Lisa McMichael

I was in a kick-off meeting on a new project that took an unexpected turn. My team was sitting at a very large conference table − six of us if I recall correctly − overlooking the river and expansive cityscape. I was enjoying my decaf soy latte while we made small talk with our client; […]

We want to work well together! We want to jell because it’s costly and painful when we don’t. So why is it challenging for some global work teams to thrive while others click? Why is it that some project teams start and run smoothly when they are located in different continents and time zones and other […]

Read part 1: The too familiar persona I imagine we’ve all used Cooper’s personas to routinely “engage the empathy of the design and development toward the human target of the design.” Nothing wrong in using goal directed personas, however one user profile model isn’t the best fit for every brand or its users’ motivations and […]

Design personas are user research models employed in various fields of design. Software design teams have been embracing personas in their work since roughly 1999, following Alan Cooper’s published work on goal-directed personas in his “Asylum” and “About Face” texts. They’ve become a user research staple, and the must-do-method for most of the products and services […]

I was really intrigued when I heard Eric Quint introduce the scale and scope of his job on a Web Conversation by dmi.org to an audience from 40 countries. We were there to hear the 3M Company’s Chief Design Officer talk about change management. For those who are not familiar with 3M, their products are found […]

I just read Changing change management shared by David Stallsmith. No doubt digital (interactive media) and the software powering it can be incredibly useful for delivering and managing change within organizations. The descriptive and prescriptive digital examples discussed in the article seem to verify that digital is both positive and transformative when done right. And […]

Part 1 see: “Is software eating the world? Or, is it really customers?” In the earlier post I mentioned that more companies are focusing on the opportunities software offers to create customer value through the customer experience (CX). This rising development is a result of the rise in popularity of software, and it is spawning […]

Part 1 of 2  Are software companies poised to “take over large swathes of the economy?” Apparently Marc Andreessen thought so in an article from 2011. I think he is right. Let’s take a quick mental inventory of a few of the major firms running on software and delivered as online services – eBay, Amazon, […]

I was surprised to know that designing for people with various forms of literacy issues would benefit literate users. In one study presented in a session I am now attending, I learned it does! Another surprise, about 50% of U.S. citizens report some type of literacy problem. As a result, when we think about digital transformation […]

Last week I participated in AccessU Summit, a daylong online conference sponsored by Knowbility and Environments for Humans. I have ‘sketched out’ some of the key ideas I took from each session, and I’ve grouped them into sections to steer you in the direction of the material that interests you the most. In addition to these, […]

For some time now I have contemplated, as a design practitioner, is my perception of design for users inclusive, empathic and universal? This has been nagging at me for some time. Actually it’s been calling my name, “Psst. Lisa, you’re behind the curve in your understanding of designing the user experience for people that are, […]

Earlier I posted on the importance of designing the small details (aka, microinteractions) with as much care as we design features. Dan Saffer, the author of Microinteractions – designing with details, refers to them quite simply as “small pieces of functionality.” He goes on to say they tend to be simple and brief, and either delightful or frustrating. Designing […]