Employee v.s. Consumer Apps

Does anyone else think employee-facing tools mostly seem unsexy? Certainly, if no consumer is paying to use it, there's no need to invest in making it beautiful or perfectly functional!

Fortunately, user-centered design is seeping into the enterprise world. As this culture slowly spreads, there are different challenges and views an employee-facing app is up against that consumer-facing apps might not come across.

"Employees are required to use the tools we give them. If it gets the job done, the tool is sufficient."

You can force undesired tools on employees. However, providing tools that are suitable to the users needs may reveal more company benefits than you think. Do you want your employees to be more efficient? Do you want them to make more informed decisions? How about less mistakes? Especially in the service industry, the face of your company is shaped by the interactions your employees have with your customers. If the tools cannot assist the guest in the best way possible, there is still some work to do.

"The tool doesn't need to be intuitive. That's what employee training is for."

How much time and money is spent learning how to do the job? How much of it is spent learning how to use the tool? There is a lot of struggle and risks in getting entire user groups to switch a new tool (or an existing tool), especially if it does not cater to the user's learning abilities and logic. Especially for touch-interface products, something that may seem "obvious" may not be for your target demographic. Design for your audience and training will be minimal.

"We get feedback from a few people who used to work in the field. Here is what needs to be built..."

Part of the struggle with top secret products meant for consumers is that you need to stay top secret. That might be why some products are built with just a small set of SMEs (subject matter experts), but can two to three experts speak for everyone? Building enterprise solutions, especially in-house, means there is full access to a bunch of your users. There's no need to find someone who resembles your demographic if they are your demographic. The closer to reality you can test the products, the more refined they can become.

"This off-the-shelf tool from X company looks great! It can do ___ and ___ and ___. Not a bad price for it either."

Cinderella's step sisters couldn't fit in that glass shoe. Also, as tempting as that shoulder-padded leather jacket on sale might be, it might not suit you. Sometimes we put the cart before the horse and try to shape employees in using products that don't quite fit their use-case. Make sure products are reviewed after outlining what the user needs. If there needs to be a work-around, it means the product isn't good. Consumers do not face this dilemma because as soon as they try out an app and it doesn't work for them, they can easily uninstall it from their device. Employees, as mentioned earlier, have less freedom to choose; therefore, creating or finding tools specific to them is the best in the long run.

Final note: Building better employee tools means making someone's everyday job a lot easier.

Both consumer and employee products find value by their users because they provide something of need or want. Research says that "buying time has similar benefits for happiness as having more money" (Independent, UK). It works as a "buffer against the time pressures of everyday life." Imagine reducing repetitive stress from a daily routine; a daily routine that's unavoidable, called work. We don't want to create friction, but reduce it.