What is a Usability Expert?

Usability experts, usability practitioners, or user experience experts/practitioners are often thought of as professionals working within a sub-field of human factors, although the titles can still be used interchangeably to some extent. Usability is typically thought of as an area that focuses on ease of use and learnability, whereas the broader area of human factors is thought to encompass a more broad array of areas including user workload, user performance, safety, etc. However, this is only a general rule of thumb.

The hallmark of a usability analyst is usability testing and evaluation, which, by the way, are kinds of task analyses that are used by human factors experts. Usability experts typically focus on user testing and evaluating products in order to identify problems that user might have using or learning to use a product and suggest solutions for those problems. Although this is not the only service that a usability practitioner will perform, it is probably the most common activity.

As you may have noted, there is a gray area when trying to distinguish between usability experts and human factors experts. However, in general, the key difference is what they focus on and their educational background. In other words, those labeling themselves as human factors engineers, human factors psychologists, or ergonomists, typically have a formal education (Masters or Doctorate degree) in human factors or a closely related field, whereas those labeling themselves as usability experts, user experience professionals, etc., typically do not have the formal education in human factors, but may have some on-the-job experience.