NFR 001: Make it easy to use

Designing an enterprise application.   Recently someone was grumbling to me about the statement “easy to use”. They felt it was a worthless statement; what does it actually mean? For them it had no meaning and thus should not be used at all.  This is nonsense.  “Easy to use” is a worthy statement that should either be treated as a non functional requirement with clearly defined acceptance criteria, or as a measurable KPI.  So to start the thinking on defining what easy to use must mean to your project, try using the BDD format of given, when, then:

As an Expert User
Given I have had no training
When I have to complete <insert goal>
Then I will be able to accomplish it in under five minutes

As a Novice User
Given I have had no training
When I have to complete <insert goal>
Then I will be able to accomplish it in under seven minutes

Links

Dan North introduces BDD

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