Informatics
require the ability to tweak standard UX design approaches to accommodate biological data com- plexity. An example is ‘canvas sort’ (a variant of standard card sorting), applied to complex enzyme data at EMBL-EBI22. Rare scientists-turned-UX specialists make ideal candidates. Their background knowledge and intu- itive grasp of practical R&D challenges offer dis- tinct advantages when designing usability testing scenarios and tasks. This is particularly true if they are familiar with the types of data being used, as they can create realistic usability tests, for example. For researchers seeking a career change without leaving science, it is well worth exploring UX Design as a profession23.
Life science research is constantly changing and new technologies (eg CRISPR, RNASeq, next gen- eration sequencing) are increasingly available. All UX specialists,
regardless of their background,
need to keep up-to-date through continued profes- sional training in the life science field.
Scope of UX work in life science R&D UX design for life science R&D serves internal research scientist users first, with the main goal of facilitating data analysis and visualisation. However, the nine companies we reviewed report- ed that UX teams can also be tasked with deliver- ing projects for enterprise-wide internal processes (eg compound registration systems, reporting, col- laboration, supply chain, manufacturing, business
intelligence) and external products. One company said: “[We work on] a variety of colleague-facing, scientist-facing, healthcare professional (HCP)-fac- ing and patient-facing digital tools. Anything from our corporate intranet site to connected self-medi- cation devices.” UX is also important for Business-to-Business (B2B) scientific software. Criticisms levelled at purchased IT systems often centre on poor engage- ment, adoption and acceptance by internal users (ie scientists). UX-designed software solutions,
Figure 4
UX design employed throughout the product development process. It involves techniques for user- centred design, evaluation and overall alignment with the organisation’s business goals. A UX specialist will be able to do everything, from identifying pivotal problems through to mapping user journeys, designing websites and validating the approach. The figure shows methods that were explicitly described in our survey of nine companies
Figure 5
Good UX empowers scientists. Example case study from Novartis: “We created an app to support lab-based researchers by combining and harmonising their workflow(s), reducing human error rate and closing all gaps. We achieved this through interviews, user testing and other research methods. The UX team created a custom-designed solution, including software for mobile and grounded devices, to meet our researchers’ complex needs, while feeling intuitive and easy to navigate.” Image copyright: Novartis
Drug Discovery World Summer 2017 59
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