11 Books That Helped Me to Design Better
Time to time I’m asked to recommend a book to someone who want to “break into design” and really don’t know that to say to keep things simple. I am not experienced a lot in many of the methods for better UX design, but I certainly can tell you what I read and how I think it affected my later work.
I will tell you a little bit about my background to help you understand more the books I picked up and what I already knew before. This will vary a lot from person to person and I suppose there is not a definitive list that fits everyone’s needs.
Before I list the books
I started as graphic designer at 2004 and I kept myself outside any community and with very poor English proficiency I even didn’t read anything. That fact made me greatly surprised after 2010 when I started to read at least articles about design. Then I joined a company with a UX designer and I started to read about UX design. After 2015 I attended a year long course for UX designers and then I started to read a lot. Not as much as Nadya (UX Blog) does, of course. Since that time I had to invent my own way of reading to not waste time on useless books, because I am not fast reader at all.
My definitive TOP 11 list for beginner designers
Let me state something in advance and apply this on each book by publishers Book-A-Part and Rosenfeld Media: Any book I’ve read was short and with no tales, which are two of the most important features for me.
#11 Observing The User Experience
I have read Observing The User Experience as my first official UX book ever and even though it very long I read it as a novel from the first page to the end. It gave me a excessive view on the whole process of user research, all the methods, how much time it can consume, what to start with or examples of the deliverables.
#10 Just Enough Research
I’ve got just one chapter from Just Enough Research from a lecturer of UX Well and when I read the rest of the book later that year, I still remember just the one chapter. I was quite worried after reading the previous book Observing The User Experience, because the whole process of UX designers looked overwhelming and very complex.
#9 Card Sorting
I confess, I didn’t read Card Sorting yet, but I’ve been told it’s useful. I learned about card sorting different way already before, so I didn’t feel it can bring me more knowledge.
#8 Information Architecture for the Web And Beyond
I’ve had a real struggle with reading this book, so at least, it’s good to run through Information Architecture for the Web And Beyond to catch the terminology and google it elsewhere.
#7 About Face 3
After reading both Observing The User Experience and Designing For The Digital Age I read just few chapters of About Face 3 to learn more about certain subjects.
#5+6 Handbook of Usability Testing + Rocket Surgery Made Easy
I should have buy a hardcover of Handbook of Usability Testing, because I carry it with me here and there. It contains tutorials, script examples and checklists. The Rocket Surgery Made Easy was a quick read for me and it explained a lot by just few words and illustrations. I gained a certainty to facilitate the testing and not to worry too much.
#4 100 Things Every Designer Needs to Know About People
When I was working for the DDB Prague, an advertising agency, we usually produced microsites, campaign websites, banners, promo images etc., I’ve had always on my desk 100 Things Every Designer Needs to Know About People so I could use as much as potential for the conversion rate. Quick read, very short chapters, summaries and sources.
#3 The Elements of User Experience
I remember “just” the main diagram of The Elements of User Experience and it seems to be the most important thing from the book anyway. It gives a form and structure to the whole user experience.
#2 Designing For The Digital Age
The book that covers it all. It’s good to start with Designing For The Digital Age, read a chapter one at the time and try the new knowledge in the practice. For almost 10 months this was the only source I used. People may tell you how experienced they are, throw at you opinions on every method out there, but in the reality there are not many people who tried every method several times. So I recommend to start slowly, keep the instructions and examples obtained from Kim Goodwin and try it at least few times, on several projects. After a year you will see how you can a should bend these rules for better serving your purposes.
#1 Interviewing Users
In my humble opinion, the best book in this is undoubtedly is Interviewing Users by Steve Portigal, who also wrote my favourite book Doorbells, Danger, and Dead Batteries about, as he refers to it, “war stories” from the user research he, his colleagues and friends did through out their careers.
That was it. Books written by designers are great in one particular thing — The have in mind the needs of other designers. The books are usually very short or at least the chapters are. They include summaries for each chapter, a structure of the book and naming of the chapters is good also.
What I read now?
I will continue later by a list of additional reading with more fresh examples, which I read now. The topics changed a little bit and I focus now more on popular psychology books about conscious and unconscious decisions, perceptions and cognition.
