David J Gilmore

Helping to improve user experiences through design

I have been working on innovation, product design, user experience, human factors and human-computer interaction for over 40 years..

In the mid-1990’s I led a team that demonstrated the need for something richer than usability … and we were working with Don Norman at Apple on this and related ideas and it was around this time that Don coined the term ‘User Experience’.

At IDEO I was part of the Human Factors leadership that revealed how contextual, empathic research could identify users’ implicit and latent needs in ways that designers could act upon.

Since IDEO I have worked at Intel, Logitech, GE Research and Elekta, leading developments in user experience across hardware and software, in consumer products and in complex industrial domains (for example, gas-fired power stations and radiation therapy). 

It is a lot more than User Interfaces

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Solving Real Problems

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Prototypes for early concept exploration

Are you building prototypes early enough? Do you assume that engineers should build your prototypes? Do you know how to build prototypes that help you explore your concepts before you commit to engineering development?

Authentic Conversations

Are you hearing authentic responses? Or are you hearing what your customers and users want you to hear, or what they think you want to hear?

Strategic UX or UX Strategy

Are you using your UX capability strategically? Or are they delivering great UI in places where it might or might not matter?

Some previous work

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The Customer Journey Across Many products

User experience encompasses a bigger journey than just day-to-day use of the product. When your company makes many different products that journey crosses portfolio boundaries.
User experience encompasses a bigger journey than just day-to-day use of the product. When your company makes many different products that journey crosses portfolio boundaries.

What is the digital experience of the human-machine interface?

HMI’s have been graphical for a long time, but they haven’t really been digital – what might their digital transformation mean?
HMI’s have been graphical for a long time, but they haven’t really been digital – what might their digital transformation mean?

Designing an Unknown Experience

The Vocera communicator came with a vision of Star Trek style communication. Nothing like it existed and it wasn’t clear which contexts of use would turn out to be fruitful. The first step therefore is enabling the experience to be better imagined and explored.
The Vocera communicator came with a vision of Star Trek style communication. Nothing like it existed and it wasn’t clear which contexts of use would turn out to be fruitful. The first step therefore is enabling the experience to be better imagined and explored.

Some publications

Read more of my past work and thinking

More Writings
Radiotherapy's Future Experience

This paper describes how a suite of research techniques were used to inform the development of a vision for the future of radiotherapy that was to later become Elekta’s MRLinac Unity.

Usability engineering for a complex, medical device

This paper summarises the activities required and complexities encountered while undertaking the usability engineering process for a large, complex, and new-to-the-world medical device – namely Elekta Unity, the first high field Magnetic Resonance (MR)-Linac.

Making Things Better

Human Factors and User Experience design have developed relatively independently and from different traditions and yet they both share the all important goal of making better things for people to use. This paper explores how we might bring them closer together and recognise the overlaps – especially in the context of safety-critical systems.