Standards

Quality

The Usability Company reporting follows the Common Industry Format (CIF) developed by NIST (National Institute of Standards and Technology) to ensure standard reporting of usability testing results. The CIF outlines the principles that are intended for use by usability professionals within supplier organisations to generate reports that can be used by customer organisations. The CIF is also intended to be used by customer organisations to verify that a particular report is CIF-compliant.

We adhere to the CIF where feasible and modify it where there is a need. These modifications are usually dictated by particular client requirements to better assimilate the findings into the design process.

In addition The Usability Company works with, and is involved with the following:

ISO (International Organization for Standardisation) is a worldwide federation of national standards bodies (ISO member bodies). The work of preparing international standards is normally carried out through ISO technical committees. Each member body interested in a subject for which a technical committee has been established has the right to be represented on that committee. International organisations, governmental and non-governmental, in liaison with ISO, also take part in the work. 

Usability is defined in a number of ISO's:

• ISO 9241 - 11: in terms of measures of effectiveness, efficiency and satisfaction. Ease of operation is an operational metric for effectiveness. For simple products this component of usability is the most important: the percentage of users who can successfully complete the main intended tasks with the product. For more complex products efficiency of operation may also be important: that the main task goals can be achieved in an acceptable period of time. 
• ISO 13407: 1999 Ergonomics - human system interaction - human-centred design processes for interactive systems. This is an international standard that defines best practice in the design and measurement of ease of use.
• ISO TR 18529: 2000 human-centred lifecycle process description is intended to be used in conjunction with ISO 13407. It contains descriptions of human-centred processes structured for use in process assessment and process improvement. 

Human Centred Process Improvement Group

Our Chairman, Catriona Campbell, was invited by peers to be a member of HCPIG, The Human Centred Process Improvement Group, which is a team of UK HCI professionals who continue to offer improvements to the ISO Standard 18529.

Government Web Quality Framework Committee

Catriona also represents the industry on the Government Web Quality Framework Committee, organised by the e-Envoy's office. This group is tasked with setting the web quality standards for e-enabling UK government for 2005. Catriona is one of two Usability Professionals selected to contribute to this committee.

The guidelines have just been published and answer the question: "What is a good government website?" The guidelines can be found on the Office of the e-Envoy website.

Usability Accreditation Scheme

In addition to adhering as closely as possible to usability standards, our Chairman Catriona Campbell represents the UK on a worldwide working group to 'accredit' usability professionals around the world. An accreditation scheme for the industry is supported by 90% of UK practitioners.

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© The Usability Company 2007