Here's how you can address team member resistance to usability testing as a project manager.

In many cases, resistance arises due to timelines. As a project manager, it's crucial to assist in clarifying and prioritizing timelines. Usability testing involves stepping into the shoes of real consumers. Therefore, it's important to educate the team about the significance and benefits of usability testing.

When you run usability tests, you save time and money by avoiding costly development mistakes. For example, if you find out users struggle to navigate a specific feature, you can fix this before launch. It’s significantly cheaper to make changes before launch than after a product has already been released. Usability testing helps find and fix these problems early in development, saving resources and time. By engaging in usability testing at the beginning, businesses can reduce the chance of having to make any changes or redesigns later on. Additionally, usability testing delivers significant cost savings by resolving potential issues before going to market, preventing costly failures and streamlining the design process.

Share its benefits, share success cases. take initiative with small goal and involve team. Educate them. Let them play and understand. forcing any thing might not work .

After making everyone aware about the importance of usability testing, the best thing to do is to make usability testing a part of the development cycle, just like testing code is. No UT, no release.

Bring out the benefits such as the improvement of the product and customer satisfaction and saving costs to eliminate the resistance to usability testing. To avoid distraction, give the planning for these exercises as an example, and pilot successfully the innovation with the team. Make sure that advice and feedback hold a key place in the team's relationship with you and are impersonally given.

Session contextual inquiry, observing & interviewing users in their actual environment, helps engg teams improve the UX by identifying pain points, assessing intuitiveness & evaluating navigation and efficiency. Here are some ways it helps: Identifying Pain Points: Direct observation and user feedback reveal where users struggle Assessing Intuitiveness: Observing natural interaction and comparing user expectations to actual experience. Evaluating Navigation: Tracking user paths and counting clicks. Quantifying Efficiency: Analyzing clicks and task completion times. Understanding User Behavior: Gaining contextual insights and noting user adaptations. Gathering Comprehensive Feedback: Real-time interaction ensures thorough feedback.

Share results with stakeholders, get feedback from the user and make the results of design successful for the team members. Work in loop, with small testing small interviews and small refinements to test one step at the time

- Utilize Strengths: Assign roles based on team members' strengths and expertise. - Developer Involvement: Engage developers in setting up the testing environment effectively. - Designer Insights: Allow designers to observe user interactions for design improvements. - Marketer Analysis: Task marketers with analyzing user feedback for communication strategies. - Team Ownership: Foster a sense of ownership among team members for the product's success.

Getting everyone on board gives you better results. The more ideas it is better. People should be in a environment where they can simple questions, get deep explanations, free to place ideas without getting embarrassed. This helps to broaden the perspective and yield much better results from users perspective.

To ensure the success of your usability testing (UT) effort and the entire design process, establish trusted partnerships with your leaders, stakeholders, marketing/sales team, and especially your engineering team. As I always coach in my sessions, make your idea their idea. This approach fosters collaboration and ensures you understand the technical readiness needed to bring your vision to life. When everyone is on board and feels ownership, the design and UT process becomes a shared mission, leading to more successful and innovative outcomes.

Also, the user researcher could share findings early and be open with the feedback. The team can be resistant when they don't have early access to insights. It is worth noting that feedback doesn't have to be the negatives only. I use the word 'opportunities' instead of 'negatives' because it allows for open-mindedness rather than the feeling of criticism

- Open Dialogue: Foster open communication to address team concerns about usability testing. - Workload Management: Outline clear plans to manage additional workload effectively. - Feedback Approach: Emphasize that feedback aims to enhance the product, not critique individuals. - Project Integration: Integrate usability testing into project schedules to streamline development. - Timely Benefits: Highlight how early issue detection can prevent delays and improve overall outcomes.

Asking for the quality improvement in the product with employees is a great point to start. People working on product know where the product is lagging technically and fixing which tech areas can lead to better product. User feedback is another area which can play a leading role, If a area is generating most user issues, then a relook and revisit to the functionality may yield better results from users feedback.

It is crucial to measure your leverage in terms of budget and timeline and plan your usability testing (UT) accordingly. Listen to your project managers and ensure they are on board with the schedule. Sometimes, UT can be as simple as talking to friends and family for quick feedback or posting on Instagram or LinkedIn with a small gift card incentive. These methods offer quick, economical ways to gather valuable insights without significant investment.

In usability testing, our focus should extend beyond merely observing user tasks, set parameters, metrics, and responses. A comprehensive approach involves prioritizing the training of facilitators and observers, as well as meticulously setting up the testing infrastructure. By equipping facilitators and observers with the right skills and knowledge, we ensure they can create an environment that feels natural and unobtrusive for participants. This environment encourages participants to engage authentically with the tasks, providing genuine, constructive feedback without the constraints of a simulated setting.

- Resource Provision: Ensure adequate resources, including tools and facilities, are available for usability testing. - Time Allocation: Allocate sufficient time within project schedules for testing activities. - Training Opportunities: Arrange workshops or sessions with usability experts to train the team. - Encourage Questions: Foster an environment where team members feel comfortable asking questions. - Knowledge Sharing: Promote sharing of insights and lessons learned from usability testing efforts. Providing comprehensive support fosters team confidence and underscores the importance of usability testing in enhancing product quality and user satisfaction.

Be open to receive feedback, Be open to experiment. There is no Silver bullet to Usability. It all matters on how much you can listen to the feedback and how simple you can make the experience.

As a UX expert, sharing examples of successful usability testing (UT) and the positive changes it brought is essential. Occasionally, I show negative results to spark curiosity and set realistic expectations. Encourage colleagues from other departments to lead by providing them with well-prepared materials such as interview questions and scripts. This approach empowers them and fosters a collaborative environment, ultimately driving the initiative's success.

In today's hyper-agile development environment, UT is a luxury; set the right KPIs at the beginning of the test. Once the study concludes, produce an outcome deck detailing your methodology, personas, geo-locations, features evaluated. Include a MoSCoW Analysis, which categorizes features into Must-haves, Should-haves, Could-haves, and Won't-haves based on engineering effort and impact. Highlighting both positive and negative outcomes. Remember, design is an iterative process that never finishes; as famously quoted, "Design is not just what it looks like and feels like. Design is how it works" – Steve Jobs.

- Acknowledgment: Regularly recognize and appreciate individual and team contributions stemming from usability testing. - Positive Reinforcement: Highlight successes during team meetings or through dedicated communication channels. - Team Recognition: Celebrate achievements publicly to foster a sense of accomplishment and motivation. - Encouragement: Use wins as opportunities to inspire ongoing dedication to usability testing. - Team Bonding: Consider team events or activities to strengthen camaraderie and morale. Celebrating wins from usability testing not only boosts team morale but also reinforces the value of user-centered design in achieving successful outcomes.

Share great feedback with team, Which motivates them to concentrate on other areas for improvement. Have a open culture where feedback is appreciated rather than pushed back. Throw a few confetti around when someone appreciates how easy the product to use.

Check what are the issues, topics and problems the usability tests can solve for that team member to showcase and advocate for the added value and impact of usability tests. In addition, check for cases on other departments that usability tests helped to demonstrate its general value. Be ready to explain and guide.

One thing to keep in mind is that the Stick needs to be used as well as the carrot! If after educating, providing support, encouragement…. The person is still resisting, perhaps they may be suited better for a different job