Role: Ambassador User
The Ambassador User generally comes from the business area being addressed and becomes an integral part of the development team.
Relationships
Performs:Responsible for:
Additionally Performs: Modifies:
Main Description

This role provides the key focus for design decisions. Working closely with the Project Manager, Developer(s), Tester(s) and the Architect, the Ambassador User drives the system's requirements, bringing input and ideas to the various sessions on behalf of the users; and keeping the other users informed of what is happening. The holder of the Ambassador User role must have the desire, authority, responsibility and knowledge to be able to ensure that the right system is built for the business. This does not necessarily imply a senior position within the organisation, but a level of empowerment during the project to fulfil the role and a clear allocation of time to participate in the project as required.

Responsibilities

  • Providing key input to business requirements and design sessions
  • Communicating with other users and getting their agreement
  • Providing input into prototyping sessions
  • Reviewing documentation
  • Reviewing and accepting delivered software
  • Providing user documentation
  • Ensuring user training is adequately carried out
  • Organising and controlling user testing
Properties
Multiple Occurrences
Optional
Planned
Staffing
Skills
  • Knowledge of the relevant business area goals and the organisation politics
  • High-level view of how the computer system should function to support the business
  • Good communication skills
  • Ability to disseminate knowledge and ideas.
Assignment Approaches

Ambassador Users should have a positive attitude towards the development since they will be exposed to a whole raft of new ideas and technologies that can be daunting.

For some critical projects, it may be necessary for Ambassador Users to be on the project full-time, but this is often not possible and may even be counter-productive. It is perfectly acceptable for an Ambassador User to be part-time. However, the presence on the project needs to be continuous, e.g. at specified times of the day and/or on agreed days of every week.

Key Considerations

Ambassador Users must be representative of the entire community of users. The whole user community should see them as such - not just the user management. They must have authority delegated to them to make decisions and to guide the work of the developers. This is particularly important when considering changes of scope due to time limitations.

More Information
Guidelines

This program and the accompanying materials are made available under the
Eclipse Public License v1.0 which accompanies this distribution.

OpenUP Copyright.

OpenUP/DSDM Copyright.