This document discusses moving UX work to a more strategic orientation within organizations. It provides a conceptual framework that views UX activities through three lenses: strategic, organizational, and operational. The strategic lens involves understanding business forces, inflection points, and positioning UX as an innovation driver. The organizational lens focuses on effective cross-team collaboration and joint initiatives. The operational lens covers measuring UX outputs and investments. An example case study illustrates how to apply this framework in analyzing a company facing disruptive forces and needing to transform its product approach.

1. @liamfriedland | UX India 2014
UX as Business Strategy
strategic
organizational
operational
Interaction
TM

2. @liamfriedland | UX as Business Strategy
Acknowledgement
The ideas and content in these slides are the result of a 14 year long creative collaboration with Jon Innes. Over the years Jon and I have had many lengthy and animated discussions on the topics of UX strategy, leadership, management, and tactics. The fruits of our chats have resulted in a series of tutorials, workshops, and presentations that have been delivered at CHI, UXPA, UX Strat, IXDA, and now UX India.
Any errors in these slides are entirely my own.

3. @liamfriedland | UX as Business Strategy
Conceptual framework for workshop
strategic
organizational
operational
Interaction
TM
Moving to a strategic orientation
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Framework as a means for thinking about UX activities as they relate to core business processes
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Benefit from a systematic, structured, approach
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Process areas function as lenses to focus thinking and approach
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Interaction between key processes to create business value

4. @liamfriedland | UX as Business Strategy
Why does UX need to be strategic?
Effective UX organizations imagine the future
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Scenario planning + risk reduction
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More accurate + early determination of product concepts
UX becomes a differentiating factor in a commodity market
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Competitors develop comparable offerings over time
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Mainstream markets value UX more than early adopters
High technology businesses are maturing
•Design becomes a more distinct phase
•Design orgs become innovation competency centers

5. @liamfriedland | UX as Business Strategy
Need to move from this worldview…
One external worldview of UX teams
UX as consulting / service organization
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Design: Makes things look good
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Usability: Tests to find bugs after the code is working
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Not a core business competency
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Important but not essential
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Practitioners don’t have a good sense of business issues

6. @liamfriedland | UX as Business Strategy
…to a more strategic orientation
Strategic worldview of the UX team
New framework: Strategic UX
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Innovation driver
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UCD informs all aspects of product direction
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Essential—no product development without UX
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Key contributions throughout the development cycle
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Business value is large, wide-ranging, and demonstrable
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Quantifiable, reproducible, high-quality processes

7. @liamfriedland | UX as Business Strategy
Operational processes
strategic
organizational
operational
Interaction
TM
Overview
•
UX outputs
•
Measuring UX investments

8. @liamfriedland | UX as Business Strategy
UX outputs
UX
Formative Research
Summative Research
Interaction Design
Information Architecture
Visual Design
Concept Prototyping
TM: Jon Innes | UX Innovation

9. @liamfriedland | UX as Business Strategy
High
Low
Level of Effort
Measuring activity levels: Design-focused teams
Design-focused

10. @liamfriedland | UX as Business Strategy
High
Low
Level of Effort
Measuring activity levels: Research-focused teams
Design-focused
Research-focused

11. @liamfriedland | UX as Business Strategy
High
Low
Level of Effort
Measuring activity levels: UX-focused teams
Design-focused
Research-focused
UX-focused

12. @liamfriedland | UX as Business Strategy
Organizational processes
strategic
organizational
operational
Interaction
TM
Overview
•
Effective cross-organizational collaboration
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Broadening perspectives with joint initiatives
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Disciplinary blinders

13. @liamfriedland | UX as Business Strategy
Collaboration is key
Big picture, organizational perspective
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Step outside of your cube or office & engage
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Perform an organizational audit
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Establish a foreign policy
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Define your goals and strategies for influencing others
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How do you interact with other groups in your company?
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Cultivate allies in other groups to help + help you
Initiatives of common interest

