Enterprise UX design can single-handedly make or break two businesses at the same time, the service provider and the user.
Did you know? The market for productivity software is projected to grow at a whopping 13.8% reaching USD 149.74 Billion by the year 2030 (Source: Market Analysis Report). This means the scope for enterprise UX would be that much bigger.
But what exactly is Enterprise UX Design?
To tell you in simple terms, an enterprise UX is a design created for applications or software used by big corporations (or enterprises) and their employees to streamline their tasks and improve productivity.
An important but often neglected aspect of software that can make or break the business, both the one that created it and the one that is using it. Where good enterprise UX can simplify the product and help users, bad UX design can impact productivity at large.
This blog article goes in-depth about what Enterprise UX is and how it can help your organization. That said, let me elaborate on the question from the title.
What is Enterprise UX Design?
As mentioned earlier, UX design for applications or software that will be used by professionals or employees of an organization is defined as enterprise UX design. These software can be productivity management software, Enterprise Resource Planning systems, intranets, or Customer Relationship Management software. All these tools are usually used by employees to manage different tasks and departments at their workplace.
Enterprise software is usually domain-specific which means its features and functionalities are only useful for a specific industry. So, if we take Human Resource Management Software, the tool is only useful to manage employees at any organization and may not be useful for people from the marketing department.
Or the software could be a school ERP that helps schools and educational institutes manage their entire workflow. Someone from the finance industry would have no use for the software.
It is safe to say that almost all B2B software or applications need enterprise software design solutions. Subsequently, enterprise UX must also take into account the end-users of the software. But designing the enterprise user experience is different than designing a consumer user experience.
How is Enterprise UX Design Different?
The types of UX design based on its end-users are broadly classified into two, enterprise UX and consumer UX. Where consumer user experience design is mainly focused on general users, enterprise user experience design is concerned with organizations and their employees.
Other differences between the two are as follows.
| Enterprise UX Design | Consumer UX Design |
| Is designed for a particular industry, domain, job role, or organization. | Is designed for general audiences. |
| Buyers or enterprise software may or may not be users. Users may or may not get to choose the software. | Buyers are users and they are free to choose the software/app they want. |
| The software or app is configured by the administrator and the end user may not customize it. | The user configures and customizes it. |
| Has to encompass all the features and functionalities of the software. | Normally made for a particular task or set of functionalities. |
| The efficiency of the software is more important than aesthetics. | Equal, if not more, importance of aesthetics. |
| Bound by limitations and stiff legal security requirements | Comparatively relaxed restrictions. |
Enterprise UX design focuses on maintaining a high bar of productivity for the users while ensuring it covers all the features of the software.
Why is Enterprise UX Important?
Business software is often one that is in dire need of a good UI and UX design. Having a bad enterprise UX design can easily hamper the productivity of your organization. When that happens, often angry clients make sure that others know about such software, hence, harming the software provider’s reputation. This leads to a lesser number of customers for the software provider.
Software or applications with good enterprise UX designs have many perks such as
- It increases employee productivity at work
- It streamlines collaboration by offering better task flows
- It showcases the data comprehensively without cluttering the interface hence avoiding confusion.
- It reduces the learning curve to focus on getting work done.
- Since the software is easier to use, the implementation also takes less time. This can be a competitive advantage in many industries.
What Challenges Do Designers Face with Enterprise UX?
One of the biggest challenges that an enterprise UX designer might face while conducting research for the design. Since enterprise software has multiple users with different roles, job profiles, and seniority levels, bringing them together for an interview may take longer than necessary.
Furthermore, those who purchase the software may not even use it. So, it is hard to understand how the users will interact with the software.
Another one of the challenges is the sheer amount of information that needs to be covered while designing the software. Unlike consumer apps that serve only a single purpose and have a set target audience, enterprise solutions have a wider range of people to serve with a single software or app.
This means higher attention to detail is needed to ensure that the software or app does not end up cluttering the workspace. For the same, the enterprise UI design must also be clean and tidy.
After reading this, you must be thinking, “Then, what is the solution?”
Let’s check out the normal workflow of UX designing for enterprise software.
What is the Typical Workflow for Enterprise Software Design?
A streamlined workflow for designing the enterprise software ensures a smoother design process. Most experienced enterprise UX designers follow a set of steps to gain information for their projects.
Here’s what a typical workflow for enterprise software UX design would include.
- Connect with the End-users
While most of the project meetings occur with the top management and decision-makers of the organization, it is important to gain the perspective of the users of your software. In the end, if the users find your software too difficult to understand and use, it defies its purpose.
