The Flexibility Usability Tradeoff design principle is about the balance between having the many options or solutions and the functionality and simplicity of the design. Example of flexibility is the swiss army knife. It has scissors, bottle opener, knife, saw, file, and more. However, the flexibility comes at a cost of increased complexity and decreased usability. The small scissors aren’t usable for large cutting tasks.
Example: The Swiss army knife’s flexibility: it has scissors, bottle opener, knife, saw, file, and more. However, the flexibility comes at a cost of increased complexity and decreased usability. The small scissors aren’t usable for large cutting tasks.
“If an audience’s needs are clearly understood then designs should target those as efficiently as possible, whereas if they are less well understood then build greater flexibility and contingency into systems to ensure the widest possible set of applications.” From www.doctordisruption.com
Example found online: A Convertible Dress that allows the user to have multiples styles based on the occasion.
Example found in the real world: An all-in-one screwdriver that provides several options for heads. However, the tradeoff is the heads are not tightly secured to the pipe because it uses magnets to attach the two pieces.
Davidson, very good examples of the Flexibility Usability Tradeoff design principle. Another example I was reading about the other day is the debate about whether or not have a global navigation for a website or mobile app. I think this topic could be considered somehow within this design principle. What do you think?
The idea that menus can add complexity and have users click several times to perform an action had designers thinking in different ways to approach it. For mobile we have the famous burger menu for instance.
This article from NN/g describes the pros and cons of having or not a global navigation and how to approach it:
https://www.nngroup.com/articles/killing-global-navigation-one-trend-avoid/
My take on this is exactly what is explained on Universal Principles of Design: understand the audience and its needs. The design should follow.