Situated Reflexive Change : User-Centred Design in(to) Practice

ii Front cover picture: some of my colleagues at KTH during a workshop. All illustrations in the thesis are by Fredrik Ahnmé Eriksson, except for figure 7, page 49 (the three personas) which is by Rikard Hilding. iii To my parents, who taught me that there is always more to learn. iv v Abstract Technology used in the Swedish workplace is perceived to be controlling, generally still difficult to use, and with a low degree of usability. Even though the field of Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) has been concerned with researching different ways of developing usable systems for at least half a century, there seem to be problems with the diffusion of the results into practice. One of the possible approaches to developing usable systems is user-centred design, and in this thesis I am concerned with the issue of introducing user-centred design and usability work in public authorities and institutions. I will present work done in two different research projects with a focus on change, where the aim has been to introduce or enhance usability work. Through a lens of social construction-ism and reflexivity I will explore the outcome of the projects and the implications for the introduction of user-centred design in practice. Furthermore, I will explore whether the focus on the introduction of usability work might hinder the formation of a sustainable change in the organizations interested in developing usable systems. The research question then becomes; can we introduce usability work in organizations? The answer to this question is no. Instead, we need to change our perspective from introduction to situated reflexive change: focusing on sensemaking and a situated process of ongoing change, where the stakeholders in the organization themselves must play an active and responsible part. This entails a shift from dualism to duality and a reconsideration of what our usability methods can contribute with. Furthermore, I will explore possible approaches to working with situated reflexive change with tools that are familiar in the field of HCI, but with an expanded scope. In particular I will discuss field studies conducted by system developers as a tool for making sense of usability issues, personas as a tool for inducing reflexivity in and on practice, and usability coaching as a sensemaking tool for both organizational stakeholders and researchers in order to understand and reflect upon change. List of Papers This thesis is based on the following papers, which are referred to …