Software companies becoming more concious of feature bloat

Interesting article about Symantec's Norton suite in the Aug 18 issue of Business Week. The article quotes Rowan Trollope, who runs (or ran) the consumer products group at Symantec - he discovered that his friends turned off most of the features in the Norton suite rather than deal with all the problems it causes. It was a wake-up call, and he set out on a mission to get the bloat out of Norton.

I've had the same experience. Friends and family ask me "Can you look at my computer? It's really slow accessing the web." Inevitably I find out they recently installed Norton and between the anti-fraud, anti-identity-theft, anti-virus, anti-adware, and anti-spyware it's grinding their system to a halt.

Kudos to Rowan to listening directly to customers, but I have to wonder - why did it take a directive from a top executive to embark on trim the fat in Norton, which for the record, is still as bad as it was two years ago? It's painfully obvious to customers, and should be painfully obvious to the support team, the product management team, and the QA team.

Thankfully, we're just at the cusp of getting beyond the GeeWhiz phase in the software industry, where everything is so revolutionary that people will buy it regardless of how painful it is to use. The software industry today is a bit like the car industry of 1920 - the sheer novelty of horseless transportation outweighed the fact that driving most cars was more complicated than brain surgery. Now that there's a computer in most homes, and "Photoshopping" is in the mainstream vernacular, we're very nearly at the point where ease of use, design, and simplicity will win over feature bloat. It can't come soon enough.

Unified Communications goes mainstream

I remember Fred once told me we dramatically overestimate the success of a given technology in the short term, and then dramatically underestimate it's impact in the long term. It's definitely been true for VoIP and Unified Communications - they hype was unbelievable, and VoIP pundits predicted the rapid death of traditional telephony, then as the promise failed to materialize overnight, and people suffered through the unreliability of early systems, they lost interest.

I remember having conversations a few years back with colleagues about how cost-reduction will drive VoIP adoption, but the true benefit of VoIP and UC will be business productivity and integration with other enterprise systems. I was happy to see an article today titled "Vertical Apps Drive UC Interest" in FierceVoIP . The article cites a report from Light Reading that finds that vertical market applications in finance and healthcare, as well as Fixed Mobile Convergence and Collaboration are driving adoption of Unified Communications.

In the next few years we'll finally start to see the true promise of VoIP - softphones for your mobile device that completely integrate with your office PBX, archiving and searching customer calls in your CRM system, and many things we can't even begin to imagine. The future is here.

Want to create software your users love?

Last week Lorraine Chapman, Macadamian's UX Project Manager, delivered a webinar on the right and wrong ways to get user input on design. Many software companies still go on "gut feel" and market research when designing new features, citing time constraints, budgets, or simply "we know our product-space best" as excuses not to get user feedback . Lorraine dispels some of the common myths about involving users in design and covers some of the techniques and best practices we use in design.

Click here to view the archived webcast.

At the Stanford Summit - What is Green?

Many of us at Macadamian are very passionate about green tech and the environment. A question we've been bouncing around Macadamian is what role does the software industry have in green tech?

I'm listening to an amazing panel on green tech. On the panel is the Chairman and CEO of Southern California Edison, and the CEO of New Energy Finance to name a couple.

The panel acknowledged that while most of the buzz is about solar and wind power, one of the biggest opportunities in the next decade is the digitization of the grid. The power grid will go through the same revolution as the communication grid. Look at your cell phone bill - every text message is itemized, categorized, and quantitized. Look at your utility bill - it shows you how much energy you used in a month, and if your utility is really sophisticated, it shows you how much was onpeak and how much was offpeak.

As we come online with Smart Meters, it opens the door for new ways of conserving energy. Imagine that your meter can negotiate with your washing machine, to tell it the best offpeak time to start the cycle.

It may not be as sexy as solar, but the impact is huge.

At the Stanford Summit - on usability of IPTV

I'm at the Stanford Summit this week, and last night was a great opening panel of media executives. While most of the Summit is panels of startups, it was great to hear from the established broadcast and media companies like ABC and Paramount about the future.

One remark really stood out, and the panel agreed - part of the success of VOD and IPTV hinges on usability. Tivo, for example, has great usability, and it's the only "independent" PVR that survived and thrived. On the other hand, the usability of most set-top boxes from mainstream cable companies is rotten. I can relate - the box I received from Time Warner is virtually unusable. Searching for a show is a pain-staking experience.

The panel was clear an unambiguous. What they are seeing is usability drives adoption. When you give consumers an easy way to find and consume video content, they adopt.

The Ten Faces of Innovation

I just finished reading The Ten Faces of Innovation by Tom Kelley. Highly recommended reading for anyone running a product development team or in a product development role.

What I like about IDEO's approach to innovation is that they don't subscribe to the Lone Designer in a Dark Room mentality. They beleive innovation can be a repeatable team process. Ten Faces talks about the ten personas you need in an innovating team:

1. The Anthropologist: Observes human behavior and develops a deep understanding of how humans interact with products on a physical and emotional level.
2. Th Experimenter: Prototypes continuously
3. The Cross-Pollinator: Explores other industries and cultures, and brings revelations back to the team
4. The Hurdler: Knows how to overcome (or outsmart) the roadblocks in innovating, like finding internal budgets for the project
5. The Collaborator: Brings this eclectic group together and leads from the middle of the pack
6. The Director: Gathers the talented crew and helps spark their creative talents.
7. The Experience Architect: Designs compelling experiences, beyond mere features and functionality.
8. The Set Designer: Creates the environment in which the team is going to do their best work.
9. The Caregiver: Anticipates customer needs and is ready to look after them.
10. The Storyteller: builds awareness and morale through compelling stories.

I love the way that Kelley starts the book - he proposes that we have too many Devil's Advocates in our organizations. You know how it goes: when someone proposes an idea that's outside the box, there are several people willing to jump in with "Well, that's fine, but let me play Devil's Advocate for a second".

What if instead of saying "let me play Devil's Advocate, and shoot down your idea, but mask it in my Devil's Advocate persona", we said "let me play the Experimenter for a minute, and go put together a quick prototype", or "let me play The Cross-Pollinator" for a sec - I saw something similar work in another industry - I wonder if we could apply it here?" Do you think that would make you a more innovative company?

Kelley's not proposing that your team have each of these functions, but that people on the team adopt these personas. In a small team, one person might be the Director, the Set Designer, and the Storyteller wrapped up in one. He's proposing that a high-performing innovating team has each of these personas somewhere in the team. If you see these behaviors, nurture them. Innovation is a state of mind.

Habits of top innovators - getting unstuck

I'm looking for a coach (a business coach that is), and so I reached out to a colleague who is at the top of his game, and he expressed that he too is looking for a mentor. I found this interesting - where do you go for mentoring when you mentor for a living?

Recently I had the pleasure of studying with one of the top bass players in the nation, and I asked him "who do you study with?" It turns out he doesn't study with other bass players - he's learned about all he can from other bassists. Instead he goes to the best sax players, and the best trumpet players, to learn how they approach solos and phrasing, and he interprets and applies that to his bass playing.

What does this have to do with innovation? Bear with me - I'm almost there.

When you think you've plateaued with your product or business, or you're fresh out of new ideas, one of the best ways to break through is to study a different industry. How did a completely different industry tackle similar problems? What can you learn from the trade journals of a different vertical? Let's say you're in software - instead of attending a software event, go sit in on a manufacturers luncheon. Can talking with a product manager at another non-competitive company help you approach things differently? People are usually more than happy to chat with you, or even give you a tour of their facilities if you just ask. Who knows what it can do for your business.