14. @liamfriedland | UX as Business Strategy
UX outputs + organizational synergy
Market Research
Innovation Mgmt.
Project Mgmt.
Support
Subject Matter Experts
Documentation
Brand
Quality
Marketing
Sales
Engineering
Product Mgmt.
TM: Jon Innes | UX Innovation
UX
Formative Research
Summative Research
Interaction Design
Information Architecture
Visual Design
Concept Prototyping

15. @liamfriedland | UX as Business Strategy
Disciplinary lenses as blinders
Developers
As seen by
Designers
As seen by
PM
As seen by
QA
As seen by
Developers Designers PM QA

16. @liamfriedland | UX as Business Strategy
Strategic processes
strategic
organizational
operational
TM
Overview
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What is strategy + what it isn’t
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Forces impacting business
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Inflection points
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Case study
Interaction

17. @liamfriedland | UX as Business Strategy
Strategy
Unique + valuable position
Strategy is not:
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A vision
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A plan
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Optimization of the status quo, i.e., refinement
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Following best practices
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Efficiency measures
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Innovation or technology
Strategy is:
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Differentiation activities: Where to play
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How to win
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Core capabilities & effective combinations
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Management systems
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Saying no to say yes

18. @liamfriedland | UX as Business Strategy
Six forces impacting businesses
The Business
Power, vigor, and competence of existing competitors
…of complementors
…of customers
…of suppliers
…of potential competitors
Possibility that what your business is doing can be done in a different way
From “Only the Paranoid Survive” by Andy Grove

19. @liamfriedland | UX as Business Strategy
Strategic inflection points
Business goes on to new heights
Business declines
* Requires a fundamental transformation from what you were to what you will be
Inflection Point *

From “Only the Paranoid Survive” by Andy Grove

20. @liamfriedland | UX as Business Strategy
Inflection points in detail
Agile UX
Distributed development
University to online learning
Nuclear family to aging boomer
Database to big data
Blackberry to Smart Phone
iPod to iPad to Watch
Laptop to tablet
Lab testing to remote usability testing
Enterprise to pro-sumer
Brick & mortar to eCommerce
Hardware to software
Local to global
Software utilities to enterprise security
Lean startup
Version 23 to concept car
Total design management
Data-based design
West to east
Market
Tech
Product
Process

21. @liamfriedland | UX as Business Strategy
Case study: Concept Car | Forces + inflection point
Forces
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Acquisition strategy fragments product architecture
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Mature competitors integrate offerings
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Startups deliver innovative solutions
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Users & field teams demand improvements Inflection Point
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Product focused:
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Fragmented offerings
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Unified, cloud-based concepts
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Create a shared vision—a new way of doing business

22. @liamfriedland | UX as Business Strategy
Case study: Concept Car | Current + future activity levels
Before
High
Low
Level of Effort
Concept Car

23. @liamfriedland | UX as Business Strategy
Case study: Concept Car | Organizational synergies
Synergies
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Collaborate with PM’s to build a shared understanding of competitive trends
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Collaborate with Architects to build a shared understanding of data technology trends
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Conduct market demographic research to understand next generation’s (millennial’s) technology preferences and share with organization
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Conduct UI technology research to understand new trends and share with organization
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Collaborate with marketing to enhance product branding and extend and renew the visual language
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Evangelize and share knowledge company-wide in order to get execs and products teams energized by and enrolled in the new vision

24. @liamfriedland | UX as Business Strategy
Group Activity

25. @liamfriedland | UX as Business Strategy
Group activity | Tying it together
Instructions
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Form teams of 6
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Select a captain for each team
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Read through the provided case study with your teams
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Team Work on the case study:
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Describe the forces at work?
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Describe the inflection point?
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Current UX activity levels for your team (provided)
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What are the future UX activity levels for your team?
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What new activities will be necessary?
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What will be the effort levels for new activities?
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How do your activities synergize with other teams at the company?
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Prepare a presentation to your execs:
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1 page with Forces + Inflection point
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1 page with Activity Levels
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1 page describing the synergies of the activities with other teams at the company
strategic
organizational
operational
Interaction
TM