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How to change the CEO's mind
A friend of mine recently joined a new Web 2.0 startup. The site is impressive. Clever name, interesting premise, and a visually striking design. A stream of social activity pours down a column on every page. Text, buttons, fields all fade into view just - so. Finely tuned. This is the very leading edge of what Web developers can do today.
There's just one problem: I couldn't figure out how to complete the primary task on the site.
I wrote my friend, complimenting the team on its visual design skills, but mentioned my lack of success at getting anything done. My attractive, visually precise, finely tuned user experience was, in the end, a failure. I would not be returning to the site.
My friend responded that this wasn't a surprise, the user experience is a major known issue on the site, and that the team is working on it. It appears that the founder and CEO has certain priorities for visual panache that outweigh the user's interest in getting through the site. This is all pretty standard for many companies, but it raises an important question that is worth exploring:
How does one change the mind of the CEO?
Just remember that the best way to change the CEO's mind - any stakeholder's mind - is to show them users, in person, in real time, having an unscripted, authentic user experience.
Show the CEO, in person, a user struggling to understand the site, finally giving up, and saying, "this is a beautiful site that I can't figure out and I'm never coming back."
Show the CEO several of these people, having the same problems in their experience despite not being forced into it by leading questions or any sort of script.
Show the CEO all of this and simply ask, "What did you observe today?"
And watch what happens.
I could not agree more! In fact - we have been chided for being too simple in our UI design. However - we took the opposite tack of the CEO above - we wanted using our solution to be as easy as possible and support many browsers, devices and platforms. Perhaps we were too extreme to usability - but that was an error we were willing to make.
Now of course - we took the chiding seriously and are upgrading our look and feel - but it will not be to the detriment of our usability for customers.
Thanks a ton for discussing this topic.
OK. What if you have that CEO who just doesn't want to hear it? What if you have that CEO who views this type of evidence as negativity and you don't get the job? What if you have a CEO who attacks the design team after they see user feedback like you describe? What if you have a CEO who just doesn't believe design is worth the investment? Who never reads blogs like Good Experience? What if you have a CEO with a big ego who likes to talk with people more than finding solutions? We designers need the stakeholders to work with us. Not view us as their competition. How many CEOs read your blog?
I've seen this work and I've seen this not work -- it doesn't work if the CEO (or board member, or VC, or diff CxO or other high level decision maker or stakeholder) decides that all "those users" aren't the target (even if they're current customers/users or fit the company's target audience) or that, even after watching 6 or 8 or 12 or more, all of them just aren't savvy enough. The stakeholder needs to be willing to listen first in order to be willing to have her/his mind changed.
If it were always this simple. In the past, the CEOs that I worked with were more the COE (Cheif of Everything) types, and fancied themselves to have brilliant marketing minds (they didn't...they never really do). How does one manage "up" when the CEO is a control freak who thinks that he/she needs to have a finger or a foot in everyone else's role?
Adding metrics to what you posted below work great too Mark. Most CEO's (as you know) must see the relationship between the impact and the bottom line. Showing them how difficult it is to use their site as you detailed, and adding metrics showing the impacts will definitely change their mind. Backing up qualitative with quantitative is a great way to show both adequacies and inadequacies to C-level folks. There is a fine line between leading edge and bleeding edge.
Nice read.
Cheers,
Josh
As someone who is very technologically blonde, this is an ongoing problem. My area of expertise as a consultant is the Customer/Client/Patient Experience, and I've worked with numerous clients just on websites alone, operating on the theory that if I can figure it out, anyone can.
This isn't just a problem with websites; many offices and brick & mortar businesses are run in a manner that serves the "vision" of the business owner but is incompatible (at best) for the customers or all-but-dysfunctional (at worst).
What's interesting, and the main story is a perfect example, is that the worst Experiences are usually delivered by businesses whose primary decision maker is the kind of person who is unable to comprehend that, a) his way isn't the right or best way, and/or, b) that "everyone" will embrace it because, after all, it's brilliant.
The only way to have any influence over these people is to show them how much money they have lost and continue to lose because their brilliant vision isn't customer/user friendly. And even that doesn't work with everyone. Sometimes you just have to sit back and let go and allow it to be a failure. It's painful when you've put a lot of work into it, but sometimes that's the only way.
UX rarely has power in an org. Often, we must convince those who make decisions that to do what we recommend is beneficial to the company, their teams, and to them as individuals (not necessarily in that order). It's a permission game. The more permission we are given, the better we are able to do our jobs.
Sometimes we have champions in the org that recognize our value and what we can deliver. Often there are those who at worst know the UX buzzwords and at best aren't willing to give UX enough of a priority to be effective. Those are the cases where we don't have much permission to act and can be frustrated at our lack of impact.
In these cases, a more modest approach may be necessary. Each additional bit of value we deliver and can take some amount of credit for will typically give us a little more confidence and permission until we have earned the trust of the one with the power. That can take time. Sometimes a lot of time.
A key decision as practitioners is whether it is possible to change this person's perspective and if it can be done in a timeframe we are comfortable with in terms of our own growth and career (and whether there are other options available). I'm not saying quit as soon as you hit a wall with a stakeholder. Recognize that change takes time. Recognize that not everyone will change. Decide whether you have the patience to wear down the rock.
I reject the premise. If the CEO doesn't understand the value of good, usable design, then that's a company I don't want to work for. I'm either joining a company where the CEO is competent (screened up front before I take the job), or I will become the CEO of my own company that cares about the user experience. Let the clueless CEOs figure it out for themselves.
@David - good point, though I think it's more complicated in practice. Surely the CEO (or whoever the boss is) can talk a good game during the initial interview - "we're customer-centric," etc... even if the commitment isn't there - just as prospective employees can occasionally present a different face in the interview than what they bring to the position later.
Showing users having problems definitely helped me so far. However, if the CEO sees user testing as a waste of time and resources and would rather have the next feature out the door earlier, then there are no user stories to show. I've found those type of CEOs frustratingly difficult to convince.
Not to say we shouldn't try, and thisis a good method, but it doesn't *always* work. I've seen CEOs do incredible rationalizations to brush away the problems when they watch users. As Jeff Goldblum said in The Big Chill, "I don't know anyone who could get through the day without two or three juicy rationalizations. They're more important than sex."
Sometimes CEOs deserve a break - we can't expect them to all come from marketing and service backgrounds even if that seems like it should be so. If a CEO isn't taking on-board a message about a usability problem, then usability and marketing people should consider how well they are communicating the issues to the CEO rather than blaming.
HOW you show the CEO a user stuggling with a site could be a key issue. Doing it in a live, in-person demo could make the CEO feel he's being set up. Commissioning a series of usability tests with screen capture video might be an easier way to get across the idea. Usability test videos are a bit slow to watch and the CEO shouldn't be expected to sit through them. It would be easy to edit-down the videos (even using a cheap and simple video editor like PowerDirector etc.) into a highlight reel that shows the repeated, shared difficulties experienced by multiple testers.