Business Context
Topics include business strategy, client management, knowledge management, project management, e-commerce and business-to-business.

The following resources are our top picks in this category.

Cost-Justifying Usability. Randolph G. Bias and Deborah J. Mayhew, editors. (1994)
This book provides structured and proven techniques by which usability engineers and their managers can quantify the costs and benefits of a projected new product in order to make a convincing case for investment to the business types in the company. It presents an overall framework, perspectives internal and external to the company, case studies from software and hardware developers, and discussions of special issues.

Customers.Com: How to Create a Profitable Business Strategy for the Internet and Beyond. Patricia B. Seybold. (1998)
This book outlines steps aimed at any organization grappling with the challenge of doing e-commerce right, and offers a technology roadmap and suggestions for getting e-commerce initiatives off the ground. The heart of the book is the 16 case studies of companies that have successfully embraced e-business and e-commerce.

Information Architecture of the Shopping Cart. Sarah Bidigare. (May 2000)
This ACIA white paper explores the principles of design for process-oriented information architectures by illustrating the best practices in the design of e-commerce ordering systems commonly referred to as "shopping carts."

Living on the Fault Line: Managing for Shareholder Value in the Age of the Internet. Geoffrey A. Moore. (2000)
This book shows why sensitivity to stock price is the single most important lever for managing in the future. It includes strategies for achieving and sustaining competitive advantage, metrics to keep management teams on course, blueprints for how the blue-chip companies can meet the challenge of the dotcoms, and more.

Practical Taxonomies. Sarah L. Roberts-Witt. From: Knowledge Management. 47-54 (January 1999)
This article provides advice for building a knowledge classification system that categorizes all the information the organization chooses to track in a logical manner so that it can be reliably accessed by anyone in the organization.

Quantifying the Effect of User Interface Design Features on Cyberstore Traffic and Sales. Gerald L. Lohse and Peter Spiller. From: Proceedings of the CHI 1998 Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems. (April 18-23, 1998)
This article predicts store traffic and dollar sales as a function of interface design features such as number of links into the store, image sizes, number of products and store navigation features. By quantifying the benefits of user interface features, we hope to facilitate the process of designing and evaluating alternative storefronts by identifying those features with the greatest impact on traffic and sales.
Note: Registration is required.

Usability Is Good Business. George M. Donahue, Susan Weinschenk, and Julie Nowicki. (July 27, 1999)
This paper discusses the cost-effectiveness of usability engineering and performing usability cost-benefit analyses in order to acquaint software professionals and other interested parties with these topics.

Why Most Web Sites Fail. Harley Manning, John C. McCarthy, and Randy K. Souza. From: The Forrester Report. 3:7 (September 1998)
New media executives can apply a disciplined approach to improve all aspects of ease-of-use. Start with usability audits to assess specific flaws and understand their causes, fix the right problems through action-driven design practices, and maintain usability with changes in business processes.
Note: Registration is required.

The following are also excellent resources.

Best Practices for Designing Shopping Cart and Checkout Interfaces. Dack Ragu.
As the growing number of Internet users are given the opportunity to purchase more goods and services online, it is becoming increasingly important to the success of e-commerce that the online buying experience be clear, quick, and easy. This document is an attempt to identify the best practices involved in the development of two important elements of an online shopping experience: the shopping cart and the checkout process.

Building A Great Customer Experience to Develop Brand, Increase Loyalty and Grow Revenues. Mark Hurst and Emily Gellady.
This white paper tells the secrets for making web sites welcome places that encourage customers to stay and buy. It gives strategies and tactics to help build a great customer experience -- the key to online success.

Built to Last: Sucessful Habits of Visionary Companies. James C. Collins and Jerry I. Porras. (1997)
This book identifies 18 "visionary" companies and sets out to determine what's special about them. To get on the list, a company had to be world famous, have a stellar brand image, and be at least 50 years old -- such as the Disneys, the Wal-Marts, the Mercks.

The Cluetrain Manifesto: The End of Business as Usual. Christopher Locke and Rick Levine.
This resource includes seven essays filled with dozens of stories and observations about how business gets done in America and how the Internet will change it all. It is for anyone interested in the Internet and e-commerce, and is especially important for those businesses struggling to navigate the topography of the wired marketplace.
Note: The book is available through Amazon.com.

Collaborative Web Development: Strategies and Best Practices for Web Teams. Jessica Burdman. (1999)
This book offers advice on pulling together a team, establishing procedures, setting a timeline, communicating effectively with team members and clients, balancing scope and technical sophistication with cost and time constraints, and managing large-scale web sites. The CD-ROM contains templates, sample forms, and demonstration software.

Customer-Effective Web Sites. Jodie Dalgleish. (2000)
This book addresses every component of e-commerce success: content, navigation, applications, information architecture, visual design, technology, and more. It presents 17 rules that every site must follow to attract profitable customers.

The Deadline: A Novel About Project Management. Tom DeMarco. (1997)
A project management novel that vividly illustrates the principles -- and the outright absurdities -- that affect the productivity of a software development team. Key chapters end with journal entries that form the core of the eye-opening approaches to management illustrated in this entertaining novel.

