Summary: Putting It All Together - Foundations for Designing User-Centered Systems - page 395

Fig. 14.8 The question was,
''How did Robinson Crusoe
meet Friday?'' The
duplication of the answer into
the extra information field
suggests that the interface did
not support a system
designer, and that the results
were not tested
When designers (and implementers) push back against the discussion and
management of risks related to human-system integration, this may be because
they do not fully appreciate the risks in this area. Explicitly including designers as
stakeholders should focus on helping them become more cognizant of the issues
and context involved that is outside their training. Giving them this broader
context should ultimately lead to better integration and greater risk reduction,
including the reduction of system implementation related risks.
14.4.5 Extension 2: Learning Within and Between Projects
Given the multidisciplinary nature of system development, and the importance of
involving all the stakeholders, it is obvious that communication is important. The
various disciplines that need to talk to each other during system development all
have their own history and culture, which includes their own terminology. One of
the easiest ways of facilitating communication is through the use of representations
that help to make ideas and concepts more tangible. Pew and Mavor ( 2007 )
explicitly recognized this in their call for research on shared representation and
integration across the design process. In some ways this can be regarded as an
extension to the idea of software design patterns which provide generic templates
or descriptions of solutions to problems that can be applied in different situations
(e.g., Gemma et al. 1995 ).
One of the major results from using simulation in CAD/CAM is that the lessons
learned about one design can be applied to subsequent designs as well as to the
current design. For example, in printed circuit boards, traces (printed wire paths)
can be positioned too closely together. Tools like Spice (Thorpe 1992 ) help to
highlight effects such as cross talk between the traces and short circuits that can be
caused by the manufacturing process. After these design lessons are learned on the
first design, they can be used to steer subsequent designs away from the problem
rather than forcing the designer to start from scratch each time, modifying their