Human Factors Engineering Tutorial
The goal of human factors engineering (HFE) is to develop a system that requires minimal training, prioritizes the information necessary for decision-making, and creates an effective interface that simplifies operator workload, is intuitive, and allows for customization when possible and beneficial. It aims to improve a user’s overall situational awareness and reduce cognitive load.
Plan
Establish Goals
A project should start with a kick-off meeting with stakeholders. This meeting should establish the goals and targeted audience for the product/user interface.
Create Project Plan
Once goals are established, a Human Engineering Program Plan should be constructed. This plan is a baseline to inform stakeholders of the approach that will be taken and how human factors will be integrated into the design. It is subject to change based on data findings.
Investigate
User Interviews & Group Sessions
User interviews and/or group sessions should be conducted to solidify who the established audience is and why they use the product. Interviews should be done with existing or prospective users. User or group sessions can include card storming and/or sticky note sessions.
Task Analysis & Workflow/Workload Analysis
The data collected from user sessions and outside research will be vital in the construction of a task analysis. A task analysis identifies users’ activities, decision-making circumstances, and steps users take to accomplish work tasks. By the end of the sessions, you should be able to answer the following:
- Who is the typical user? What are they like?
- Why do they use the product? What do they need from it?
- What tasks are they trying to accomplish? How do they accomplish them? What is the work flow?
- For existing products:
- What do they find easy? What do they find difficult?
- What do they like? Dislike?
- Did they have any suggestions?
By understanding individual work tasks, a workflow/workload analysis can be constructed. These analyses identify how individual procedures sequence together to form a complete process. This gives better insight into high workload scenarios and possible points of error.
Analyze
Heuristic Evaluation
Based on the data obtained in the Investigate stage, a heuristic evaluation can be performed. This will identify existing usability issues in individual task flows and the workflow as a whole. Each heuristic should be assigned a significance level. These are the issues that should be addressed during the Design phase. For common heuristics and examples, see Common Usability Problems.
Design
Wireframes
Paper or whiteboard wireframes will address the significant heuristics established in the Analyze phase. Wireframes serve as a blueprint for prototypes and do not include much color or significant detail. A storyboard should visually document and represent the user’s journey through the interface.
These should then be validated with stakeholders through a cognitive walk-through.
Prototypes
Low fidelity prototypes are then created and tested to ensure user’s needs are met. Once validated, high fidelity prototypes will be developed, which add greater detail and closely resemble the final product.
Test
Usability Testing
The human factors engineer observes users completing a sample set of tasks, noting awkward or difficult interactions and recording comments, followed by eliciting verbal feedback. Time and accuracy data is also collected.
Collect Feedback
Feedback collected during usability testing is invaluable. It identifies what users struggled with or did not like in the design, and guides the improvements to be made before further testing. This is why it is important to keep our audience engaged at all design stages. It is more effective for users and stakeholders to address major usability issues early in the process rather than later. Low fidelity mockups can be modified much easier than high fidelity prototypes.
The Design and Test cycle repeats, following a rapid prototyping agile process. For a more in-depth look at our User-Centered Design (UCD) process, see Resources.