Welcome to the HCD-Net.
The Human-Centered Design Organization (HCD-Net) is a nonprofit organization for the advocacy and promotion of "Human-Centered Design (HCD)". It also engages in a variety of activities including research on human-centered design and its social applications and extensions.
Applying HCD into the development of a wide variety of items will have enormous positive effects in several areas and fields: engineers and managers engaged in various projects can realize the essential usability factors and their merits; consumers will find the products they purchased very useful, and thus will have the motivation for purchasing products with high usability, enabling industry to realize the importance of usability and the necessity for human-centered design as a way to accomplish high-quality corporate identity.
In the last 20 years, various developments regarding usability have been made, as seen in the effort for quality-user interface design and in the commitment to universal design.
In addition, there seems to be an increasing attention to "ISO 13407", an international standard for human-centered design. On the other hand, however, the significance of the concept of human-centered design or usability has not fully been realized among stakeholders in product development. I strongly believe and expect that the HCD-Net will make a great contribution in this respect.
The activities of HCD-Net include: the diffusion and advocacy of usability activities based on ISO 13407; the educational contribution for planning and organizing lectures and seminars on usability for engineers and designers; participation in public projects relating usability; and standardization/accreditation activities.
I strongly expect that the HCD-Net will become a part of the great tide of human-centered design. Your interest and active participation is strongly appreciated.
With sincere appreciation for your interests,
Masaaki Kurosu
President, HCD-Net, Japan
A specified nonprofit Human-Centered Design Organization