Why research does not deliver the results product makers desire. — The way we hear our music changed during the summer of ‘79. It wasn’t the medium — the shift from vinyl to audio cassettes was already underway and CDs were aeons away. On the first day of July, music became portable and personal. For the first time, people could pipe…

Early in my career, I had the fortune to get trained with mavericks, design mavericks. And, oh boy! Those designers had a temperament. In a design review, there were only two outcomes — bin or in! Very often young designers like me were the dartboards of unidentified flying objects. Being…

A lot of changes are happening across the globe which will significantly impact the way payments are done. Lets gaze into the crystal ball to see the not so distant future of payment user experiences. Me Merchant With AirBnB and RelayRides, hotels and taxi operators are already facing the heat — cars…

“Nothing is as empowering as real-world validation, even if it’s for failure.” ―Steven Pressfield, The War of Art — Why do more than 90% products fail in the market? Most failed products are found to be either useless, have little value to the buyers or users, made on CEOs’ whims and fancies, are not needed today — far ahead in time or far behind in time, don’t really solve…

The product head of a large Indian private bank that offers online money remittance was extremely concerned — after login, 72% people dropped out during the money remittance process. After several product iterations, the dropout rates did not change significantly. However, turning to usability testing helped them understand the key…

“Customers don’t care about your f#$%*g solution, they care about their problems.” —Dave McClure Useful first, usable later: Is a Banana Peeler a useful product? Product & services must be useful before being usable. They must have clear utility value by fulfilling a physical or a psychological human need. …