One of my pet peeves in software development is not doing enough upfront R&D into feature and product design. User feedback is often only collected after the feature has shipped, landed and users are forced to deal with the "upgrade."
It's hard to take subjective matters, such as UI preferences, and draw objective conclusions from them ... but it can at least be done in the aggregate. Before "SaaS" took over software (and made modern computing mostly unappealing to me as an end-user), companies would have to spend quite a bit of resources doing focus groups and "beta testing" before that big product release. End users could be divided into the "early adopters" and the "review watchers", the latter group choosing to wait and decide whether or not it's worth "upgrading."
There is no reason that feature and product design in software can't go through an R&D phase except for cost. It's often cheaper to do your R&D in-house even though it often misses the mark because "real" customers rarely use a product like those who are intimately familiar with all of its quirks and oddities.
So, while you're correct that accessibility, usability and aesthetics will often vary from individual to individual ... I still think that companies could arrive at an objectively "right", or at least "best" design if they bothered to do more upfront R&D; soliciting user feedback and data from "real" end users very early on in the design and development process. Doesn't mean you will please everyone, but you can at least maximize the number of end users who are satisfied.
Hard agree. I've worked with specialised user researchers before and holy shit they're good. I've never ever once thought doing research was a waste of time. It's so worth the money.
It's just really easy to get trapped in your own biases - often the bias of "This isn't that complicated, I understand it so the customer can too", and the "I know what they want" one. So in the face of 'we need to deliver fast', a lot of people won't take the time to invest in it.
If anyones interested in research methods, highly reccomend this book.
It's hard to take subjective matters, such as UI preferences, and draw objective conclusions from them ... but it can at least be done in the aggregate. Before "SaaS" took over software (and made modern computing mostly unappealing to me as an end-user), companies would have to spend quite a bit of resources doing focus groups and "beta testing" before that big product release. End users could be divided into the "early adopters" and the "review watchers", the latter group choosing to wait and decide whether or not it's worth "upgrading."
There is no reason that feature and product design in software can't go through an R&D phase except for cost. It's often cheaper to do your R&D in-house even though it often misses the mark because "real" customers rarely use a product like those who are intimately familiar with all of its quirks and oddities.
So, while you're correct that accessibility, usability and aesthetics will often vary from individual to individual ... I still think that companies could arrive at an objectively "right", or at least "best" design if they bothered to do more upfront R&D; soliciting user feedback and data from "real" end users very early on in the design and development process. Doesn't mean you will please everyone, but you can at least maximize the number of end users who are satisfied.