Robert M. Schumacher

Robert M. Schumacher, Ph.D. is Managing Partner at Bold Insight Inc., a leading global user research firm headquartered in Chicago, Illinois. Bob is a seasoned professional, passionate about the user experience. As both a manager and a technical leader, he has responsibility to ensure that clients' objectives are met and expectations are exceeded. He holds several patents, and has written dozens of professional and academic papers. In 1996, Bob authored and released the Ameritech Graphical User Interface Standards and Design Guidelines which are still influential in both their form and content. Bob developed an interest in improving user performance in high-workload environments. He spent several years researching, designing, and testing enterprise applications for dozens of contact centers including several Fortune 50 companies. More recently, Bob has been become influential in how usability is applied to health information technologies. He has authored several papers on usability criteria for EHR. Together with Gavin Lew, Bob co-authored "AI and UX: Why Artificial Intelligence Needs User Experience" published by Apress in 2020. In this book we detail the linkages and dependencies of user experience and artificial intelligence. We highlight some shared history and point to how AI can be more successful if UX principles are applied. He is also the editor of the 2009 "Handbook of Global User Research" published by Morgan Kaufman. In this volume, he coordinated the contributions of 53 authors from more than 20 countries. He has served as CEO of User Experience Ltd. since 2006; User Experience is the first foreign-owned user research firm in Beijing, China. He has been invited to speak on user experience and user research at national and international conferences in North America, Europe and Asia. Bob has served as research director for dozens of global user research projects. He was one of the driving forces behind the formation of the UXalliance in 2005 which is the pre-eminent global federation of user experience companies. In more than 30 years of professional experience, Bob has held technical and management positions at Bellcore, Ameritech, Belgacom, Universal Access, User Centric, GfK, and now Bold Insight. Bob holds a PhD in Cognitive and Experimental Psychology from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.