Job: Usability Engineer

Seeking:
iContact is a four-year old venture-backed 70 person company based in Durham, NC, that provides on-demand software that makes online communication easy. The iContact product is the leading email marketing and online communications platform used by over 15,000 companies worldwide ranging from small businesses to blue chip clients like International Paper, Ford, Bank of America, Super 8 Motel, Symantec, Re/Max, United Colors of Benetton, Nissan, and LG Electronics.

The company is seeking a Usability Engineer with 3-5 years of experience working on web-based applications.   The ideal candidate will possess the following: experience managing the usability aspects of development projects; strong interpersonal and negotiating skills; user interface design skills; proficiency in statistics, data analysis and survey design; experience with all (or most) parts of the usability engineering lifecycle; ability to make strategic and tactical design recommendations based on results from usability tests, customer surveys, etc; an advanced degree in Human Factors, Cognitive Science or a related discipline.

Additional desired skills include (X)HTML; knowledge of Agile development techniques; exposure to design and prototyping tools such as Photoshop; love for mentoring others in usability best practices; familiarity with Section 508 accessibility requirements.

Responsibilities include:
· Coordinating ongoing user testing & assessment for existing and new features
· Performing usability analysis on prototypes (high-fidelity and low-fidelity) and implemented features
· Participating in the iterative design process of new features
· Conducting heuristic analyses where appropriate
· Suggesting and evangelizing usability improvements to existing features
· Working closely with user interface designers to author UI pattern documents that guide the design and development of all interfaces
· Creating user profiles and personas
· Leading all user research, including user interviews, contextual inquiries, field studies, and surveys
· Identifying, prioritizing, and tracking usability issues and making design recommendations

Salary/Benefits
Salary commensurate with experience. Excellent benefits are provided including health care coverage, a 401(k) plan, a Flexible Spending Account, free sodas, foosball, ping pong, company activities, an entrepreneurial and creative environment, and being part of a rockstar team that acts like a family.

For More Information:
If you are interested and/or would like more information, please send resume with cover letter to Sharon Cox @ scox@icontact.com

If we determine you to be a qualified candidate we may send a questionnaire or contact you to schedule either an in-person interview or teleconference interview. Additional information on the company and software can be found at http://www.icontact.com.

Contact Information
Company: iContact
Contact: Sharon Cox
Email: scox@icontact.com

Tags: jobs

World Usability Day 2007 Opens on November 8 With Live Webcast Plenary Session

Live Webcast Plenary Session — Download Required in Advance

Our opening plenary session, which will be webcast live on November 8th at 8:30 am United States Eastern Standard Time, will feature an address from World Usability Day’s founder and director, Elizabeth Rosenzweig, and a panel discussion with distinguished speakers supporting the 2007 theme – Healthcare!

The panel discussion focuses on novel strategies and integrating solutions to healthcare challenges from a user centered design perspective. Challenges range from drug delivery, technologies, and medical devices, to pediatric healthcare and personal healthcare records. The panelists use these examples to show how the application of user centered design principles benefit vital issues in human health and how this will continue throughout the upcoming year and beyond.

Job: Design Researcher

Insight is looking for a talented and innovative design researcher to work in our Raleigh, North Carolina office. Insight is a world-class product strategy and design firm with offices in Boston, Chicago, Raleigh, and Shanghai. Our teams work on a variety of exciting consumer, medical, and industrial projects and our researchers push past the limits of traditional consumer and product design research methods to provide our clients with knowledge, opportunities, and direction that lead to meaningful product and service experiences. Our researchers are part of a multi-disciplinary team involved in the design process from defining the strategic direction through full development, representing the voice of the end consumer.

Responsibilities:

• Participate in research programs to investigate user workflow, goals, tasks, and desired experiences
• Participate in and lead research programs to explore consumer needs, emotive responses, expectations, and beliefs
• Develop and apply innovative ways of collecting and analyzing data to uncover and describe new product opportunities, categories, features, and innovations
• Contribute to product definition and strategy by utilizing and integrating multiple sources of information and working closely with product strategists, designers, engineers, model makers, and interaction designers
• Work with consumers and designers to evaluate concepts and existing products on the market for improvement opportunities
• Work interactively with clients to understand their needs for research and to collect their domain and product knowledge
• Support interface and interaction design projects with design, review, and evaluation

Requirements:

• Minimum 2+ years of professional experience in research, product development, or related fields
• Experience with contextual research methods, interviewing, survey development, observational research, usability testing, heuristic analyses, and other qualitative and quantitative methods for collecting consumer needs and understanding experiences and environments
• Background in business, marketing, product strategy, anthropology, sociology, human factors, psychology, cognitive science, or ergonomics is beneficial
• Excellent analytical, writing, and presentation abilities
• Strong, collaborative interpersonal work style
• Ability to plan and schedule quantitative and qualitative research studies in an organized and detailed manner while being adaptable to changes in schedule and scope
• Experience with both generative and evaluative research methods
• Proficiency in MS Word, Excel, PowerPoint and familiarity with drawing or layout programs such as Adobe Illustrator / InDesign; familiarity with video processing and editing software like Adobe Premiere a plus
• Experience and skills in user interface/interaction design a plus, but not required
• Familiarity with database and other data manipulation programs; capacity to plan and conduct statistical studies a plus
• Ability and willingness for travel domestically and internationally
• Self-motivated, creative, and a desire to improve your skills and abilities

Send your résumé and work samples to:
hr346@insightpd.com

Please put “RES 1007” as the subject of your email.

2007 National UPA Salary Survey

The UPA 2007 Salary Survey will close on November 15. If you haven’t completed
it, now’s your chance!

Every two years the UPA surveys user experience professionals to attain in-depth data about the development of the user experience field. The survey is anonymous and open to all user experience professionals, not just UPA members. A version of the report is freely
available to all, and will be ready in approximately three months.

Please help us by taking the survey.

You can also read the 2005 salary survey report .