Why is B2B UX So Hard to Fix?
B2B Software UX is notoriously lousy. Think about that time-card UI you needed to use, or — the worst — the time you needed to file a complicated expense report. Of course, this is not the only type of B2B software. There are literally thousands of niche, specialty software solutions for any job function imaginable, such as HR Management, Financial Tracking, Marketing Software, and Supply-Chain Management. A lot of this software is feature rich, but hard to use. The software has a huge amount of value, but it is difficult to unlock.
The Reasons
There are very understandable reasons why the B2B experience is so poor. In some cases the software is just plain old, being built in the late 90’s or early 2000’s. Web app design was in its infancy, and the browser technology did not allow for rich experiences. But once you’ve got a piece of software that has wide adoption and it is very feature rich, doing a UX-only overhaul is very difficult. It is high risk, that the scope is large, and the existing user base will complain about any significant change to what they have. I have seen this first hand during my career as a web app designer, the conundrum where the users complain incessantly about the poor usability of the product, but then are resistant to a significant change, even when it is a vast improvement.
There is also an intuitive reason that B2B software is bad: the buyer is not the end user. Normally the IT and Procurement departments are responsible for purchasing software on behalf of the enterprise, and they use an IT scorecard to assess potential solutions. However, the scorecard does not include usability, because these are not factors that affect IT or Operations directly. Additionally, most companies do not necessarily possess the expertise to execute a UX review even if they were inclined to do so.
So, what’s to be done? Let’s approach this from two angles: the perspective of the buyer, who is purchasing the software, and the perspective of the seller, who is building the software.
The Fix
For the buyer, I will invoke Grudin’s law: “When those that benefit from a technology are not those who do the work, then the technology is likely to fail or be subverted.” I first came onto this law in Don Norman’s groundbreaking book “The Design of Everyday Things”. How might it be applied to the procurement process? Well, include the user of course! When a company is buying software for its end users, those employees need to be represented on the scorecard that evaluate the purchase decision. When stated like that, it’s hard to believe that it is ever done any other way. Regular users are not UX Designers, and then cannot provide a detailed heuristic review of the product that they are being asked to assess. But, they can give their own subjective views on whether the software will be something they can adopt.
Now let’s approach it from the creator of the software. As I have said, there is a very high technology risk in replacing an entire UI in one fell swoop, and it’s quite rare that the business case for such a large investment would look attractive to executive management. What that means that there will probably not be a massive, one-time investment to to redo the UX; it will have to happen over time. In order to achieve the ‘build it over time’ approach, the UX team needs to construct a UX Roadmap for the product. The roadmap should show how, incrementally, the software would evolve to meet modern standards. The would include all net-new product, as well as all the legacy UI that has accumulated over the years. Typically a component library or design system will need to be build as the first step, so that all work can align with a single set of standards.
Concluding Remarks
Hopefully I’ve illustrated in this post that fixing B2B UX is both a supply and demand problem: software vendors should improve decrepit platforms, but the purchasers need to start requiring improvements. From the purchaser side the solution is straightforward: include real end users in the purchasing decision. From the vendors side, there is no easy answer. I have suggested that from a business risk perspective, an incremental approach is safer, more realistic, and more likely to appeal to executive management. In terms of concrete advise about how to improve UX, there are a number of resources. Firstly, there is now an entire conference called Enterprise UX dedicated to this topic. Secondly, the blogosphere has actionable material on B2B Design; here is an example of a post that I recommend, called “Designing for Enterprise and B2B SaaS”. Thirdly, Strathearn Design, my consulting firm, specializes in Enterprise UX Strategy and Design.
The B2B space is not hopeless. Start-ups of course are disrupting incumbent players, bringing slick UIs to the table and embarrassing the dinosaurs during the sales cycle. You can see the change yourself: whereas job application software including Monster and Taleo used to be convoluted and Dilbert-esque, streamlined services are appearing all over the place. In my previous job had occasion to use several pieces of software related to hiring temporary workers (Fieldglass, Scout) and it was refreshingly current. Some software that is both B2C and B2B is also shows moderate leadership in the UX space, such as Trello, Slack, and Dropbox. I don’t think we have seen the end of large, monolithic software that struggles to keep pace with modern standards, but I think that slowly the state of affairs is going to improve.
