What I’ve learned having a UX partner.

I’ve worked in agencies before and I’ve always heard of UX designers. Sometimes the title is coupled with UI, and sometimes with visual design. Some places want you to be a hybrid designer who can do user experience, user interface, visual, and even motion design. Hats off to all of the designers who do that and actually kill it, like really kill it, that’s like being a brain surgeon and cardiologist all in the same day. As for myself, I identify as a visual product designer. I have a traditional Bauhaus based education in print design, so I really wasn’t taught anything about digital design. The first time I had heard of a UX designer it was 3 months into my first job, now, my UX partner is one of my most valued teammates.

For the past 10 months I’ve had a UX partner in crime. We’ve tackled a huge section of the My Verizon app together along with a data analyst and business analyst. We work in an agile workflow, complete and total collaboration. None of this waterfall hand off BS. Every single decision that’s made, is made with the user in mind and influenced by both UX and visual design.

When we’re given the task, we brainstorm about the solution and how we can get there. We sketch on paper and talk through the flows and functions. We both understand the functionality and business purpose equally. When we land on a direction, she writes the user stories and I’ll take a stab at the initial flow. We work off of the same file 😱😱😱😱. I know right. It’s actually amazing. The designs are already set up and it’s easy for the UX designer to pull together screens quickly or to wireframe if you will. We have more discussions around what we’re thinking and continue to refine the designs. She takes my opinion about user experience seriously and I take her visual design feedback seriously. That’s how we land on the best work possible.

Of course we also have our own responsibilities in our disciplines. She handles IT calls and feedback. She writes the annotations and makes the flow charts. In the meantime, I work with the copywriter to get tone right, I make sure we have pixel perfect designs and I set the patterns that happen across all screens.

After having worked with a UX designer for so long I truly believe it’s a team effort with all egos aside. Some of the best visuals have come from something she has said and some of the best flows come from input I’ve had. Working this way allows us both to be completely involved in final outcome and to be confident about it. When we present the work, we both know exactly why all of the decisions, UX or visual design, was made. The work is truly so much stronger.