Quick Wins to Becoming a Better UX Designer

A few quick and simple tips we’ve picked up over the years that’ve made us better (and more flexible) UX designers.

Habits only take 30 days to change, so if you can think differently for 30 days, it’ll make a massive impact for years to come.

Stay Humble

Being open, honest and ready to learn (and fail) at the drop of a hat makes UX designers great.

It doesn’t really matter how much you know about UX, truth is, there’s so much to think about and account for, that it’s impossible to know everything…and that’s okay.

Some of the best UX designers we’ve met, aren’t the ones with 10 years experience, they’re the junior ones who’re open to learning and making mistakes (that they can learn from).

We’ve heard this quote a few times…

“UX design is like football, everyone thinks they know best.”

…and it makes us laugh (not because we’ve met tons of arrogant UX designers) but because we’ve been guilty of this before too.

Being successful a few times, doesn’t guarantee that you’ll be successful forever — you’re still going to need to follow a process.

In fact, one of the reasons you were probably successful before, was because you were comfortable to learn and discover the best way forward.

You don’t need to re-invent the wheel every time you tackle a new project, you have to prepared to do what’s right and (ultimately) what could work.

There’s never any guarantees.

Evaluate Your Process

Technology moves fast.

Make sure your process evolves as quickly as the world does.

A few years ago, we wouldn’t need to worry about designing for smartwatches or small wearables, now we design for these most days.

Right now VR is set to explode, it’s only a matter of time before we’ll need to incorporate VR theory (and potentially design) into our workflows too.

Interestingly enough, when technology evolves, user behaviours do too.

It’s now perfectly normal for people to stand in the street and take selfies or to bump into people walking and texting — no one questions it anymore.

Technology changes my world and your world.

Products adopted by the masses become part of our ‘social norms’ and from there, they make low-level changes to what we do and how we act.

If you check your smartphone when you wake up (or before bed) then your behaviour has changed. If you use Tinder instead of meeting partners in bars, libraries or Match.com — then your behaviour has changed.

All of these minor behavioural changes slowly become habits and as time goes on, these habits shape and define the world around us.

They change everything.

Next time you come across a UX problem, tackle it with fresh eyes. When things begin to change in the world around you, identify why and what that change could means for you and your users.

An Assumption is an Assumption

Innocent until proven guilty, an assumption has no authority until it’s tested or has been tested (in similar circumstances).

UX requires us to make assumptions, but remember that that’s all they are. It’s scary the number of times we all let our egos get in the way of looking for (or at) actionable data.

Ultimately, it’s not about being the smartest person in the room, it’s about making an impact and as boring as data can be, it makes a massive difference on your impact.

The last thing you want to happen, is to adamantly stand by an assumption that’s completely wrong, with no data to backup it or an actionable plan to test it.

Long story short, we’ve been there and it sucks.

Even if you’ve lived and breathed the industry (or the subject) you’re making assumptions for, people are complex and often really strange creatures with unusual quirks.

You could be using your own experience as a primer for the assumption and you could be the anomaly within the industry.

Random assumptions with no data, piss people off.

Whether this is clients or your employer, it gets to a point where everyone turns around and says — what are you basing this on?

If you turnaround and say ‘my humble opinion’ then you won’t annoy people, but they won’t take you very seriously.

If you say ’10 years industry experience’ then they’ll ask you for data that matches your thoughts. If you can’t find any, things start to get heated.

Not every assumption can be backed with data to begin with. Instead, make sure there’s a plan to validate the assumption using key metrics.

If at the end of it all it turns out you were right, celebrate.

If it turns out you were wrong, celebrate.

You’ve learnt something either way and that’s important.

So, how do we know the above tips will make you a better UX designer? We’ve tested them on ourselves and our friends 🐹

We now have more clients, better work and we’re enjoying ourselves much more than we were 3 years ago.