The one where we realized that we really don’t know what UX means
Written by Mario Ferrer & Sergio Vila — May 2019
Season 13, Episode 7.5
FADE IN: INTERIOR, BIG TECH COMPANY — MORNING
UX Designer 1 is very excited. It’s his first day at the office. He went through a super long and tedious interview process, did a whole bunch of design exercises and finally got the position at a flashy big tech company with millions of customers. He can’t wait to start working and prove everyone he’s an awesome designer. Project Manager 1 introduces him to the rest of the team. She tells the team how exciting it is to finally have someone that can help them validate with users the product they’ve been working on for the past 18 months.
A clunky round of applause by the team gives UX Designer 1 a welcome to his new gig. He’s not 100% sure that his job is to validate things, but he’s so pumped that he let’s Project Manager 1's comment slide.
UX Designer 1 is glowing as he goes back to his standing desk. He realizes that everyone’s super busy coding new features and UI Designers 2 and 3 are extremely busy drawing wireframes and producing graphics. He sighs and thinks it would be a good idea not to disturb them and get up to speed on his own by reviewing what the team has been working on for the past six months.
CUT TO: INTERIOR, MEETING ROOM— AFTERNOON
UX Designer 1 spends a couple of days doing a heuristic evaluation of the product. Once that’s done, he sets up a meeting to share his findings with the rest of the team:
UX Designer 1: Hey everyone, I’ve done a painstakingly thorough heuristic evaluation of the app you’ve been working on, and I’ve identified some critical issues that we definitely need to address asap. The most important one being that the app is not consistent. Like at all. For example, we are using different types of buttons and wording to tell people to do the exact same thing.
UI Designer 3: Well, that’s something we know, but we don’t have it in our priority list at the moment. A year ago, different teams were working on different parts of the app, and that’s why it looks like that.
UX Designer 1: I see, but Nielsen clearly states that users shouldn’t have to wonder whether different words, situations, or actions mean the same thing. So that’s wrong, and we should change it now. Besides, let’s be honest, it really shouldn’t take us that much time.
Developer 2: Actually, it would require a copious amount of time because we need to go through all the screens and change it manually.
UX Designer 1: Really?!? Oh, I thought that was a quick win.
Developer 5: Nope. The backend was build two years ago, and we can’t automate that part.
Project manager 1: Ok, Ok. Why don’t we do the following: we keep the feedback from UX Designer 1 and see if we can fix it in the future.
Marketer 6: In any case, I really don’t think we need to change this right now. If I were a user, I would totally understand what the app is telling me. It doesn’t really matter if the texts on the buttons are slightly different.
The meeting comes to an abrupt end with no agreements made. The problems flagged by UX Designer 1 won’t be fixed because they are not in the list of priorities, and the rest of the team is quite pissed off.
CUE: WORLD’S SMALLEST VIOLINS
But if only UX Designer 1 had taken the time to talk with the team before telling them everything was wrong…
FADE TO BLACK
DESIGN DIRECTOR’S NOTES
Ok… let’s get one thing out of the way real quick: “UX Design” as a term to define a craft should not even exist. Anyone who works on a product is a UX Designer to some extent. Anyone that has an impact on how a product behaves, looks like, gets coded, gets shipped, marketed, or sold (yes, even the people who create marketing campaigns or sell at a store) ALL of them are in a way UX Designers. The moment your decisions have an impact on a product, you’re shaping the experience of that product.
As designers, we are a part of the process, that’s why labeling ourselves as “UX Designers” is pretentious. UX is a team effort, not a lone wolf situation, or as Sarah Richards puts it: “User Experience is everybody’s responsibility”. We are at the same level as developers, customer care agents, content designers, project managers, and marketers. The sooner we accept this, the better for everyone’s mental health. The sooner we start working together, the better the product will be. It’s all about complementary skills, not “mad skillz”.
Now, someone could argue, “yeah, but UX designers are the ones who speak on behalf of users. They know their needs, their wishes, and they translate that into a product that is easy to use”. Well… hate to break it to you, but most of the times it's actually customer care agents who have a better understanding of customer needs and pains because they talk to them EVERY SINGLE DAY.
