Measuring End-User Delight: Is Success in Project Design and Delivery Enough?

This paper explores a new approach for measuring project success, and makes the case that end-user delight is a necessary part of performance review. Regardless of project type, there are three generic phases that all successful projects must navigate: initiate, implement and influence. These are translated into their primary goals of design, deliver and delight. Evaluation of any project can be undertaken using the lenses of its financial, social, political and environmental context. The aim in this paper is to unpack the method for measuring delight via satisfaction surveys of project customers, such as client, end-users and local community. Two 5-point Likert scales, with scores multiplied together, are recommended to assess opinions, enabling a four-quadrant model to be produced reflecting ‘wants’ and ‘needs’. Successful projects, therefore, can be described by the percentage of respondents who have a positive view that their wants and needs have been largely achieved. Four specific success factors for measuring end-user delight are proposed in this paper, and comprise desirable (i.e. attractiveness), adaptable (i.e. flexibility), practicable (i.e. fit for purpose) and serviceable (i.e. enduring). They too are generic. These factors form part of a larger framework, known as i3d3, which can assess and rank project success and provide an opportunity for feedback that closes the loop between designer intent and customer effect. This paper sets out a possible way forward to compare future projects in a consistent and objective manner, with particular emphasis on the post-delivery phase.