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UCD in Australia: demand exceeds supply

I find it remarkable that I've seen nothing written about the current state of the usability and IA industries in Australia. This is the busiest that the industry has ever been, driven by the slow but inevitable acceptance of the need for user-centred design (UCD) as part of web and intranet projects.

To say things are busy is an understatement. Every consulting firm is busy, every freelancer is occupied, and every contractor working on client premises. To state this most clearly:

At present, demand for UCD services far exceeds supply.

Even with all hands on deck, it isn't possible to meet all the needs of clients within Australia at present. And this isn't going to change anytime in a hurry.

There are a few reasons for this. Firstly, organisations have quietly taken heed of the importance of UCD and have, without anyone really noticing, started incorporating these activities into many of their web projects. Making matters dramatically worse are a few of the big media companies building huge UCD teams to support their strategic projects.

Thats the demand side of things. On the supply side, there haven't been a lot of new specialists coming onto the market over the last 5 years. With few (if any) formal ways of learning these skills, UCD specialists are grown, not educated. It's also a much smaller market than the US or UK.

So, what does this mean in practice? A few things:

• For clients, it's become very hard to get hold of good UCD specialists, particularly for mid-term contract roles.
• There's also going to have to be a shift in the way that UCD services are obtained. In the past, organisations could put out a small RFP for a usability consultancy, with the expectation that the winning firm could start "right away". Now, every firm is booked up for at least the next month or two, so clients are going to have to be more patient.
• The lack of experience UCD specialists is driving more work to less experienced staff. Anecdotally, this is impacting the quality of a lot of the work being done at present.
• It's virtually impossible for consulting firms to grow in this space, due to the shortage of new staff. This is now a strategic consideration, and firms such as ours are taking serious steps to attract the best talent. (In our case, this involves offering an unique consulting model, and the opportunity to write articles and reports, present at conferences and run workshops.)
• The market value of experienced UCD specialists is growing very rapidly, and salaries are rising quickly.
• This is putting a big squeeze on consulting firms, who are seeing their costs enormously. With many firms competing on price, this is impacting on many companies profitability, and something will have to give. (We are taking a different route on this issue.)
• Ultimately, the basics of marketplace economics suggest that the costs will ultimately have to be passed on to clients, although this is always a difficult and uncertain process.

Anyway, that's my view of the world, and there's no doubt it's an interesting time at the moment. Apologies again for the lack of comments (must upgrade my blogging software!), but feel free to email me your observations and thoughts. I'll then collect these together and blog a summary...

Posted by jamesr on August 15, 2007 05:16 PM
Categories: Information architecture, Usability & user-centered design