Human Factors at the Speed of Relevance for Agile Engineering

Abstract

Traditional Human System Integration (HSI) processes are at risk of being eliminated in the development process given the high velocity and continuous delivery methods of Agile and DevOps engineering. New processes and tools are needed to enable human factors practitioners to promote usable and effective products for users. This paper describes tools and approaches developed to synchronize HF and UX product design with quick-turn feature development in the DevOps environment. The process involved rapid user research survey and design validation usability testing tools for gathering feedback from users quickly enough to support DevOps and Agile timelines. The tools and processes afforded objective data to validate design decisions prior to agile development, which had become informal and based upon subjective judgement rather than empirical evidence to keep pace with the development velocity. The tools developed worked remotely to increase the ability to access users and decrease the logistics effort associated with gathering participants. This paper addresses a case study that successfully addressed the challenges for HF and UX practioners in our role of developing designs using agile and DevOps environment to improve the quality of the design proving relevancy.