I came across an article a few days ago and I found his concept very familiar. At least on a couple of fronts. Firstly, the diagram he used reminded me of Abraham Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs. Secondly, I had already theorized similar concept a few years ago. I covered at least 4 out of the 5 qualities written by the author.
4 years ago. I wrote a proposal to a colleague on what makes a product great and how we can make it better. In my proposal, I pretty much just summed it up below. In order for a software product to be great, it needs to:
- Work
- Be fast
- Look pretty
- Be easy to use
I didn’t go into technical detail on how to achieve each of the quality above. However, my main objective was to put in a process around each of the 4 qualities. For example, we already had a team of developers who make sure the software works and it’s fast to use. However, in order to make it look pretty, we need a team of visual designers and developers. Or to make it easy to use, we need a usability team and so on.
Just like one of my favourite Daft Punk song, you can make anything: Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger! Well. For most things in life anyway.