Must Know Disciplines In The Modern Design Tech Universe
Since the popularisation of user experience design there has been an explosion of professions within related fields. As time goes on practitioners collectively strive to evolve, innovate and refine this exciting era of design.
Design technologists, evangelists and thought leaders alike are at the helm of this push for excellence but with so many disciplines manifesting themselves, lines are beginning to become blurred and confusion sometimes evident when trying to understand this domain.
To visually organise these disciplines in a a way that makes sense and to show context of how each discipline is valuable, they have been arranged in the periodic table of modern design technology disciplines. As they are displayed, there are two dimensions that assist practitioners in their understanding:
a) The broadness of the discipline (broad field disciplines or narrow field disciplines)
b) The focus of the discipline (product & service focused or user focused).
These two dimensions are continuous spectrums which means that although you may find a discipline on the outer edge of the table, they are all intertwined and serve their own purpose in creating an amazing experience for all participants involved. Overlaid on top of these disciplines are approaches such as design thinking, lean and agile.
Broad Field Product & Service Focused
This includes the following disciplines:
1) Service Design (SD)
2) Product Design (PD)
3) Experience Design (XD)
4) Human Centred Design (HCD)
“It’s not ‘us versus them’ or even ‘us on behalf of them.’ For a design thinker it has to be ‘us with them’”
— Tim Brown • CEO and President at IDEO
One may say that these disciplines oversee a greater amount of moving parts. They are fairly broad disciplines which take into consideration a variety of different processes and goals to determine the outcome of a service, product, experience or solution.
Broad Field User Focused
This includes the following disciplines:
1) Brand Experience (BX)
2) Customer Experience (CX)
3) User Experience (UX)
4) User Research (UR)
“We see our customers as invited guests to a party, and we are the hosts. It’s our job every day to make every important aspect of the customer experience a little bit better.”
— Jeff Bezos • Founder + President, CEO and Chairman of the Board at Amazon
These disciplines hone in on the specific users who engage in the experience(s), product(s) or service(s) created for them. Within brand experience design (BXD), customer experience design (CXD) and user experience design (UXD), there are generally elements of user research.
The level of user research is determined by the organisations maturity within a certain discipline however the way in which research is conducted may vary based on needs. It is best to determine what the research requirements are upfront rather than going with the same approach for every study. In some instances digital tools may be best to be able to get a larger sample size from self moderated usability testing. Other times it might be more appropriate for practitioners to conduct moderated testing with a facilitator. This provides an opportunity for realtime dialogue that creates greater clarity and gives time for additional interrogation of a participants comment(s). These disciplines remain fairly broad and really begin to go into the psychology and behavioural aspects of design.
Narrow Field Product & Service Focused
This includes the following disciplines:
1) Visual Communication Design (VCD)
2) Information Architecture (IA)
“Design is the intermediary between information and understanding.”
— Hans Hofmann • Painter
This is very specific to the product or service being created. Visual communication design is the realm of the graphic designer and visual artist. These are the pixel perfect artisans who beautifully create epic masterpieces for the platform, service offering or product. Information architecture is less visual but beautiful in it’s own right. The ability to take information and make if flow in a cohesive and natural way is an art form within itself.
Narrow Field User Focused
This includes the following disciplines:
1) User Interface Design (UI)
2) Interaction Design (IXD)
“It’s not enough that we build products that function, that are understandable and usable, we also need to build products that bring joy and excitement, pleasure and fun, and yes, beauty to people’s lives.”
— Don Norman • Director of The Design Lab at University of California
This brings in the user intent and emotional awareness when using the product or service. These disciplines focus on the standards of UI best practices and adheres to brand guidelines. It creates delightful experiences when users interact with the interface though smooth transitions, actions and animations.
— fin
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— ST
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Curating Remarkable Experiences Through Experience Design
The ability to design remarkable experiences is a capability which is an ever growing desire for businesses to have. A focus on User Experience (UX), Customer Experience (CX) and Brand Experience (BX) have proven to elevate brand affinity as well as customer satisfaction.
As time goes on, it is becoming harder and harder to innovate as experiences tend to mimic one another in the name of best practice principles. Through experience design thought leadership there are underlying key themes which allow organisations to break through the noise and create truly meaningful experiences with technology.
— Sherwin Torres
About the author
Joining international consulting firm Ippon Technologies and reporting into the Managing Director of Ippon Australia, Sherwin is the head of Ippon Australia’s experience design consulting practice. A thought leader in experience design, he is tasked with building up the firm’s XD capability and oversees all aspects of BX, CX, UX, UI, IxD, User Research, Human Centred Design and Service Design.
With over 10 years in the industry as a design technologist, Sherwin is the former Head of Digital CX Development at The Good Guys, former Head of eBusiness Operations at AAMI and former Head of eBusiness Support at Melbourne IT. He holds a Double Masters for the Master of Information Systems Management/Master of Business Administration, a Double Degree for the Bachelor of Business Information Systems/Bachelor of Business and a Diploma of Information Technology (Network Engineering).