That little thing called empathy
The thing that makes us, UX Designers different from the rest of the common people involved in the creation of a product is a little something called “empathy”. That is, the ability to understand and share the feelings of others better than anyone else. We UX Designers are empathetic by nature, we are the best at being empathetic, there’s no one more bigly at being empathetic. We UX Designers represent people because only we know what they actually need (sometimes they don’t even know, but we know). We UX Designers connect with people at a level that the rest of the team simply just can’t. That’s why we fight with our teammates to raise the user’s voice. That’s why we say NO a hundred times for every time we say YES. We are the champions of product consistency, the defenders of usability, and the emissaries of delightful interactions.
WRONG. WRONG. WRONG.
We can’t understand the people using our products or services if we don’t understand the people we’re working with. Reach out to them. Listen. Be humble, try to see the world through their eyes, appreciate them as human beings, and try to understand their feelings.
Building products is about creating bonds with your teammates. It’s about building trust, as well as sharing your fears and wishes. Empathy is like a muscle that you can train by listening and just giving a fuck.
“None of us is as smart as all of us.” — Ken Blanchard
No individual team member has the knowledge and experience of the team as a whole. That’s why it’s crucial that team members listen to one another’s opinions, learn from their peers, and respect others.
Here are a couple of things you shouldn’t do on your first day at the office as a UX Designer if you want to stretch bonds with teammates:
- Don’t do a heuristic evaluation or an expert review and then tell everyone in the team what they did wrong.
- Don’t send an email telling people that UX is not UI. We’re looking at you ketchup bottles.
UX is not (only) about usability
A product should be easy to use. Understanding what we are doing and why we are doing it, is what makes us feel accomplished and happy. Purpose can guide life decisions, influence behavior, shape goals, and even offer a sense of direction and create meaning. We don’t like things that are broken or apps that make us feel stupid. Not understanding what we are doing or why we are doing it makes us feel stressed, and when we feel stressed, our primal reaction is to run away from the source that is producing it.
Sure you have to test your product frequently and take usability issues seriously, but that doesn’t mean UX Designers are just there to hunt for usability flaws. Some project managers and product owners perceive UX Designers as “validators.” It’s like we needed a referee (users) to tell us what’s right and what’s wrong. Team members make bets on what THEY think would be better for the people, and then UX Designers bring people into the office to validate the team’s work.
If we don’t have any users at hand, the temptation to say things like “If I were a user of this product I’d never do that” is incredibly high. But you know what? You’re not your user. So please stop saying what you would or wouldn’t do if you were a user. Seriously, stop it now.
Instead, do user tests with the target audience you’re designing for, identify problems, and fix them. If you don’t know who are you designing for, well, maybe you should consider doing some research and start by understanding who those people are, what they do, and what they need.
If the people you bring to the user tests don’t understand how your product works or they struggle to perform the tasks you ask them to do, you can always say it was not the right type of user. Keep testing until you find a set of people that love what you’ve designed and perform the tasks perfectly. Oh, and also, discard those that don’t understand your design. Feels wrong, right?
Before you start testing, write down what you want to learn, understand who are you designing for, bring them to the office, go to the place they live or work, and let them try out your product. If they struggle or don’t understand something, flag it, and discuss with the team how critical the problems you discovered are, make a plan, and address those issues.
Bursting the UX Design bubble
Being a UX designer is hard if you don’t care about people. It will make your life miserable. We genuinely think that most designers, developers, writers, and project managers out there want to create products that people love. But then again, the road to hell is paved with good intentions.
You need to ask yourself the following:
Do I want to make a product to get a lot of customers, make a lot of money, and get a promotion?
or
Do I want to make a product that empowers people, helps them solve a problem, and make their lives easier?
If you chose the second option: Ding! Ding! Ding! Congratulations, UX Design is flowing through your veins. Now go and get out of the office, talk to people, try to understand why they do what they do, and build something meaningful to them. If it’s the first option, welp… maybe it’s time to consider switching careers.
We recommend that you read the following articles. The authors are way smarter than we are…
- In Conversation: Content Design with Sarah Richards by Richard Buck
- The term “UX” by Don Norman
- UX is not Usability by Gideon Simons
- Usability: a part of the User Experience by Mads Soegaard
- The importance of empathy in the workplace by DeLores Pressley
Designfeld is a comedy series about a Designer and his fellow UX Writer, in their struggle to find… they don’t even know what they’re struggling to find, they just want to share their views on Design and why it can get quirky sometimes.
