The Importance of Inclusivity in User-Centric Testing
Technology supports our modern day-to-day lives. So, what happens if that technology arrives at problematic or harmful conclusions for some classes of people? Businesses and customers are more aware of bias than ever before, as the topic has been covered in popular media and professional journals. While technology may be developed with good intentions, in practice, tools often fall short.
But now is the time to act upon those intentions. Be proactive and factor inclusivity into both software development and testing. That’s the only way to ensure applications are equally usable by all customers. And every customer matters for business.
Too often in application development and testing, organizations fail to design and test with a range of diverse customers in mind. Product management might provide customer personas to help guide design and testing. But these profiles are often generic, lacking details like varied backgrounds or different locales. Likewise, testing works on assumed customer workflows, which often neglect to consider customers using other languages, or those with various disabilities, ages or educational levels.
Let’s rewire the development and testing processes to consider inclusivity from the very beginning. In this blog, we’ll explain how to factor those qualities in, along with a user-centric testing approach that generates positive user experiences.
Inclusivity and user-centric testing
User-centric testing relies on practicing inclusivity to promote testing that covers the largest possible number of customers. User-centric testing must ensure that all customer types are covered, including customers with disabilities and people of different genders, ages, locales and technology experience.
Accessibility testing and user-centric testing are not one and the same. Accessibility testing is vital on its own to certify that users with a variety of disabilities can use a digital product or application. It is inclusive for users with disabilities but generally doesn’t take into account other customer variances.
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Customers use applications differently based on their:
- intent
- system
- device
- role
- access
- understanding
- experience.
Consider an average US-based Agile development team. Many team members use the same computer platforms and similar devices, with varying levels of knowledge and experience. Generally, team members have strong technology experience and live in the same general region or locale. In these scenarios, the team might unintentionally generalize customers to match their collective background and experience levels. For user-centric testing, a diverse group of testers is highly recommended to achieve inclusivity.
At a minimum, application development and testing teams must recognize the complexity of customer identities. When developing and testing code, holistically consider customers based on a number of characteristics without focusing on a single characteristic like age, disability or gender. For example, when creating web page buttons, use simple graphics to designate different button actions. Implement hover text to provide additional information. Make using the button functions intuitive for the majority of users. The test strategy should include which user identities and definitions to use.
Factor inclusivity into development and testing
Rather than try to address it ineffectively later, bake inclusivity into development and testing processes. Applications that ignore inclusivity and customer diversity find themselves continually missing the mark and unable to achieve a positive user experience.
Today’s customers are outspoken. They are willing to switch to another application when their needs are not met. Ask yourself, when was the last time you created code or tested as a disabled user with a neurological disorder? Or any other disability? Can new users figure out how to log in and find the functions they need? Likewise, new users must be able to accomplish application tasks in an intuitive way.
Consider that more than 25% of customers have some sort of disability. If the team is not factoring inclusivity into coding and testing, it’s disappointing, frustrating or generating non-positive user experiences for a quarter or more of available customers. Now, think about how many of an application’s customers are not technology-savvy, or use slow access speeds or older devices. Can the application afford to disappoint its potential user base?
Factor inclusivity into development processes by:
- Conducting an Agile planning or brainstorming session to create additional customer personas or use case workflows with added user type variations. These personas could include disabilities, genders, locations and access levels relative to the application.
- Expanding the development process to include coding more than a single workflow or objective.
- Creating an automated unit test suite that covers persona variations.
- Discussing unconscious bias within the team and how that bias affects the application and its users.
For most teams, unit tests are based on specific code strings. Add in tests to check for defined customer variances. If more details are needed, ask the product management team to provide inclusive and diverse customer personas. If that’s not feasible, leverage Agile — and conduct a planning or brainstorming session to come up with possible variations. Add code to cover as many variances as possible, including connectivity to alternate devices and technology platforms. Finally, rather than coding a happy path of functionality, cover additional customer workflows identified during brainstorming. Developers might find that there are actually multiple happy paths, or the code might be combined in a variety of ways to add inclusivity to the overall application functionality.
Incorporate inclusivity into testing processes. But don’t stop there. Also apply these tactics to infuse more accessibility and inclusivity in user-centric testing:
- Expand accessibility testing so that it covers a defined set of users with a variety of disability types and levels.
- Use data from the development brainstorming session to create additional customer workflow test cases.
- Develop a separate test suite dedicated to testing usability across the application for a designated set of customer identities or attributes.
- Use crowdtesting to help accommodate a wide variety of customers without creating additional work.
Inclusivity takes real action
Inclusivity is more than just a popular buzzword or political reference. Inclusivity is real, it’s alive and it represents millions of potential users and customers around the world. Developing and testing for diverse users means practicing inclusivity to provide all customers with a positive and successful experience. Incorporating inclusive design principles into development and testing attracts more customers. When diverse customers feel valued and supported, then business reputation and profits improve.
Be aware of unconscious bias that prevents tests from being developed for diverse customer bases. Everyone has unconscious bias. It’s part of human nature. For testing purposes, keep it out of the test development and execution process. Improve customer test coverage by expanding tests to cover non-typical customers and those with special access requirements.
Every tester should consider customer diversity when developing tests. Leverage data analytics or AI tools to help find diverse and inclusive user traits. Create test cases to verify usability for all selected traits. Educate and challenge testers to test more than a single customer workflow with inclusivity in mind. Never assume customer identities are simple or straightforward.
Outside of the organization, crowdtesting offers an effective and compelling means to developing and testing against customer personas. Applause offers a global community of more than one million users around the world who mirror the variety of devices, technology platforms, educational backgrounds, experiences, roles and locations. These experts can offer perspective on usability or directly test the product from their perspective, depending on your needs.
When testing is inclusive, all customers feel they can fully use an application without adding workarounds. Every customer matters to a successful business, and each deserves a positive user experience.
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