On February 9th, I will be presenting at an Agile Academy Meetup in Brisbane on combining agile and usability. Over the past 3 years at Suncorp, my primary focus in my role has been to combine usability with agile. This has been a challenging endeavour for two main reasons:
Traditional usability closely resembles the traditional software development approach in its formality and insistence on up-front analysis and design. Usability is iterative, but not agile.- Suncorp undergoing extensive change with the rollout of Agile across the enterprise and integration activities after aquiring the Promina group in 2007.
Owing to these challenges, I have focussed on minimising the tension between agile and usability approaches by leveraging the common values shared by both techniques in software development. The techniques I have forumulated to use with our Agile projects are derived from approaches employed by Jeff Patton, Allan Cooper, Steve Krug, Robert Hoekman Jr, Jesse James Garrett and Stephen Anderson.
My presentation will explore the following topics:
- The differences between Agile & Usability
- Shared Common Values
- Applying Garrett’s Five Elements of User Experience
- Rapid User Research Techniques (Goals & Needs Analysis; PACT Workshops)
- Persona Development
- Conceptual Design
- Avoiding “Featuritus”
- Parallel Track Development
I have structured the presentation so that anyone from a project manager to a developer can begin employing some of these agile and usability friendly techniques into their projects. This presentation will be held on Level 28 of Brisbane Square, 266 George Street, Brisbane starting at 5.30pm. If you would like to attend this free event, seats are limited, so please RSVP on the Agile Academy Meetup site.
Hope to see you there on February 9th!

The Video & Slide Deck from this Presentation are now online
The Agile Academy have published the video and slide deck for this presentation on their website:
Enjoy!
January 27th, 2010 at 2:47 pm
Teale, will your presentation be video-taped? If so, where will the video be posted?
Thanks,
Israel (aka agile_exec)
January 31st, 2010 at 5:42 am
Hi Israel,
Yes, I do believe they are intending to video the presentation. I intend to post slides and a link to a video following the presentation.
Thanks for your interest Isreal.
Cheers,
Teale
February 7th, 2010 at 11:54 am
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This post was mentioned on Twitter by teale: Free session on combining Agile with Usability | Feb 9, 17.30, BNE | http://tinyurl.com/ycv9ds3 #agile #usability #ux #design…
February 7th, 2010 at 12:51 pm
This is an important topic that does not always get the attention it deserves. Good luck in the presentation! I look forward to watching the video.
Best,
Israel
February 7th, 2010 at 9:47 pm
[...] interaction » Blog Archive » Live at Interaction’10: day 1 3 Tweets Free Session on combining Agile with Usability -| Agile is from Mars, Usability is from Venus by Te… A free session hosted by the Agile Academy on combining usability and agile. 3 Tweets [...]
February 9th, 2010 at 10:17 pm
Great talk – very thought provoking and another angle rarely expounded on in development meetings. Thanks.
February 10th, 2010 at 8:49 am
That was an awesome presso last, it made a lot of non-suncorp people in the room think “I’ve heard about this UX and IX stuff wow I should really take a look at that” Hence the lack of people having their hands up
Are you going to post the links that you mentioned last night online at any point??
February 12th, 2010 at 1:35 pm
Good presentation, Teale! I wish I could be there when you delivered it.
What would be your good advice about inserting A/B Testing hooks in a B2C application? From a usability standpoint, what should I be thoughtful about?
Thanks!
Israel
March 11th, 2010 at 11:04 pm
Hi – I would like to say thanks for an interesting post about a subject I have had an interest in for a while now. I have been lurking and reading the posts avidly so just wanted to express my thanks for providing me with some very good reading material. I look forward to more, and taking a more active part in the discussions here, whilst picking up some knowledge too!!
May 10th, 2010 at 3:18 am
Your video is great! So is the concept with song! Thank you Michael ! LOVE