I agree with your statements about the human angle of usability testing. I’ve been hearing a lot of feedback from ‘client’ teams (i.e. teams receiving the usability report) over the past few years about how much of an attack the usability report tends to seem (even if it was never intended to be an attack). I’ve been guilty of it myself of not always acknowledging the challenges of each particular situation.

Good post. Thanks.

I agree
The human angle is always important. It can be as important as getting the design right or applying scientific rigour to the testing.

“Tester” or “Usability Evaluator” should never equal “Film Critic”.

Cheers, Andrew