When I was starting out in digital design, before the advent of the smartphone (the iPhone specifically) the world as a whole (outside of tech circles) thought UX meant UI design. Even companies who should have known better often thought of UX and UI as afterthoughts — asking the designer to simply skin what the developers had built. Only enterprise level software developers seemed to care about UX and a lot of that drive seemed to come from customers who complained about how the difficulty performing certain tasks within the software.
Once the iPhone debuted it changed the design culture within many companies bent on simplifying their UX to match Apple’s iOS. I’d see listings for designers/developers who had 3+ years of iOS experience — when the SDKs and the OS itself was less than a year old.
Often this was contributory negligence between the hiring structure and HR. “We always ask for a minimum of three years experience in “X” platform/language.” I still see this mentality today — which is why when I hire, I always ask to see the unfiltered candidates for a job posting. Even if it’s overwhelming.
