Education
Traditional programs in Design emphasize aesthetic qualities related to craft, beauty and form; the solution to the design problem is judged based on emotional value, and the judgment, or critique, is often grounded in the field of fine art. User Centered Design, however, shifts the focus from the visual to the personal; a design solution is judged based on the relevance to the individual who ultimately must use the creation. Central to understanding this principle is embracing a very simple idea, but an idea that dramatically shifts the locus of attention during the creation of goods. This idea is that The User Is Not Like Me.
When embraced by designers, this core philosophy implies that consumers are unique, and that the designer holds a bias in the form of an expert blindspot. The more we know about a topic, the more we forget what it is like to "not know".
To illustrate this point, consider an example. You are the designer working on a kiosk for a bus station; the kiosk will replace the need for constant assistance from on-staff personnel, and will allow riders to purchase tickets even during the off hours. You've designed a pretty great looking kiosk; it has a lot of features, and even allows the tracking of a complicated route with multiple destinations and layovers in various cities. The kiosk ships and slowly finds a home in various southern cities.
Now consider Martha Saltzburgh, a single mother of two who has just been displaced by the hurricane that hit the south. Before the hurricane, Martha worked at a small hotel; she worked in the office, and was responsible for nearly all of the accounting and bill paying. Martha didn't go to college; she taught herself the relevant software programs, and while she doesn't understand all of the laws and regulations she needs to follow, she prides herself on making very few mistakes. She has no extended family; she managed, quite successfully, to locate a beautiful and affordable house for her two children, but it has been destroyed in the storm. She has no renter's insurance - has never even heard of such a thing - and was living month to month prior to the disaster. Martha's credit cards were destroyed in the hurricane, as was nearly everything else she owns; she doesn�t know where she is going to take the kids. She's been told, however, that she needs to evacuate the city immediately, and the bus is the only affordable and immediate way out.
When Martha interacts with your interactive kiosk, what state of mind will she have? Will she be happy? Easy going? Does she hope that the kiosk will be riddled with features, and that she will be able to map her route in a visual manner - zooming in on various landmarks along the way, and saving her route to a personal account?
The User Is Not Like Me; in Martha's particular situation, she is about as unlike you as you may ever wish. Are you responsible for the interaction Martha has, in her unlikely and unpredictable situation? Can a designer adequately predict such catastrophes and plan for Martha to use your creation? Should a designer attempt to predict these things?