Information system professionals’ knowledge and application gaps toward Web design guidelines

Abstract

Web design guidelines are adopted by many usability evaluation methods as one of the criteria for success, while usability is proven to significantly impact Website performance. Since Web design guidelines cover a broad range of system and interface design solutions, knowledge of them can be considered as a prominent indicator of Web design skills for information systems (IS) professionals. This study empirically assessed how much IS professionals know and apply Web design guidelines via a survey to 500 randomly selected companies from Taiwan’s Fortune 2000 corporations. As expected, the knowledge–application gaps of IS professionals were statistically significant in all Web design guideline categories. Meanwhile, certain guideline categories were proven to be more difficult to acquire or apply than others. Finally, degree, gender, experience, training hours, and courses taken were also proven to be determining factors for Web design guideline skills. Implications for developing Web design guideline skills are also discussed.

Introduction

Conceptually speaking, a guideline provides advice on the solution of a design problem and may suggest possible solution strategies (Newman & Lamming, 1995). Preece et al. (1996) summarized two kinds of guidelines—high-level guiding principles such as “know the user population” and low-level actionable rules such as “provide a RESET command.” In general, guidelines come from psychological theory or practical experience (Preece et al., 1996), and almost all human–computer interaction (HCI)-related textbooks devote a significant effort in studying design guidelines (Shneiderman and Plaisant, 2004, Pearrow, 2000, Nielsen, 1999, Newman and Lamming, 1995).

Although a Web design guideline may seem to be as trivial as an individual advice to a Web design problem and solution strategies, its integral importance can be inferred from its strong tie with usability and Website design, which also influence Web performance. Chevalier and Ivory (2003) suggested Web design guidelines as one of the candidates to improve Web usability, while many usability evaluation methods actually contain design guidelines (Agrawal and Venkatesh, 2002, Palmer, 2002, Nielsen, 1994). Palmer (2002) further pointed out that Web usability and Website design significantly influence Web performance metrics. The link of Web design guideline with usability, Website design, and Web performance thus becomes evident. The driving force behind this practical importance is the maturing Internet and World Wide Web (WWW) which together form an increasingly popular framework for enterprise application development called Web-based Information Systems (IS) (Satzinger, 2002). Thus, a Web platform has been transformed from its mere marketing presence to support all facets of organizational works (Isakowitz, Bieber, & Vitali, 1998).

The academic effort to ensure Web usability and to emphasize Web design guidelines has also surfaced in recent years. HCI-related courses have been strongly recommended to be included in the graduate-level curriculum of IS (Gorgone et al., 2000), in computing curricula (Chang et al., 2001), and in the master’s level of MIS and e-commerce programs (Chan, Wolfe, & Fang, 2003). However, research-based Web design guidelines are still confronted with some challenges in actual applications (Evans, 2000), which is indirectly supported by Cook and Mings (2005) who pointed out that the gap in usability education and research exists between the academia and the industry.

As a factor which influences Web performance, Web design guideline can be deemed as a desirable knowledge and skill for e-corporations. Therefore, it is worthwhile to assess the gaps in practice and to address these application and gap issues by examining how much IS professionals know and apply Web design guidelines. The outcomes will be helpful in uncovering development opportunities and strategies in Web design guidelines for IS professionals in both the academia and the industry. To pursue these objectives, the remaining sections are organized to present a review of design guidelines, the research hypotheses, data collection and analysis, and finally, the implications and limitations of this study.