THE PRACTICAL MOBILE STRATEGY GUIDE:

A ROADMAP TO MOBILE

ChaiOne is an Enterprise Mobility Agency that helps companies transform their business leveraging mobility at scale.

ABOUT CHAIONE

A ROADMAP TO MOBILE

MOBILE STRATEGY

AGILE DEVELOPMENT

USER EXPERIENCE DESIGN

QUALITY ASSURANCE

02

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04 Introduction

06 Setting Up a Mobile Team

10 Developing a COE

14 How Much UX Research Do You Need?

17 The UX Research Process

24 Creating a Roadmap Strategy

29 Conclusion

THE PRACTICAL MOBILE STRATEGY GUIDE: A Roadmap to Mobile

01Introduction

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Mobile has been a hot topic these past couple of years and only continues to grow as more enterprises adopt BYOD policies and develop mobile applications. The BYOD adoption rate is predicted to top 35% by 2016. In order to understand what it takes to develop a mobile strategy, we’ve created this practical mobile strategy guide to help you out. This guide will give you steps, tips, and some best practices in implementing a mobile strategy in your organization. You will learn how to build a mobile team and develop a COE. In addition, we’ll talk about the importance of UX research and its process. To put it all together, we’ve included tips to help you create a roadmap for your mobile strategy. Without further ado, let’s get started!

INTRODUCTION

02Setting Up a Mobile Team

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In your mobile strategy, one of the most important components to consider is your team. The people in your mobile team are crucial to your strategy since they will be the ones doing the tactical work to make your vision a reality. In order to set up a mobile team, you’ll need the following people:

SETTING UP A MOBILE TEAM

DEVELOPERS - These people play an important role in developing mobile apps since they are the ones who will build the code for the app.

DESIGNERS - They are needed to visually craft what the application will look like and will determine how the user will interact with an app.

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SCRUM MASTER - Scrum Masters aka Project Managers are needed to clear roadblocks to make sure that the team meets deadlines and stays true to the vision.

QUALITY ASSURANCE SPECIALIST - Since no developer wants to say that their code is wrong, QA Specialists act as an impartial party that tests an app to ensure that everything works properly.

SETTING UP A MOBILE TEAM (CONT.)

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Besides considering the different roles above, we have found that you should look for certain personality characteristics when building your team. Since mobile is a technology that continually changes, you need people that are curious, opinionated, and passionate.

CURIOUS - From the design and development perspective, your team needs curious people that will ask questions. Asking questions makes processes better and improves the quality of any product or service. (ex. Why are we doing it this way? Is that the best way to do this?)

OPINIONATED - They should be able to develop an opinion and defend it against challenges. We believe that the best ideas will ultimately win.

GENUINELY PASSIONATE - People in your mobile team are legitimately passionate about this stuff. They are eating, sleeping, and breathing mobile and technology.

A LITTLE QUIRKY - The people that are the most successful in mobile teams tend to be a little quirky. They have other passions in fields like music or coffee that can be blended in with their professional lives and help keep the ball moving forward.

SETTING UP A MOBILE TEAM (CONT.)

03Developing a COE

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DEVELOPING A COEBesides setting up your mobile team, you can take your mobile strategy to the next level by developing a center of excellence or COE. You may have heard of the general term ‘center of excellence’ before. What does it mean exactly? A center of excellence refers to a team or entity that provides leadership, best practices, research, and training for a particular area. These centers are present in various industries such as technology, education, and business. For example, the Forensic Technology Center of Excellence (FTCoE) exists to test, evaluate, and provide technology transition assistance for crime labs and other agencies. In technology companies, the center of excellence is associated with things like software and mobile. For your strategy, you’ll need to set up a mobile center of excellence.

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DRIVERS FOR DEVELOPING MOBILE CENTERS OF EXCELLENCE

A MOBILE CENTER OF EXCELLENCE (mCoE) is a type of center of excellence which includes a group of people that are set aside in IT as the knowledge center in mobile. People in the organization can come to this center of excellence to get guidance and advice on policies and procedures if they want to pursue a mobile project. The mCoE helps facilitate mobile initiatives and acts as a gatekeeper to make sure the most important initiatives get approved in the enterprise. According to an IDC white paper, mobile centers of excellence “help to establish a centralized strategy, governance, and set of standards – from both technological

and organizational perspectives – to facilitate a scalable strategic enterprise mobility program”.

The KEY DRIVERS for developing a mCoE include a need for alignment and agility, mobile app and website development requirements, BYOD programs, and an emphasis on accountability and measurement. With an increase in decentralization of IT purchasing and increasingly complex business units, companies need IT alignment in regards to mobile. A mobile center of excellence can help control technology selection and reduce costs of duplicate work. With a mCoE, organizations can prioritize

mobility projects, share best practices, and help direct software development lifecycle principles.

