3 Key UX Tips I’ve Learned at General Assembly
UX Designers aren’t just pixel pushers
For the past few weeks, I’ve been attending the 10 week UX Design program at General Assembly. I’m only on my 2nd week, but I’ve already learned so much more than I thought I would. UX is a much bigger field than I thought it was, and with that I’ve learned a lot more than I thought I would! I wanted to share a few ideas that I think is really important if you’re learning UX, or want to learn more about it.
Research is a thing
When I first got into UX, I thought I would be spending all my time in front of a computer, making icons or creating buttons in Sketch. While UX Designers do that, research is a big part of UX. You really have to think about who’s using this app, how they’re using and discovering any problems they’re coming across.
On the first day, we actually went out with a group of other students and conducted research to find pain points people were uncovering. On the first day! Ever since then, research has been the main point we’ve been covering in class. So, research really is everything.
Every company does things differently
Our instructor has been in this industry for about 24 years. She’s worked at Google, Sephora and has started her own companies. Every single team she’s been on has a different process than the previous. Some do wireframes, others just skip to the design stage. Some do empathy maps, others do personas. Some teams have dedicated researchers, others have a team of 2 UX designers that have to do the research.
Every company, from a startup to Fortune 500, does things differently. One thing I was really worried about when I first started GA was they’d try to teach us a specific way to do things. Well, that’s not the case. They teach us basically everything we need to know, so no matter what company we go into, we can excel at our job.
Users will tell you what they think you want to hear
When people find out your interviewing them, they will try to give you the answers they think you want to hear, and not the truth. They want to make sure your satisfied and that they were helpful.
For instance, one of my friends was doing research on BART, San Francisco’s subway system. Now, BART is full of flaws. But, she went up and asked someone, “what don’t you like about BART?”
“Oh, there’s nothing wrong with BART.”
Once she pulled some more strings, she actually found that she hated waiting a long time for trains. See, the user basically lied to her because she did have problems with BART, but didn’t want to voice them for her. Better yet, maybe she didn’t actually think it was a pain point.