A qualitative approach toward understanding the end-users helps the designer pinpoint their aims and expectations from the software or application.
- Have a Representative Attend the Meetings
It is important for the service provider, the designer, as well as the client, to have a representative of the end user attend crucial design meetings. This way they can share their valuable inputs to help you improve the software task flows and design a better UI and UX design.
- Create Enterprise UX Patterns and Design System
Enterprise software design is an expansive domain. To help simplify your work process, it is important to create enterprise UX design patterns. These UX patterns are design elements that can be reused to solve repetitive usability problems.
The same goes for creating enterprise UI design patterns.
| PS. UX design patterns are different from UI design patterns. Where UX design patterns repeat the navigation and user flow to solve a recurring problem, UI design patterns repeat visual elements and components. |
With patterns in place, creating a pattern library or an enterprise design system will simplify the further process in case any changes need to be rolled out.
- Get End-user Feedback
As you may ask for the feedback of your design client, it is helpful to get the feedback of your design’s end-user. Although this may not always be possible, it helps you improve your design whenever you receive constructive feedback from the users.
However, it may not always be possible to follow through with these design steps to create your enterprise design solution.
So, here are some tips to design better.
Top 3 Tips to Design Better Enterprise Software UX
Businesses with better enterprise software solutions work more efficiently than businesses that don’t. That said, most businesses are used to using one single software for a long time unless they don’t get a strong enough alternative or reason to switch.
Here are some tips that you can use to ensure better enterprise UX for your software or application to allow your employees to work more efficiently.
#1 Find the Right Balance Between Design and Functionality.
Enterprise software has multiple features that need their due exposure. So unlike consumer UX, you need to be careful while trying to simplify the UX design.
You cannot over-simplify it nor can have all features in one place. The former will not justify the functionalities offered by the software by hiding it. Whereas, the latter will confuse the user by over-complicating the interface.
Hence, finding the right balance is extremely important while designing the UI and UX for enterprise software.
#2 Opt for Creating Non-linear User Flows
Because the users, their roles, and their needs are variables, creating a non-linear user flow (although, it is a task) helps make navigation easier and less complicated for the users. Creating a non-linear user flow also allows experienced users to customize their work process without having to go through a linear flow of set processes.
#3 Choose Agile as Opposed to Waterfall Methodology
While waterfall methodology is great for consumer UX design, the same may not apply to designing for enterprise applications or software. Unlike Waterfall, the Agile methodology divides the project into phases so that feedback and iterations happen throughout the process. This reduces the time spent on changes and ensures on-time deployment of the software or application.
These tips will help you design better enterprise software UX design for your business or organization which, in turn, will increase your organization’s productivity and ultimately prove to be a silent force behind your success.
FAQs about Enterprise UX Design
Who is an enterprise user?
An enterprise user or an enterprise software user is an employee of an organization or a professional that uses enterprise software to streamline operations and collaborations with other employees for higher work productivity.
What is enterprise user experience?
The term Enterprise User Experience or EUX refers to web or software application designs with a focus on providing better usability of the software, application, or website to its users that include organizations, businesses, and their employees.
Why is UX important for business?
Enterprise software or application with better user experience (UX) increases business productivity while encouraging seamless collaboration between employees and easier data management & representation. It can also help businesses work more efficiently hence gaining more profit in the long run.
Why is enterprise design important?
Good Enterprise design works to simplify employees’ tasks and help them work more efficiently, hence allowing them to get more work done in less time. A good enterprise design streamlines workflow and encourages employees to make better decisions by presenting the information more coherently.
What are the benefits of enterprise UX?
The benefits of enterprise UX include:
- Higher work productivity
- Seamless collaboration between employees
- Better data representation
- Logical user flows that do not confuse users
- Comprehensive dashboard that keeps the features organized
And more…
Moreover, once the employees start using software or applications with better enterprise UX, they will not want to switch easily. So, for a software vendor, that’s one group of loyal customers and advocates for their brand.
EndNote
Enterprise software with bad UX is saturating the market. It is precisely because of this, that there is a need for better enterprise software UX design solutions. Carefully designed enterprise software UX ensures higher business productivity and improved efficiency in collaborations.
The article discusses in detail how better enterprise design solutions can help your business grow faster and it discusses the challenges that designers face while working with enterprise UI and UX. Finally, it offers some important tips on how you can make your UI and UX design for enterprise solutions better.
Does your business use enterprise software to aid its operations? Which software according to you has the best enterprise UX design? Tell us in the comments below.
How Can Yellow Slice Help?
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