RECENTLY, USER CENTERED DESIGN has become increasingly important in instructional design. Although in the past, user design has not traditionally been part of the instructional design process, it is now being used to empower the user, and to involve them in the decision-making process of design. However, the key to successful user-centered design is stakeholder participation. How do you enable stakeholders?

In traditional instructional design models, the designer has not always consulted with the end users. The instructional designer typically began with a needs assessment to identify the problem, then began designing the solution.

Learners have been a part of the analysis process, but ultimately administrators were to make the final decisions on end products. The learner would eventually come back into the process through the evaluation phase, when the end product would be almost finished. 

Stakeholder participation is a foundation of user design research. Who are the stakeholders, you might ask? 

Stakeholders are any persons who may be directly affected by the design issue at hand. For example, in a public school setting in which a technology plan is being designed, the stakeholders might include administrators, support staff, teachers, parents, students and even community members.

Effective user design must not only include multiple stakeholders, but also multi-level participation. Referring to the same public school example, multi-level participation might include stakeholders in the classroom, and at the school, district and state levels. Certainly this would take much planning, and collaboration, which suggests that strong leadership is necessary to involve multi-stake and multi-level participation.

According to Carr-Chellman and Savoy’s article, User-Design Research, several factors must be considered when attempting to enable stakeholders (Carr-Chellman 2003). Their research suggests that participation for the stakeholder must be worth their while. The stakeholder must feel valued in order to want to offer their time and input.

Stakeholders are precious sources of information that can be tapped to further the development of design. Strong user design involves stakeholders from the analysis stage, all the way through evaluation.

Although every design situation is different, overall, higher stakeholder participation produces higher satisfaction in the outcome. The social and public systems researched in Carr-Chellman and Savoy's article reported better outcomes in programs that deployed stakeholder input.

Stakeholders can have a positive effect on improving planning, evaluation and social change. Better outcomes come from stakeholders who are knowledgeable in the organization, interested in the project, and motivated to provide input.

One concern about the involvement of stakeholders in design is the diversity of the stakeholder group. Although multi-level and multi-stake participation is recommended, one should give attention to any possible existing conflicts between stakeholder participants. In these cases, it is always beneficial to consider stakeholders simply as sources of information that can guide the designer to produce a solution suitable for all.

Stakeholder participation is a fairly new concept in instructional design, but can provide much satisfaction for the designer and users in the end.

Bernadette Minuto, Teacher, La Mesa Spring Valley School District
Minuto, B. (2005). Enabling stakeholders in user-centered design. In B. Hoffman (Ed.), Encyclopedia of Educational Technology