Developing a user-centered software development process - enhancing usability and customer focus.

Abstract: Competition among IT-companies for market shares increases daily. To win customers' trust,companies must offer high quality and user-focused solutions to an affordable cost. This masterthesis focuses on changing the approach of an IT-consulting company, based on an interactiondesign perspective. Following a self-diagnosis through an analytical study, issues were clarifiedwith a need of focused requirement management. An improvement strategy was applied andthrough its outcome, a new software development process was created, considering the earlyinvolvement of the user. A pilot study was conducted with the created process, emphasizingknown methods, streamlining communication and development, in order to evaluate the newapproach. It resulted in a customized process that fulfilled the company’s criteria, increasingtheir awareness of a user-centered process’ impact. The decision to implement the newdevelopment process still remains within the company, since their willingness as organization isa pre-requisite.