Good UX design principles

User-centric design solves technology and business problems from a real person's perspective, doing real work behind the screen with the tools built by Pega. Good design anticipates user behavior and helps users seamlessly accomplish what they set out to do.

The design process must incorporate empathy as a critical element. Empathy is the ability to understand what other people feel from their perspective. It is not the same as sympathy, which is the act of showing concern. Using empathy helps Pega create solutions for the problems the software aims to solve. For Example; Empathy towards the citizen developer is what we see today in the simple to easy features of App Studio.  

Bad design makes for tiring, tedious, and frustrating experiences. For example, enterprise software users might spend over eight hours a day with Pega Infinty™ products, and good design keeps users engaged for those eight hours to focus on their job instead of struggling with technology. Engaging design elicits positive feelings, and positive feelings at work lead to better performance and results.

There is a formal process for creating a user-centric design. In practice, the process might look like the following example:

Scenario

David, a designer, and Petra, a product owner, are invited to observe CSRs use a Pega Customer Service™ application in a call center. David sits next to Cece, the CSR, who answers chats from customers. David notices that Cece handles conversations from a dozen customers simultaneously, and she struggles to switch back and forth between waiting customers. David sees an opportunity to improve the experience for CSR and help customers with the wait time, increasing customer satisfaction with the interaction.

David and Petra bring these insights back to the team and brainstorm with Elizabeth, the lead engineer. David suggests adding visual cues to show the order in which the CSRs should answer chats. Petra adds that the team should use wait time and customer value to derive the order. Elizabeth has some concerns about the impact on the performance and says that her team plans to look into it. Together, they agree on an acceptable wait time to prioritize speed and efficiency. The team uses the wait time as a metric and discusses developing solutions to test with real users.

Analysis

In this scenario, the team implements good UX design principles to create an effective solution for CSRs and their customers.

First, the team observes and defines the user problem by:

• Empathizing with the end user.
• Understanding the context and constraints.

Then, the team proposes a goal and solution by:

• Ideating on a concept.
• Rendering the designs in collaboration with the team.
• Testing and evaluating the design prototype against goals (for example, reviewing performance/load time and the speed and wait time of KPIs).

Finally, the team implements the design.

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