10 quotes bad designers

On the Internet there are many materials on how to identify a good designer. This article approaches the question from the other side - in it I would like to talk about what signs indicate a bad designer. Below are ten quotes to help you identify severe cases.

№1 "I'm a designer, I know what the user needs"

Often there are designers who believe that they understand the problem field better than everyone else - investors, other team members, in especially neglected cases, even the users themselves. In the end, they cling to the solution they have outlined, and dodge any criticism.

It is necessary to understand: no matter how many years you have worked in this area, all your ideas are only hypotheses. A hypothesis must be checked. Skipping the validation phase, you base the entire workflow on unsupported assumptions. That is why experienced experts say: a good designer comes from user problems, a bad designer comes from his own solutions.
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№2 "It worked at that time, it works now"

Here you can quote the famous statement of Heraclitus, the Greek philosopher: "You can not enter the same river twice." With respect to UX design, this means that what worked in one context may not work in another. For each new product that you take to work, you should select the tools and equipment that best fit the project.

# 3 "It seems that users are experiencing significant cognitive load. We need to conduct a heuristic verification to make sure that the initial hypothesis is valid ”

This is just one example of how designers use professional jargon in everyday discussions. Inside the UX team, such phrases are quite appropriate, but outside of it, when the designer tries to share an idea or ideas with a company, they confuse people. Similar expressions do not speak of anything to people who have little idea of ​​the techniques used in UX design. In the end, behind unfamiliar words, they lose the thread.

Remember: sprinkling it with jargon, you don't look cool. In addition, you invite other people to meetings and presentations not to show you how cool a specialist is, but to receive a valuable response from them. One of the basic skills of a UX designer is the ability to express complex concepts in simple language. Describing the UX practice is simple, you will achieve that everyone will be on the same wavelength with you.

№4 “There is no need to make a prototype. We will launch the product, and everything will become clear "

Another common mistake that teams make is that they skip the prototyping stage and immediately spend a lot of development resources. When they invest a lot in a product, and after launching it turns out that in the natural environment the solution does not work as expected - this is a very stressful situation.

Prototyping allows you to test the hypothesis, before wasting your time and the time of developers to create a complete product. It will be better if the problem emerges at the prototype stage - the cost of eliminating it will then be much less than if the product has already been released to the public. As David Kelly, the founder of IDEO, said: "The sooner you go through failure, the sooner you will achieve success."

Creating a prototype does not always take a lot of time. Designers can use various tools for this purpose. One useful technique is called rapid prototyping; This is a common way in a short time to make layouts of different states of an application or site and test them on users.

№5 "The product is launched, the more I have nothing to do here"

Some designers believe that after the product has entered the market, nothing more is required of them. In fact, the process of working on the design of the product does not end with the release. In many cases, the amount of work after starting a project may even exceed what was done before. The designer will need to revise the interface based on user behavior data — he should focus on how users interact with the product, extract relevant information from this, and make adjustments to the design to improve the experience.

This quote also reveals another serious problem - the lack of a sense of belonging. A designer who says so does not feel adequately responsible for his decisions.

№6 "I am a creative person, not a techie"

Designers often perceive development and marketing as necessary components of work on a product, but at the same time they spare time to get to know these areas more closely. In other words, they prefer to lock in within their industry.

In fact, overcoming these barriers is a great way to get better at UX design. Talk with developers, build connections with marketers, try to look at the project from their point of view. This will allow you to appreciate the contribution of many people with whom you work on projects. Both a deeper understanding of the processes and empathy towards other team members will help create better products.

№7 "We need to do as investors want, and nothing else"

The position “who pays the order of music” is a common problem in the field of design. Of course, if you design a product exactly as investors want it to be, it becomes much easier to move. But in this approach lies a serious danger. The fact that a person occupies a high position in the corporate hierarchy does not mean that he is always right. A UX designer is a person who takes responsibility, and it is he who will be guilty if the design doesn't work. That is why the designer must masterly be able to negotiate. He must make sure that in the process of work everyone has the right to vote, and not just those with money.

№8 "Either we do, in my opinion, or I leave the project"

Imagine this situation: you conducted a study of user behavior and found a lot of problems with usability. You require the team to work them all. You are sure you are right and refuse to compromise. You say that if all the errors are not corrected, the UX will be useless.

Undoubtedly, the willingness to defend the right UX solutions is a valuable skill for the designer. But he must also be able to analyze the current context and adapt to it. There are no teams with an unlimited resource volume and therefore it is almost impossible to satisfy your demand and eliminate all the flaws in UX. For this reason, teamwork requires compromise. To prevent the project from getting stuck in the dead center, you need to put your recommendations in order of priority and make sure that the team takes the most critical ones (that is, those that strongly influence UX), while less important ones can be postponed for a while ( project backlog).

№9 "If so do Google and Amazon, it means we need to"

When, when discussing design decisions, loud names begin to sound, this makes the arguments more convincing. But not the fact that the practices of other companies or projects will be suitable for your case. There is nothing wrong with borrowing patterns from big players when creating designs - but only if they form a more positive experience for your product. And you can see this, again, by conducting tests with real users.

№10 "We carry out the process of working on the design strictly according to plan, without deviations"

The way the design work is unfolding is a critical aspect. Without a clearly outlined plan of action, the designer will have to move almost gropingly. On the other hand, when the whole process is clearly described, it is possible to provide users with a wonderful experience.

Many people think that there is one universal list of steps for the process of creating a design that guarantees excellent results and can be applied to any process. Unfortunately, there is no such solution for all occasions. You can prescribe the steps for each project individually, but in general, the flow of work will always be determined by specific requirements - because each project is unique and has its own needs.

In addition, the plan is not closed to change: designers must be prepared to adjust it based on information received. For example, if you tested usability or A / B testing and found out that some element of product design needs to be changed, be ready to go back to the prototyping stage and think about another solution.