If you can't beat them, join them—a little.
You experience design friction as confusion, distraction, and frustration. In contrast, Steve Krug's words, "Don't make me think," are the paragon of digital design. There are user inferences so frictionless that you forget it's your first time navigating them. But is thinking such a bad thing? Thoughtfully deployed friction can sometimes be a better design.
In 2016, Wired published an article about the neighborhood app Nextdoor. The app has a "Crime and Safety" resource section, and user-submitted reports historically lacked information. The Nextdoor team wasn't pleased with the process or output, so they overhauled it and added friction. They replaced the simple text entry field in the "Crime and Safety" section with forms, prompts, and validation. The forms had drop-down boxes for some inputs and stopped users if inputs were missing write-in information. After this change, Nextdoor saw a 50 percent increase in users canceling their reports before finishing. For several users, the new, marginal friction wasn't worth submitting an incident.
Compare that to Cal Newport's story about IBM in the 1980s. IBM was implementing an email system, a multimillion-dollar investment to simplify the transmission of hardcopy messages. Beforehand, their engineers carefully measured inter-office communication and designed the new server to more than meet their needs. Within a week, the server was overloaded.
Both Nextdoor and IBM experienced induced communications from low-friction designs that pushed the cost of communicating to nearly zero. However, the consequence was more volume with no corresponding rise in quality—noise. Moreover, this story doesn't have a happy ending because, roughly 30 years later, it's not just IBM that is overloaded; it's practically anyone with an inbox.
Yet, friction could be a part of reducing this excess. In some cases of open-ended user-generated content, a little friction could significantly reduce noise. There is untapped value in that pause between the amygdala and neocortex, stimulus and response, and reaction and thoughtfulness.
For example, imagine company email—that single-text entry field guided instead by forms, prompts, and structure. These could enforce best practices of what should be included in an email to avoid iterations, avoidable questions, or routing to the right resource. Friction could incentivize senders to abandon an email in favor of a different medium. Over time, a new system of protocols might replace email altogether because it works better for capturing, organizing, and tracking requests, both internal and external.
Open-ended tools sometimes produce unintended results. Friction is inconvenient, but its cost may be what's required to jump to better outcomes.
This website reflects the author's personal exploration of ideas and methods. The views expressed are solely their own and may not represent the policies or practices of any affiliated organizations, employers, or clients. Different perspectives, goals, or constraints within teams or organizations can lead to varying appropriate methods. The information provided is for general informational purposes only and should not be construed as legal, actuarial, or professional advice.
