Since the first commercial computers of the 1950s the user interface (UI) has been the ugly stepchild of corporate software. Always the last component to be designed, UIs are often boring, forms-based, and difficult to use, said Infor, Inc. CEO Charles Philips in an interview on theCUBE from Inform 2014.

Part of the reason, as Wikibon CEO David Vellante said recently on theCUBE, is that neither the IT department, which selects software based on the features list, cost, and compatibility with the corporate infrastructure, nor the CFO, who signs off on the purchase but will never use it, care about the UI. The users who are stuck with these monsters have little say and no better alternatives. Choices range from bad to worse.

However, users may be in for a welcome change thanks to the consumerization of corporate software. Mobile consumer apps, in contrast to corporate productivity applications, are all about the UI. And some new-age productivity software companies at least are paying attention.

Tableau

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Tableau, Inc. is one example. Even though it was born on Microsoft Windows and not in the cloud, Tableau was designed from the ground up to appeal to end users. Its growth strategy is “land and expand”, and that has worked spectacularly well for the company as users proudly show off their creations to their colleagues.

Tableau is intuitive, responsive, and appealing to end-users, which are adjectives that few would attach to the average ERP or data analysis program. And the UI is vital for that. The result is that today it has legions of enthusiastic users who are its best sales people. A product that snuck in the door on the laptops of a few employees with no corporate endorsement has swept through organizations to the point that IT and the C-suite are forced to add it to the company standard product suite. That is the definition of user revolt, in this case against user unfriendly analysis tools.

The annual Tableau conferences, like the one that recently concluded in Seattle,  have the flavor of revival meetings, with cheering crowds greeting even minor product enhancement announcements when they aren’t running to the next class to learn what else they can do with a product that they commonly describe as fun to use.

Infor

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Infor, under CEO Phillips, has taken this a giant step forward by creating its own design department called “Hook and Loop” with staff recruited from the fashion and video design fields. It has rebuilt its Lawson ERP system for the cloud with a new UI designed to make it easy and even fun to use. Hook and Loop is intimately involved in the design and creation of all of the company’s new and redesigned software, Infor’s Chief Creative Officer Mark Scibelli explained on theCUBE.  The company set up a Hook and Loop design lab at Inforum 2014 where attendees, including theCUBE, could tour the results of its work and talk to the designers.

Trend for the future

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This new focus on the UI is clearly a trend out of the consumerization of productivity software. Users whose experience with computers was once only with the clunky software they used at work now carry tablets and smartphones for personal use. In that environment the UI is everything.

Users boycott mobile apps with poor UIs regardless of their other advantages. They carry those new expectations into the office, where they quickly become impatient with the clunky experience of the software they are expected to work on all day. Software-as-a-service vendors, who often focus on the small-to-medium company market in verticals such as hospitality, have to design their UIs to appeal to non-technical end-users, because those are their customers.

There are productivity benefits, too. Software that office workers enjoy using makes them more productive and reduces training time. Studies have shown that it also boosts morale, which improves retention. Good UI design is particularly important for mobile workers, who often work in distracting environments. Employees who feel in control and who look forward to using the tools on their computers are going to be better at their jobs overall. This is a trend too long in coming.

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