Another DRIVER TO CONSIDER is the implementation of BYOD programs across various organizations. The mCoE can help govern BYOD programs in areas such as strategy, standards, and business needs. Even though BYOD is a hot topic among enterprise IT, we find that the ultimate key driver for developing a mCoE is to emphasize and increase accountability and measurement. Creating a mCoE can ensure consistency for mobility projects that are tied directly to core business objectives.

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THERE ARE MANY CHALLENGES that come with assembling a mobile center of excellence and introducing a new technology initiative. Change can be hard, and you will need to learn how to work with both early

adopters and laggards in order to show the benefits of a technology initiative. Ultimately, building a mobile center of excellence will take work, but it helps an organization decrease its mobile

app development costs in the long term. Along with financial benefits, the mCoE will help improve software quality assurance while maintaining the organization’s brand throughout these initiatives.

DRIVERS FOR DEVELOPING MOBILE CENTERS OF EXCELLENCE (CONT.)

04How Much UX Research Do You Need?

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IN THE PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT CYCLE, just thinking about the aesthetics of a product isn’t enough - you’ll need to do some user research. Some people describe user research as a “secret weapon” which is now used by many large IT companies and startups to make their products usable and desirable for their end users. For example, Google now has its own user experience (UX) research product where people can sign up to help researchers improve their products.

WE NEED TO UNDERSTAND THAT WE AREN’T DESIGNING FOR OURSELVES. Jumping out of our own mental models and design assumptions is a basic rule in coming up with user-centered design. Without empathy, it’s extremely difficult to come up with a product that is desirable for users.

HOW MUCH UX RESEARCH DO YOU NEED?

We need to understand that we aren’t designing for ourselves

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HOW MUCH UX RESEARCH DO YOU NEED? (CONT.)SO, HOW MUCH UX RESEARCH DO YOU NEED? To be frank, there isn’t a golden rule for UX research. It depends on how much the company values UX research and what they need to learn. Researchers can do it in a short amount of time by talking to users or they can invest years doing ethnography studies around the world. The best way to find out how much UX research is required is to have a group discussion with stakeholders, managers and other members of the project team to come up with an affordable research plan. In most cases, the more user research done, the better the project will solve the identified problem. If you ignore it completely, you are setting yourself up for disaster.

USER EXPERIENCE RESEARCH is a key component in designing delightful mobile applications. Many times it feels like something you can skip, but without proper and comprehensive UX research, you might be setting your project up for failure. Do yourself a favor — invest the time upfront with UX research and create an app that your users will truly enjoy. Believe me, the ROI is worth every penny.

05The UX Research Process

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THE UX RESEARCH PROCESSSince UX Research is integral in the mobile app development process, you’ll need to understand the basic research process in order to develop your mobile strategy. How does the UX research process work? To demonstrate, we’ll use a scenario where a client wants a mobile application built to facilitate warehouse operations. We’ve outlined the basic steps of the UX research process in this section.

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DEFINE BUSINESS OBJECTIVES AND IDENTIFY THE USER GROUP Ex. Objective: Increase daily efficiency, User Group: Forklift operators

DEFINE BUSINESS OBJECTIVES AND IDENTIFY THE USER GROUP INFORMATION NEEDED FOR PROFILES: Knowledge,Experience, Psychological Charateristics, etc.

CONDUCT VARIOUS PROJECT MEETINGS

GET INFORMATION TO CREATE USER PROFILE

DISPLAY INFORMATION IN A PERSONA

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PURPOSE: OBTAIN A USER-CENTERED MODEL OF HOW THE WORK IS CURRENTLY BEING PERFORMED

^ Get documentation and copies of objects/artifacts

^ Observe operators in the field and interview them

^ Analyze data collected

^ Construct task organization model

PURPOSE: FOCUS DESIGN EFFORT, DETERMINE INTERFACE REQUIREMENTS Types of Usability Goals: qualitative, quantitative, subjective, objective GOALS SHOULD ALWAYS BE DRIVEN BY BUSINESS NEEDS AND GROUNDED IN DATA

CREATE REENGINEERED TASK ORGANIZATION MODEL TO MEET DEFINED OBJECTIVES DESIGN INFORMATION ARCHITECTURE OF THE APP

CONTEXTUAL ANALYSIS

USABILITY GOAL SETTING

WORK REENGINEERING

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DESIGN AND USABILITY TESTING

CREATE WIREFRAMES, WHICH ARE BLUEPRINTS THAT LACK VISUAL DETAIL, AND REFINE AS NEEDED

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DESIGN AND USABILITY TESTING (CONT.)

