As with all software that is built, there comes a moment where you start ‘adding’ too much to it. As a UX-er I always ask: will this extra feature make our software more complex?
The goal of software is usually to make our lives simpler. But by adding too much, we start to make the software so complex that it makes our lives harder. It forces us to have to ‘work around’ the software.
When I say it makes your life harder, I’m not exaggerating. I once had a 50+ year old user of software we built. Before we demonstrated the software she said: “I’m actually very scared for what you are going to show us because it will impact my work. It can make my work days harder or easier.” After the demo she was relieved to find it makes her work days easier.
Since there are different roles that need different data, the software can quickly become too crowded. For example: management and executives need different features than employees. But when we combine all these different features — that serve different purposes — inside one tool we make it a complex and people will not use it. You will have wasted your investment.
What I found helpful is to create separate environments for different roles. This might require more work but it will really help the organisation do tasks efficiently and with more success instead of becoming a tool that ‘stagnates’ everyone.
When building software let’s keep asking the question:
What do you absolutely need in order to make work easier and what can we leave out of it?
Any questions or comments on this blog post?