Redesign of a website for technical information and service tools following a human centered design process to reflect the workflow of different users

Abstract

Web-based services designed using human centered design methods containing instructions how to self-complete various tasks and providing interfaces to do them helped various organizations become more efficient. However, often software engineering teams have a lack of understanding of when and how users should be involved when designing such systems. They are often unsure how to measure the impact of human centered design methods. This thesis presents a human centered design solution to designing a website for technical information and service tools for Windows services at CERN. This involved using a carefully chosen combination of design research methods to study user, stakeholder groups and their workflows as well as organizational requirements. I then used this data to inform the design decisions and outputs such as sitemaps, wireframes and a high fidelity prototype. The study focused on the role of these methods in the design process and how they could help to accomplish the goals of the project. Also, on evaluating the impact of these methods on the design outcome. It was found that interviews, card sorting and usability testing each had a role to play in the process with the new design performing significantly better than the old one. Further to this, usability testing was found to be a useful evaluation and development technique.