Informal feedback rather than performance measurements - user-centred evaluation in Scrum projects

Agile software development methods are nowadays becoming more common, but this does not mean that usability aspects are automatically catered for. Especially including user centred evaluations in Scrum projects are challenging for usability professionals. This paper presents results based on an interview study with 21 industrial usability professionals in five professional roles in Scrum projects. Various informal user centred evaluations are conducted. Evaluations generally occur throughout the project and some also precedes the project. The user centred evaluations conducted typically are empirical qualitative and seldom quantitative. The most common purpose for the evaluations is gathering feedback on design solutions. The business analysts mainly use one approach that is asking users about their opinion whereas the other roles use several user centred evaluation methods. Usability professionals often use informal feedback rather than performance measurements. Based on these findings usability professionals are encouraged to use various user centred evaluation methods in order to provide feedback to the three major phases of user centred design, the context of use, the user requirements as well as the design of the software. Researchers are encouraged to study the use of empirical qualitative evaluation methods in Scrum projects and describe new ways of conducting qualitative evaluations.