Six findings on the same daily task, all correctly classified as low severity. Together they can cost you several full-time equivalents.
Severity is assessed per item and experienced in aggregate. No triage process that scores findings separately can see the difference.
An extra confirmation step. A field that defaults incorrectly. A list that resets its sort order. A search that requires an exact match. A screen that loses position on return. A save that takes four seconds.
Each is individually tolerable. Together they can add ten minutes to a task performed nine times a day, which across a few hundred people is measured in people rather than in minutes.
Users describe this accurately and it gets recorded as sentiment. “It just fights you the whole time” is not a mood. It is the only correct summary of six items that were logged separately — and a good example of how an organisation can receive precise information about its own system and file it as an attitude problem.
Triage by task as well as by item. For each critical behaviour, add up the accumulated friction and treat the total as a single finding with its own severity. It takes an hour.
More on this in chapter 20 of Built to Be Used.
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This article accompanies the book Built to Be Used.