Designing Business: Multiple Media, Multiple Disciplines. Clement Mok. (1996)
Illustrated with examples from dozens of Fortune 100 companies, this guide reveals how the right design strategy can give businesses a powerful advantage. The author offers a new paradigm for design success, one using traditional design tools, such as diagrams and graphics, blended with new computer technologies.
Note: Currently out of print.

Don't Make Me Think! A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability. Steve Krug. (2000)
A guide for web designers, programmers, project managers, and anyone else creating a web site, clearly explaining what is needed to make good decisions about creating a usable web site that people want to visit.

The Dotcom Survival Guide: How to Tap the $19 Billion Customer Experience Fund. (June 12, 2000)
This report shows how e-commerce sites can increase revenues by improving their customer experience. Includes strategies, tactics, and thirty-one e-commerce case studies on merchandising, e-mail, navigation, search, checkout, fulfillment, and more.
Note: Free registration is required.

Enterprise Knowledge Management. Daniel E. O'Leary. From: Computer Magazine. 31:3, 54-61 (March 1998)
As employees turn over in today's overheated job market, organizations are likely to lose access to large quantities of critical knowledge. This article discusses the potential for creating a system that will capture company-wide knowledge and make it widely available to all members.

Futurize Your Enterprise: Business Strategy in the Age of the E-Customer. David S. Siegel. (1999)
This book is focused on developing a corporate online presence aimed at meeting consumer needs. The book includes tools and methodologies needed to transform a management-led organization into a customer-led company, fictional case studies that show how these techniques may be applied today, and speculative future scenarios in which the Internet is no longer a tool but a platform for work, community-building and individual empowerment.

Holiday '99 E-Commerce: Bridging the $6 Billion Customer Experience Gap. Mark Hurst. (September 1999)
The definitive guide to e-commerce success for the '99 holiday season, showing how to capture a part of the $6 billion customer experience gap. It includes case studies of eToys, Wal-Mart, Disney, and others.
Note: Registration is required. Report is in zip format.

Holiday E-Commerce 2000: Avoiding $14 Billion in "Secret Losses". Aamir Rehman. (October 2000)
The purpose of this report is to help e-commerce web sites prepare for the Holiday 2000 season. To get a representative view of online holiday shopping, more than 50 consumer tests were conducted on eight major e-commerce web sites across four key categories: Apparel, Books and Music, Electronics and Toys.

In Search of E-Commerce: Lessons From the Internet's Top Sites. Mark Hurst and Robert Seidman. (February 1999)
The goal of this report is to show how to succeed in e-commerce by making it easy for the customer to buy. The report includes case studies of Apple, Amazon, Dell and others.

Information Ecology: Mastering the Information Knowledge Environment. Thomas H. Davenport. (1997)
The author proposes a revolutionary new way to look at information management which takes into account the total information environment within an organization. Citing examples drawn from his own extensive research and consulting, including such major firms as AT&T, American Express, and IBM, the author illuminates the critical components of information ecology, providing a quick assessment survey for managers to see how their operations measure up.

Information Rules: A Strategic Guide to the Network Economy. Carl Shapiro and Hal R. Varian. (1998)
The authors consider how to market and distribute goods in the network economy, citing examples from industries as diverse as airlines, software, entertainment, and communications. The authors cover issues such as pricing, intellectual property, versioning, lock-in, compatibility, and standards.

Measuring the Impact of Your Web Site. Robert W. Buchanan and Charles Lukaszewski. (1997)
This book offers in-depth advice and guidelines on benchmarking, measuring, and managing a productive web site. Extensive case studies from over 50 pioneer companies, including Chrysler, Federal Express, and 3M, illustrate how this valuable methodology works in real corporate settings.

Peopleware: Productive Projects and Teams. Tom DeMarco and Timothy Lister. 2nd ed. (1999)
The authors demonstrate that the major issues of software development are human, not technical -- and that managers ignore them at their peril. The advice is presented straightforwardly and ranges from simple issues of prioritization to complex ways of engendering harmony and productivity in your team.

Secrets of Successful Web Sites: Project Management on the World Wide Web. David S. Siegel. (1997)
This book explains the process of web development from both the client's and the contractor's point of view, with 15 detailed case studies of web sites and the teams who put them together, and 11 chapters on methods for designing sites. It describes phases of the web design process including partnering, content development and design, production, and launch and maintenance, with emphasis on design and business aspects rather than technical how-tos.

Shopping on the Internet: Usability of 9 Swiss E-commerce Sites. Pascal Magnenat. (1999)
The authors assessed the usability of 9 Swiss e-commerce web sites through user testing. The authors found that users have difficulty ordering online, usability varies from site to site and user tolerance to poor usability is low.

Working Knowledge: How Organizations Manage What They Know. Thomas H. Davenport and Laurence Prusak. (1997)
The authors assert that learning how to identify, manage, and foster knowledge is vital for companies who hope to compete in today's fast-moving global economy. Building trust throughout a company is the key to creating a knowledge-oriented corporate culture, a positive environment in which employees are encouraged to make decisions that are efficient, productive, and innovative.