"What happens if we ban UX?"
Henrique Assis
"The first thing I’ll do when I’m elected Grand Empress of Design is ban all instances of illustrated owls. All of them. However, the second thing I’ll ban is UX.
Like the badgers before it, UX needs a cull. Fail to do so and we’ll be confronted with an epidemic of design apathy. Without UX reform, the chasm between what what we do, what we say we do and how non designers (the people paying the bills) perceive us will continue to grow.
Last week, I sat in a room with 20 clever UX designers. Their concerns were all the same. Nobody understands what we do. Our teams don’t buy into it, our clients don’t trust it and our long term goals are being undermined.
By the end of this year I will have been working in design for a decade. I’ve seen for myself how UX has transformed the industry. As a principle and a practice, it brings graphic designers, writers and developers together with a common, user-centric goal. UX, as championed by the early adopters of yesterday (the experts of today) has changed how everyone (should) design.
It’s time for the cool kids to turn it in. UX is going mainstream. Only it can’t, because we’ve either forgotten or are wilfully ignoring the first rule of UX. We’ve failed to communicate the values of UX in a language the people we work for and with can understand.
Design for the user. Think like them, talk like them. Don’t bog them down in your jargon. Only that’s exactly what we’ve done. UXD, UCD, UID, CS, Agile, Waterfall, Rapid Prototyping.* UX has become the secret handshake club. Of course our colleagues don’t support our practice. They don’t know what they hell we’re going on about.
Relying on undiluted, untranslated UX theory is just making our jobs harder. As much as I hate a Request For Proposal, I can understand why clients rely on it. I’ve bought design and I’ve commissioned websites. I recommend at least once in your career you do the same. With someone else’s money. From a stranger. Squeaky bum doesn’t cover it. Now imagine an RFP filled with expensive jargon you don’t understand but fear you probably should. Now imagine you’re only given an RFP to cover the first iteration (yet more jargon) with a promise to “see where it goes from there.” I know I’m being petulant, but that’s what Agile looks like to someone who doesn’t know what Agile is.
The results are in, UX works. Now let’s scrap it. Our design is better because of it. All future focus should be on co-opting it into the design lexicon. Every designer needs UX in their tool box. We’ve got to stop leaving it to the experts. I’m going to be bold here and say that the advent of UX is as important as the arrival of Computer-Aided Design. Those who resisted and left the computers to the experts died out with their scalpels and typesetters.
UX is dead. Long live Design Research. Who can argue with research? Who can argue with analysing your audience and their digital geography? Who’s doesn’t want to future proof an expensive product? Who can refuse to take part in the preliminary step in a proven successful design process?
Where UX is a movement, Design Research is a skill, much the same as colour theory and layout. It’s relevant to all aspects of design, including (especially) print. Anyone who thinks otherwise needs to spend a bit of time with the Great British Bake Off cookbooks, a series of publications so poorly planned I fear they did it on purpose.
Design Research is just part of the design process, something every designer needs control of. Re-branding UX works both ways. UX designers are covering a tiny aspect of a much larger project. Yes, the research is vital but that research needs to be communicated through implementation and beyond. Calling oneself exclusively a UX Designer adds unnecessary weight. It’s akin to calling oneself a Logo Designer then expecting someone else to deliver the full identity. The complete designer needs a complete set of skills.
Here’s our choice, continue to allow UX to exist, external to the design process or absorb Design Research it into our daily practice, into design education and into the client’s mindframe. We’re wasting valuable time selling an overly complex concept. Tweak it, re-brand it for the masses and we’re in with a shout of welcoming in a grand new era of design"