I’ve worked in wildly different teams over the years before UX design, from an inside sales team to a farming co-op. The common thread that contributed to an awesome work dynamic across these varied teams is simple: I intuitively consider my interactions with my team as a UX challenge. In response, I rise to the challenge and I give them a frictionless experience. This revelation was one of the key reasons I made the jump and became a professional UX designer.
Applying UX Heuristics to Being a Good Teammate
Jakob Nielsen developed 10 Heuristics for User Interface Design as broad principles for us to consider when designing. Consider Nielsen’s classic usability heuristics, but reframe them for interactions with your team. Whether it’s your product manager, development team, creative partners, or other stakeholders, applying these tips to our personal relationships can help us all be rad team members.
- Visibility of system status: The system should always keep users informed about what is going on, through appropriate feedback, within a reasonable time.
Communicate, communicate, communicate. I’m known for marching up to people’s desks or dropping messages to co-workers just to let them know the status of the work they’re waiting on from me, even if it’s not complete.
These interactions are quick, friendly, and keep progress clear.
2. Match between system and the real world: The system should speak the users’ language, rather than system-oriented terms. Follow real-world conventions, making information appear in a natural and logical order.
We can all get caught up in our own specialties and rely too heavily on acronyms and niche terms. While we all need a baseline level of technical understanding, there’s nothing wrong with using plain language to describe what you’re saying. Since joining my current UX team, I’ve learned that the notion of “wireframes” can vary drastically from team to team and it never hurts to validate.
I work in healthcare now, and I appreciate it immensely when people can explain disease states and medical molecules to me without making me feel stupid. It’s an art!
3. User control and freedom: Users often choose system functions by mistake and will need a clearly marked “emergency exit” to leave the unwanted state without having to go through an extended dialogue.
Clients change their minds. Misunderstandings happen.
Take a flexible approach. Use reflective listening and run ideas back to your team members to get a confirmation that you’ve understood their instructions the way they intended. If the direction changes tomorrow, consider how you will adapt. Help those around you feel like you can help the team pivot in situations when you’ve all gone down the wrong path. I do this by meeting curveballs with acknowledgement, humour, and solutions rather than blame.
4. Consistency and standards: Users should not have to wonder whether different words, situations, or actions mean the same thing.
I’ve developed a habit recently of aligning explicitly with new teams about working styles in terms of tools, file systems, and communication channels before starting a project. This way we can all be on the same page about the way that we collaborate.
5. Error prevention: Even better than good error messages is a careful design which prevents a problem from occurring in the first place.
You’re a week away from a hard deadline. Your client suddenly wants to scrap the entire concept. The team goes back to the drawing board; stressed, uninspired, and dejected from the process. Do you reflect back to the moment you sat around, watching the team’s communication break down, and think, “I knew this would happen”?
Right when the team forms and the project is briefed, trust your gut in flagging potential problems. Ask questions and lead by example in encouraging the team to communicate in a way that mitigates future problems.
6. Recognition rather than recall: Minimize the user’s memory load by making objects, actions, and options visible. The user should not have to remember information from one part of the dialogue to another.
What did she say again? Where did he put those files? Which email are you talking about? We spend an inordinate amount of time being our own mini project managers.
Whether you’re hosting or attending a meeting, come prepared. Put all the resources your team needs to access in one place. Follow conventions for file management and communication.
7. Flexibility and efficiency of use: Accelerators — unseen by the novice user — may often speed up the interaction for the expert user such that the system can cater to both inexperienced and experienced users.
Every part of your work process can be done in a way that makes it easier for someone else.
When I start building wireframes or designs, I consider who else may have to work on it. I’ll decide how to structure or name layers accordingly. Something as granular as naming the file appropriately can be helpful. Consider this: naming a file “Desktop_v2.sketch” may make sense in your context, but to the graphic designer who is working on multiple desktop designs, your file will be hard to distinguish from other similar files.
8. Aesthetic and minimalist design: Dialogues should not contain information which is irrelevant or rarely needed. Every extra unit of information in a dialogue competes with the relevant units of information.
Keep a clear agenda in meetings. We often go into meetings knowing little more than the topic being discussed. While this is a great first step, without creating a clear agenda and intent to arrive at action items, conversations can get derailed. All of a sudden we’re going down a rabbit hole about a concept of yesteryear instead of trying to solve the problem at hand. Properly structuring your meeting can reduce irrelevant or confusing information.
9. Help users recognize, diagnose, and recover from errors: Error messages should be expressed in plain language (no codes), precisely indicate the problem, and constructively suggest a solution.
After spending hours designing a wireframe, the team tears it apart in an internal review because it’s missing a key feature. What happened here? You quickly jump on the defensive, trying to tell everyone it wasn’t in the brief.
Well, you’re probably right, but that’s not very helpful. Reflect on your challenges and offer up potential causes and solutions. Why wasn’t it in the brief? Maybe the brief changed without your knowing or maybe you interpreted the brief wrong. Provide solutions both for the issue that caused the problem and the problem itself.
10. Help and documentation: Even though it is better if the system can be used without documentation, it may be necessary to provide help and documentation.
Create a culture that welcomes questions. Among this laundry list of tips to avoid mistakes, miscommunications, and haphazardly searching for files or answers, this may be the most important point on this list. Be approachable so that whatever issues arise, whatever your team needs help with, they feel comfortable asking you.
The notion of user experience design is changing and growing rapidly, evolving into somewhat of a buzzword. I’m challenged by colleagues everyday who question the true value of UX. To elevate the practice as a whole, we have to show them not only what user experience can do for a site or product, but how embodying user experience design in our every interaction can make us kick-ass teammates!
