I don't know how many other developers out there work in a company that has a tech support team. I think TechSupport is a little-known but powerful ally for any designer/developer who wants to make users happy.
Folks with a background in HCI or usability engineering might actually have better rapport with tech support than anyone else because both professions focus intensely on the end-user experience. However, any developer can benefit from spending time sitting with them and listening to support requests.
Listening with tech support for a few days might not give you a significant sample size, but it definitely gives you a better mental model of the user's most important tasks, their usage modes (which might be totally different from what you intended your application to do), and even their more abstract creative or personal goals in using the application. And of course, if you hear a user curse out some clunky feature design, that might be a feature you'd want to take a closer look at in the next revision. Designing a multi-user application definitely involves spending lots of time observing and conversing with users... it can open your eyes to new dimensions of UI design that would otherwise remain hidden behind the layers between you and the people you're trying to help.
It's pretty unusual to find folks with a combination of people skills, technical savvy, and tact. My hats off to tech support pros everywhere!
-Sam
Posted by samuel at July 23, 2003 03:57 PM