Between the lines of UX design
500 words to unblur the perception of UX design
Perhaps the stigma of UX design comes from its own advocates being unable to agree on what exactly it is they do. Some brand themselves as UX designers but only strictly apply their skill sets on digital products, others take their skill sets to branding or product design but the biggest shame is that many feel that they are not capable on contributing to the other.
This pigeon-holing of ux design has come to the point at which UX designers are no longer able to explain clearly what it is they do to those who are not familiar with the field (see the feed). What is the use of describing a profession or approach as “delivering meaning to the user” when the value of the word ‘meaning’ in UX design is blurred?
The principles of good user experience design have a great affinity to the principles of better design.
UX seems to have been separated as a stand-alone discipline. It’s been given a ‘digital only’ tag when in-fact the principles and values used in UX are, and perhaps the same, as the values in other design and problem-solving disciplines. These principles of good user experience design have such a great affinity to the principles of better design that I’m unsure how this has been lost in translation at all.
Maybe this is a knock on effect of agencies no longer being generalists but specialists in certain areas? Demanding more attention to specific disciplines rather than design as a whole. However beneficial this may have been to the industry it has had a knock-on effect to design education as now we are seeing a generation of students with no outside view of ‘the bigger picture’ only the extreme sides of design and UX design.
However you put it, it’s hard to disagree that UX design is an underlying approach to any design or problem-solving approach. The experience of your users, in such a crowded market, has never been so important that it’s hard to ignore. The golden age of UX design is over, now it’s time for us to start considering the broader reach of its impact and evolve our approaches accordingly.
UX design is a broad and powerful approach to find why exactly problems exist to humans in the first place, it’s an approach to aid solutions to not only be innovative but be well placed to be accepted and used by people, to aid them or make them feel as if they have grown.
The value of this post lies in the communication of UX design as being applicable to design as a whole and not a standalone discipline. As an Industrial designer, I can see the benefits in almost every design discipline, especially my own as I strive to learn how to approach and apply it to a range of my work.
Hopefully, this post does some good in unblurring the perception of user experience and encourage anyone to consider the experience of their products touch-points.
Thanks for reading — I’m currently a user experience intern at Bosch Power Tools and an Industrial Design student at Loughborough University. