The Gratitude for Formally Learning the Ins and Outs of a Passion
Prior to being formally trained in UX Design, I had experiences working with prototypes and wireframes. I thought my previous work in design would translate to a seamless transition back to a school setting. However, it had its ups and downs but I was grateful for the opportunity (and the scholarship) to formally learn a craft I was passionate about.
After completing my first project, I felt a great sense of relief knowing that I had gone through a week of General Assembly relatively unscathed. It was refreshing to complete a hands-on assignment that touched on different facets of the iterative design process. It’s one thing to be quizzed on what the discovery phase of the process looks like. And it’s a whole other beast to actually conduct interviews after spending hours trying to avoid leading questions for the interview discussion guide.
For the inaugural project, I had to design an application that supported the General Assembly (GA) student social experience. At first, I felt lost amongst the big words and concepts of User Experience (UX) Design. How was I going to come up with a freestanding app if two weeks prior to the assignment, I thought Lean UX dealt with weight and size?
I initially felt overwhelmed. However, like a fan of any poorly performing sports team (*cough* New York Knicks *cough*), I decided to trust in the process. In my case, the iterative design process. There is a certain genius yet simplicity running along those double diamonds of User Experience design.
After recognizing the problem brief that I had to address the students’ social experience at GA, I came up with a hypothesis. It stated that a social calendar would better organize a busy GA student’s time. Therefore, with a more efficient use of time, a GA student would have the ability to socialize (and yes, also commiserate) with classmates. With hypothesis in hand, I then interviewed GA students for data and made my way towards overcoming my misgivings of approaching strangers.
With sufficient information on the population pool, I synthesized my data using an affinity map. By grouping similar user statements together in what looked like a FBI investigation cork board, I was able to identify key trends. I was able to identify that most students had other commitments to tend to outside of the heavy workload of GA course assignments. In addition, students wanted at least a few days’ notice of any upcoming social activities in order to plan around their busy schedules.
With crucial themes of the interviews neatly organized, I was able to materialize a persona, or an ideal user of my application. Thus started the progression of whittling down the scope of the problem at hand.
My eventual problem statement framed the social issue at GA as one that could be solved with proper time management tools. Namely, a feature that would alert a user of a social event anywhere from a week to 30 minutes in advance of the looming date.
As someone who has had the experience of missing out on scheduled social outings due to forgetting the date until the day of, the alert/reminder feature on a calendar seemed like an intuitive fix. Giving me a week’s or three days’ notice of a classmate’s birthday party not only raises the stakes of the quality of gift I have to give, but also essentially ensures that I would not overbook or forget that date.
Now, the alert system was something already in use in applications like Google calendar. In fact, it is a feature I swear by when adding commitments on my schedule. Therefore, solely adding the alert system didn’t seem like a genuinely original concept. I wasn’t wholly satisfied.
However, when I looked back at my affinity map and research synthesis, I noted that all of my interviewees disliked Push notifications and preferred text messages or email notifications. And there it was. The synthesis or ‘define’ section of the double diamond held the key to my ‘Aha!’ moment. I would have my application send the alerts of the looming social event via text or email message. This way, the alerts would be prioritized properly without taking up unnecessary space on one’s phone.
This solved an actual pain point that my interviewees acknowledged — and to my knowledge it was an original idea. Now, the idea of sending an alert via email or text didn’t reinvent the wheel, but it was a concept that was all my own. And there was a certain comfort in knowing that.
With a potential fix in mind, I moved onto the ideation step in the process. I truly enjoyed this phase of the process. It put the theoretical concepts into tangible sketches and eventually a prototype. Figuring out the different configurations for the different displays was like solving a puzzle. An interactive puzzle that I had nurtured since conception when it was nothing but a wee hypothesis.
By viewing the design process through the iterative perspective, I was able to analyze, empathize and ideate in manageable morsels. Each step lends itself to the next and factors into the change in the next round of the design cycle. It truly does pay to trust in the process. You may never know where the process will lead you at the outset, but you can rest assured that it will be a journey of discovery and delight.
