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Poor User Experience - Leading Cause of Enterprise Mobile App Failures

Pete Goldin
Editor and Publisher
APMdigest

A traditional approach to mobile application development for enterprises causes friction and misalignment between developers and designers, with 50 percent of respondents saying their projects fail to lock or get approved because of user interface issues, according to Bridging the Gap: Mobile App Design and Development, a survey from Kony covering enterprise mobility app designer and developers.

The survey of more than 340 respondents from leading global brands reveals a gap in the mobile app design and development process specifically when it comes to user interface and user experience. Per Kony, this user interface gap and rework are the causes for many change requests, which lead to project delays and poor user adoption.

“Today’s IT departments are struggling to keep pace with the demands of their business to mobilize their enterprise,” said Dave Shirk, Kony EVP and CMO. “CIOs are faced with the challenge of rapidly delivering mobile applications for their businesses, and this survey sheds light on one of the biggest hurdles: business users, designers and developers don’t see eye to eye when it comes to user experience and interface design, which can cause costly delays and mobile app failures, leaving the business looking for a better answer.”

Key findings:

■ User interface is the main source of frustration: Developers said the three main reasons for changes to the user interface are because the user interface design never gets locked; the stakeholder identified issues in the user interface once they got to use the working application; and the user interface design failed to address one or more functional requirements.

■ Change requests slow down development time: More than half of developers said that 25 to 75 percent of their projects receive change requests that impact the user interface. Moreover, nearly 40 percent of developers said it takes 25 to 50 percent of additional development effort to address change requests that impact the user interface. Approximately a third said it requires 50 to 100 percent more effort for development projects, and nearly five percent said change requests more than double the original development effort required.

■ Developers struggle with user interface and user experience: Designers cited communicating input back to developers on the mobile app prototype and successful collaboration with the developer during the development cycle as the most challenging aspects of working with their developer team to seamlessly create engaging mobile apps.

“To ensure mobile app success, businesses should take a holistic approach to mobile app development,” continued Shirk. “In the world of mobile, the software development lifecycle needs to begin with design. Mobile app design is often overlooked in the development process, but companies are finding that most mobile apps fail because of lack of user adoption caused by poor design and experience. Enterprises should design their app with a mobile perspective when it comes to look and feel of the app. Doing this in a collaborative way and leveraging cloud technology is far better than the classic design tools, which have zero functionality or relevance to support the rich and varied user experience requirements of mobile technology.”

Pete Goldin is Editor and Publisher of APMdigest

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Poor User Experience - Leading Cause of Enterprise Mobile App Failures

Pete Goldin
Editor and Publisher
APMdigest

A traditional approach to mobile application development for enterprises causes friction and misalignment between developers and designers, with 50 percent of respondents saying their projects fail to lock or get approved because of user interface issues, according to Bridging the Gap: Mobile App Design and Development, a survey from Kony covering enterprise mobility app designer and developers.

The survey of more than 340 respondents from leading global brands reveals a gap in the mobile app design and development process specifically when it comes to user interface and user experience. Per Kony, this user interface gap and rework are the causes for many change requests, which lead to project delays and poor user adoption.

“Today’s IT departments are struggling to keep pace with the demands of their business to mobilize their enterprise,” said Dave Shirk, Kony EVP and CMO. “CIOs are faced with the challenge of rapidly delivering mobile applications for their businesses, and this survey sheds light on one of the biggest hurdles: business users, designers and developers don’t see eye to eye when it comes to user experience and interface design, which can cause costly delays and mobile app failures, leaving the business looking for a better answer.”

Key findings:

■ User interface is the main source of frustration: Developers said the three main reasons for changes to the user interface are because the user interface design never gets locked; the stakeholder identified issues in the user interface once they got to use the working application; and the user interface design failed to address one or more functional requirements.

■ Change requests slow down development time: More than half of developers said that 25 to 75 percent of their projects receive change requests that impact the user interface. Moreover, nearly 40 percent of developers said it takes 25 to 50 percent of additional development effort to address change requests that impact the user interface. Approximately a third said it requires 50 to 100 percent more effort for development projects, and nearly five percent said change requests more than double the original development effort required.

■ Developers struggle with user interface and user experience: Designers cited communicating input back to developers on the mobile app prototype and successful collaboration with the developer during the development cycle as the most challenging aspects of working with their developer team to seamlessly create engaging mobile apps.

“To ensure mobile app success, businesses should take a holistic approach to mobile app development,” continued Shirk. “In the world of mobile, the software development lifecycle needs to begin with design. Mobile app design is often overlooked in the development process, but companies are finding that most mobile apps fail because of lack of user adoption caused by poor design and experience. Enterprises should design their app with a mobile perspective when it comes to look and feel of the app. Doing this in a collaborative way and leveraging cloud technology is far better than the classic design tools, which have zero functionality or relevance to support the rich and varied user experience requirements of mobile technology.”

Pete Goldin is Editor and Publisher of APMdigest

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According to Auvik's 2025 IT Trends Report, 60% of IT professionals feel at least moderately burned out on the job, with 43% stating that their workload is contributing to work stress. At the same time, many IT professionals are naming AI and machine learning as key areas they'd most like to upskill ...

Businesses that face downtime or outages risk financial and reputational damage, as well as reducing partner, shareholder, and customer trust. One of the major challenges that enterprises face is implementing a robust business continuity plan. What's the solution? The answer may lie in disaster recovery tactics such as truly immutable storage and regular disaster recovery testing ...

IT spending is expected to jump nearly 10% in 2025, and organizations are now facing pressure to manage costs without slowing down critical functions like observability. To meet the challenge, leaders are turning to smarter, more cost effective business strategies. Enter stage right: OpenTelemetry, the missing piece of the puzzle that is no longer just an option but rather a strategic advantage ...

Amidst the threat of cyberhacks and data breaches, companies install several security measures to keep their business safely afloat. These measures aim to protect businesses, employees, and crucial data. Yet, employees perceive them as burdensome. Frustrated with complex logins, slow access, and constant security checks, workers decide to completely bypass all security set-ups ...

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In MEAN TIME TO INSIGHT Episode 13, Shamus McGillicuddy, VP of Research, Network Infrastructure and Operations, at EMA discusses hybrid multi-cloud networking strategy ... 

In high-traffic environments, the sheer volume and unpredictable nature of network incidents can quickly overwhelm even the most skilled teams, hindering their ability to react swiftly and effectively, potentially impacting service availability and overall business performance. This is where closed-loop remediation comes into the picture: an IT management concept designed to address the escalating complexity of modern networks ...

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In the early days of the cloud revolution, business leaders perceived cloud services as a means of sidelining IT organizations. IT was too slow, too expensive, or incapable of supporting new technologies. With a team of developers, line of business managers could deploy new applications and services in the cloud. IT has been fighting to retake control ever since. Today, IT is back in the driver's seat, according to new research by Enterprise Management Associates (EMA) ...

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