What is an expert in User Centred Design?
What does it mean to be an expert on User Centred Design (UCD)? What does it require to be a User Experience (UX) expert? What kind of educational or experiential background do you require? What differentiates an expert from just a consultant? Is an expert someone that knows the UCD process and is proficient at a large variety of UCD methodologies? Is expertise measured by the consultant’s academic credentials, industrial experience, number of clients, or knowledge of a variety of industries and platforms?
What makes the foundation of an expert is all of those things; education, experience, and a solid knowledge of the processes, methodologies and tools. But what differentiates the consultant from the expert is not just being an expert at implementing UCD in perfect conditions, but the ability to implement UCD in the ‘not so perfect’ context of the client.
As experts we need to be able to assess the client’s current processes, phase of development, schedule, and budget, and then determine what activities and deliverables will provide the best returns within their context. But this isn’t where it should end. As a UX expert, you should be able to deliver not only tactical recommendations, but strategic ones as well. Those strategic recommendations are not just on the user experience of their system or product, but on the activities that can help to move the client towards a more efficient and productive implementation of UCD.
As true user experience experts, we need to propose and implement activities and deliverables for the best return in the context of the client, and work with the client to migrate to a process that will bring to fruition more of the strategic value of UCD.
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Elisa, this is a great post but also an interesting illustration of how different people can use terminology in different - even diametrically opposed - ways.
For me, a consultant is more than an expert, not the other way round. An expert is someone with a high level of subject matter knowledge, whereas a consultant is an expert who is able to create value for their customers by applying that knowledge, taking into account the whole business context. For example, the Certified Management Consultant award is only given to individuals who can demonstrate a track record of doing exactly that.
Nick
I'd have to agree with Nick on this...comparing a consultant to an expert is a bit apples and oranges. Consultancy and expertise are complimentary yet differing disciplines, rather than differing markers on the same continuum. One can be an expert in something without doing a days consultancy, yet there aren't many who can sustain a career as a consultant without genuine expertise. If anything I think your terminology is back to front: expertise can exist in a vacuum, but consultancy requires experience and the context of the client to translate that expertise into real value, which is really what you are talking about. It is the consultant, active in the field who has to take into account the constraints, environment and political landscape of the client, not the expert tucked up in the library with their head in a book.
Matt