention. They'll like you, too.
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5. Define screen types that cover 85% of the windows
that will be designed.
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Locate important and prevalent tasks associated with your business.
Customize a standard approach to handling those tasks. We define
as many as eight primary screen types. You get efficiency and ease
of use because a given type of task is handled with a standard configuration
of objects.
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6. Draft an actual case for each screen.
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Examples: Classical Hierarchical Menu, Browser (see Figure 1),
Create-Review-Update-Delete (CRUD), Graphic Drill-down (see Figure
2), and Form (see figure 4).
Your standard should specify important elements of wording, layout,
format, and operation of each screen. Here's your creative opportunity.
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7. Meet with the committee to refine the standard
screen designs
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One or two days of grueling meetings, during which we iterate each
prototype screen design with the group and discuss numerous design
details. The committee votes on which screen examples to standardize.
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8. Draft the standards document around the examples.
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Based on decisions made at the previous meeting, we might add new
primary screen types, secondary screen types, popups, and dialog
boxes. We'll further customize screen types to match the corporation's
functional needs. We document rules associated with screen operation.
(See Figures 3 and 4.)
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9. Add general chapters.
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We document the rules for standard keys, color, error handling,
icon usage, and widget selection.
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10. Meet again with the committee to review and
approve the standards document.
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This one or two day meeting includes feedback from external reviewers,
as well. Gruel may or may not be served.
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11. Finalize the document
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We make the changes. We complete the Table of Contents, Index,
and Glossary. We fix the document headers, section numbering and
pagination.
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12. Implement the standard
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This phase may or may not include an additional iteration and meeting.
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