Write For The Users!

If you’re a human (sorry not sorry robots) who’s constantly thinking about our exciting, challenging and ever-evolving field, we need your voice and I want to be a vehicle to help more people hear it.

Would you consider writing an article for UD Pub?

Podcasting is a wonderful communications medium and the core of what I do with User Defenders, but I also believe the written word is still one of the greatest ways to get an idea across.

As a result, I started a publication where I publish “Articles that fight for the users”. These “users” happen to be UX designers (aspiring and seasoned) working in user research, interaction design, visual design and web & product design.

What I’m looking for:

• Anything that challenges the status-quo of “how we’ve always done it”
  (Austin Knight called me a contrarian if that helps clarify this point)
• Anything that adds value to newer UX Designers (systematizing design, practicing empathy, how you got a seat at the table, design leadership lessons, innovative research and user testing methods etc.)
• Anything that inspires UX Designers to not lose heart and to fight on in their important journey (personal stories of overcoming hardships on your journey, personal stories of failure and coming through the mire to victory, dealing with poor leadership etc.)
• Anything mind-blowing that’s never been written about in our field

Here’s why you should

• Warm fuzzies knowing you’re teaching what you know, and hungry, passionate UX’ers are learning from you
• Your thoughtful articulation of new, interesting ideas could earn you more attention in our field thus opening doors that enable you to serve our community in an even greater capacity
• Career booster. Many in our field will not hire designers who don’t write

Requirements

• Minimum of 500 words
• Author bio
• Decent (high-res) photo
• Be bold, and use your own voice (write now, blush later)

How to submit an article:

1. Write an article here on Medium
   (I’m mostly interested in new articles, but am open to reviewing existing articles that haven’t been published anywhere else)
2. Save as draft
3. Send draft link to userdefenders [at] gmail [dot] com with “UD Pub” in subject
4. I will review and get back to you within 7–10 days

Thanks for your interest in contributing to this publication and most importantly…our great field.

I can’t wait to see what’s swirling around in that head (and heart) of yours as we all continue on this important quest to fight for our users!

Fighting on,

Jason

p.s. If you have any questions, feel free to leave them in the comments!