Becoming the next product designer
Looking at how beautiful the earth is, it may please us to know that it took a great product designer to piece it up.
Who then is this product designer?
A product designer is responsible for the user experience of a product. They sometimes play a role in the information architecture and system design of a product as well.
A product designer may as well be referred to as a Customer Experience Architect, User Experience Designer, Interaction Designer, User Interface Designer, etc. depending on the size, the type of company, and the diversity of the design department and the particular individual’s area of expertise.
Product designers play an important role during key stages of product development, they can translate the goal of the product into a functional user experience and provide requirements feedback regarding what must be in place for users to achieve their goals.
As a product grows with new features and functionality, a product designer can ensure the user experience is intuitive, and once a product is mature they can help refine the user experience and make the product more efficient to improve page load speeds, etc.
Enough about who a product designer is, let’s get things going.
How do You Become a Product Designer?
Product designers need a unique toolbox to do their job. Creativity is a must, but they also must be good in effective communication and storytelling to explain their vision for the product design.
Design thinking is pretty much a necessity for this role, as product designers will be asked to develop user stories (including worrying about edge cases), storyboard, and mockup interfaces. Product designers may also be tasked with performing user research.
Where to start
The following steps can get your feet on a stable foundation of being a good product designer:
- Focus on a role
- Find a mentor
- Join a community
- Read good design books
Focus on a role
- Search UX and Product Designer job postings
- Focus on UX Design or Product Design
- Write down the common skills required for that role
- Focus on one skill
Find a mentor.
Find someone with the role you want through meetup or friends. Offer to buy them a drink to talk about what they do. Mentors could be found during meetups, from LinkedIn, through friends, etc.
Make sure your mentor has the role that you want to be in next. Your mentor should have some years of experience in product designing.
Getting yourself a mentor will allow you to
- Guide your decisions as you develop your career
- Get a feel for the role you want
- Have a sounding board
Join a community
Joining a community helps you find a network of people that will help you learn and accelerate your transition.
Read good design books
Buy a book from the Reading List on product design. Pick up that book you bought and read. Some great books on product design can be accessed here.
Boom, you are on your way to being the next awesome product designer