MAKE HIGH FIDELITY COMPOSITIONS (VISUAL REPRESENTATIONS OF HOW THE DESIGN LOOKS)

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BUILD AND RELEASE THE MOBILE APPLICATION

SUMMATIVE USABILITY TESTING: MEASURE INTERESTS TO DETERMINE IF GOALS HAVE BEEN MET

ONCE YOU’VE MET ALL YOUR GOALS WITH SUMMATIVE RESEARCH, YOU ARE READY TO LAUNCH THE PRODUCT Work with your developers, designers, and QA testers to build, design, and test the app

RESEARCH NEEDS TO BE A STRATEGIC ENGAGEMENT TO ENSURE THAT YOU ARE MEETING DEFINED BUSINESS OBJECTIVES AND CREATING HIGHLY USABLE PRODUCTS.

Remember:

DESIGN AND USABILITY TESTING (CONT.)

06Creating A Roadmap Strategy

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CREATING A ROADMAP STRATEGY

Creating an enterprise wide mobile strategy can be a daunting task especially if you have never done one before. Where should you start? The following pages outline a roadmap to get you started.

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1 THE COMPANY CULTURE: Depending on your company’s culture, implementing an enterprise wide mobile strategy will vary. Remember: You don’t want to change a company’s culture too soon. If your company has an internal IT department, it is important to involve these people in the process. Their input will help with the overall success of a mobile strategy. In other companies, IT projects are

outsourced completely. You’ll need to work with the outsourced company to ensure that both parties understand what the vision is for the mobile solution. There are also companies that have a mixed model where they have a small IT department and work with outside companies as well. It is very important to figure out the company culture before considering a strategy.

2 YOUR GOALS: What are your immediate and long term goals? Some companies want quick wins. At ChaiOne, we find that it is best to align with a company’s immediate needs so we can align with their processes.

ROADMAP

To start the process of creating an enterprise wide mobile strategy, you need to consider two important things:

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Milestones are an important part of implementing a mobile strategy. It’s crucial to understand that you’ll need to go through various phases to get to a great mobile ecosystem. These milestones will help keep the project on track and your company focused on your goals.

1 First Year: During the first year, you have to think of the MINIMUM VIABLE PRODUCT or MVP. A minimum viable product helps you get a mobile app out quickly and then continue to improve it through iterations. When you get software builds of the app, you need to use it and give feedback so that the developers can fix any problems and add additional features that will enhance the user experience.

Your organization will feel more engaged in the transformation process when everyone feels that their feedback is being heard. To add to that, it is important to have a mechanism to allow for the collection of feedback from users. The most important thing to remember is: There is no point in putting out an app when no one wants to use it.

2 AFTER THE FIRST YEAR: After the first year or two, your company should focus on apps that are more transactional. Transactional apps will change more of your processes and you’ll see the additional possibilities of mobile solutions. Once you’re able to see these opportunities, you’ll be ready for the next major milestone.

3 THE WORLD IS MOBILE: In this milestone, your company will understand that the world is detaching from the desktop. You’ll be able to change core business processes with mobile solutions in order to enhance efficiency and increase ROI. The more you can mobilize your processes and technologies, the higher chance your organization will be successful for the future.

MILESTONES

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PEOPLE ARE INHERENTLY AFRAID OF CHANGE. All corporations need to have a good internal communication program with its employees. You need to tell employees the benefits of mobility and show successes to encourage executives to give the program a chance and help win over skeptics. Overall, you need to move under a single organizational strategy and not under various strategies for individual business lines or departments. This can be done by implementing a center of excellence to help your company create a unified mobile strategy.

COMPANY CULTURE AND CHANGE

When the Apple store launched, people formed an opinion that mobile apps weren’t like traditional web projects since most of the featured apps were 99 cent games. People thought that it only took a couple of weeks to whip out an app, but it actually is no different in scope or design than a complex SAP implementation. It can be very complex especially when you consider the user experience. People expect apps

to be native and intuitive. One of the biggest challenges for organizations is realizing that there isn’t a difference between apps and traditional web projects. Creating the user experience takes a lot of time and research, which includes designers going out in the field to uncover efficiencies by observing employees’ work processes. Happy users are the ultimate measure of user research’s importance.

MISCONCEPTIONS

07Conclusion

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CONCLUSION

As you can tell, it takes strong leadership, a great core mobile team, and extensive design, research, development, and testing to implement a strong mobile strategy. To create better products, organizations are conducting user research to get feedback which will lead to an improved user experience. Furthermore, creating a mobile center of excellence will take your organization to the next level by providing a team to direct the overall strategy and ensure that your brand is consistent over all your initiatives. When you are in the planning process, remember to consider your company culture and organizational goals. Once your organization is ready, begin mapping out your mobile strategy and developing milestones. We hope you’ve found this information helpful. If you have any additional questions about mobile, feel free to reach out to us.

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