Measuring BlackBerry Device Productivity
BlackBerry as we all know is about productivity. However, why is there such little information about the metrics of productivity when its measurement should be fairly easy?
The key to a Blackberry's productivity has been the typing experience and their products established leadership in this regard from their very first devices. Coming late to touch phone technology with the Z10, BlackBerry managed to lead again with strong predictive text software which put word suggestions right in the middle of virtual keyboard frets allowing for "flick" typing. Q10s as well as the Bold 9900 placed text predictions above the keyboard at the bottom of the screen. This is a less than ideal solution as it forces one to look up from the keyboard and extend the thumb to select the correct word. The "Classic " I understand does not have text prediction which may reflect Blackberry's conclusion that predictive text brings little advantage to conventional physical keyboards.
The innovative Passport marries word prediction and physical keyboards by permitting "flick" typing on a capacitive keyboard, interfering far less with the flow of text inputting than is the case with conventional physical keyboards. The hybrid keyboard also combines three physical rows with a virtual one and indeed an alternate virtual keyboard of symbols which can map onto the physical keys. This innovation should improve text inputting speeds as it eliminates the need to use an additional keystroke to activate the alternate key values and another stroke again to return to the key's main values. Gestures on the capacitive keyboard are used instead of the alt key. However, the utility of the Passport's hybrid keyboard in this regard has been debated in these forums with some calling for a Passport with four rows. The Passport's ability to delete words through gestures on the capacitive keyboard is another productivity feature.
Consumer reactions to these innovations both with the all touch Z10 and Z30 as well as the hybrid Passport keyboards have been generally positive, with it frequently being noted that there is a learning curve with the Passport requiring a number of days. That said, all of the observations made in this forum and elsewhere are anecdotal and qualitative. Surely there has to be quantitative evidence available which supports these claims, and more importantly, quantitatively measures the advantage of either BlackBerry keyboard with respect to those of other devices?
The absence of quantitative claims is surprising. The speed and accuracy of text inputting is easily measurable in words per minute (WPM ) which can be adjusted for accuracy. Testing the performance of a number of individuals on a number of different types of systems and devices would establish relative speeds. It could be argued that the WPM metric might be significant in the context of old fashioned copy typing, but not relevant to document creation. However the basic keyboarding speed and accuracy measured by copy typing tests will result in faster document creation, all things being equal. In fact, a faster and more fluid keyboarding experience could arguably lead to disproportionately faster document creation as the experience is just more pleasant and less frustrating.
Another challenge to text inputting productivity is the process of editing text once it has been written. Again, this was something which the early BlackBerry pioneered and was not available in any serious way on the standard mobile devices of 10 or more years ago. While Blackberry's earlier physical keyboard phones were the highly capable with regard to text editing, virtual keyboard devices including BlackBerry are challenged in this regard. Here again the Passport's hybrid keyboard introduces real innovation and appears to have brought editing capability back to the level of the physical keyboard phone. Text editing capability is a tremendous productivity factor for those who use their devices to draft or modify documents for professional purposes. In contrast to less formal, personal messages, if you can't perform serious "wordsmithing" on your device, you'll leave the task for the trusty desktop reducing the value of your smart phone as a "mobility " tool. Again, it should be possible to measure how fast individuals can edit text on various devices, and as with text inputting speeds and accuracy, make comparisons among devices possible.
Given the clear emphasis which BlackBerry has traditionally put on text inputting and innovations designed to improve it, one would think that development work was led in part by testing the performance of a sample of individuals using different inputting and editing methods. On that assumption, BlackBerry should have the data available to indicate the relative performance of its devices against its competitors. If this is in fact the case, and one suspects that it is, why has such databeen used so sparingly by BlackBerry to market its smart phones. Blackberry has said in the case of both the Passport and the Classic that they are four times more accurate than Blackberry's own touch phone, which is the only performance claim I have seen. If there was evidence to indicate that a Passport increased inputting speeds by let's say 20 to 30 per cent on average, one would think that this would be an important selling point for the device and very much in line with Blackberry's "tools not toys "message.
The absence of text inputting performance data for OS10 devices in BlackBerry marketing campaigns might have a number of explanations:
1. The data doesn't exist. Perhaps development was not based on performance data samples that made comparisons against competing devices. Rather Blackberry's existing devices may have been the benchmark and beta testing and focus groups were used to refine and improve the approach.
2. Cross-device performance testing was undertaken, but the results are not very impressive with respect to establishing an advantage for BlackBerry devices over competitors.
3. Cross -device performance testing was undertaken and the results are very impressive. However, there might be concern that releasing them would reveal Blackberry's trade secrets and proprietary approaches to competitors.
4. Data might might have shown strong advantages for the hybrid Passport keyboard or Blackberry's virtual keyboards, with Blackberry's marketing people then fearing that it might undermine the case for the Classic.
5. Cross -device performance testing was undertaken and it is impressive, however, all the data remained in the engineering department and was never shared with the marketing department, or if it was, the latter could not see its promotional value.
Scenario 5 is not to be ruled out given how week the BlackBerry marketing effort has been in the past, although there are clear signs of improvement, witness the IPhone "trade-up" campaign.
The "Hub" is another feature of OS10 devices which is also touted as a productivity enhancement. It should also be possible to measure the advantage the Hub brings by testing the time individuals require to complete a certain series of tasks on different devices. Again any performance advantage measured would be an important selling point.
Measuring BlackBerry Device Productivity
Scenario #6 - The data doesn't matter. If the only productivity metric that mattered was typing speed then we would all be evaluated by our WPM at a keyboard.
Measuring BlackBerry Device Productivity
You have no issue, Smart 548, with making a few mistakes on the Q10 and even when you believe that there is a technology out there which would allow you to be more accurate. You just prefer the physical keyboard experience and I can understand that personal choice. The thing is that those sorts of errors are unacceptable for those who are using their smart phones in a more formal work environment where message has to be right in terms of spelling and grammar and has to say the right thing. A typing experience that avoids errors in the first place and easily allows editing afterwards is what you need in that sort of environment. Given that those professional messages may be longer than personal ones, or that there could be a need to respond to a lot of messages quickly and under pressure in the work environment, the speed and accuracy of text inputting is going to be important factor for those users. I'm inclined to think that the Passport brings a lot in all these respects, but my point is that solid performance data would help a great deal to convince "prosumers" who use their device professionally that this is the case.