Media: Adaptive Path takes on Usability Testing

"90% of All Usability Testing is Useless" by Lane Becker of Adaptive Path ought to go down with Nielsen's old assertion: "Flash 99% Bad" in the Usability Hall of Sensationalist Statistical Headlines. However, this article seems to have crept out without any rumpus to speak of.

Actually, this is probably because he goes on to argue a good case for his claim and then demolishes all sorts of preciousness around testing that has grown up rather unhelpfully on the periphery of the business.

Of the Web, he says, 'trying to determine the time to complete a specific task is a fool's errand. The real question is, why do users pause? What are they looking at? What are they thinking about? Did your navigation system fail them because of the categories you created, the words you used, or is it the placement of the navigation? Perhaps it's because of inconsistencies across the site or poorly implemented CSS tabs. Traditional usability testing will not give you these answers.'

And there is plenty more reasonableness. It will be familiar to any usability professional who has thought about what they are doing. It is nonetheless always nice to have it neatly summarised for those moments when you want a bold statistic. And Becker's own recipe for usability testing makes good reading.

Associated Link: Adaptive Path: 90% of All Usability Testing is Useless

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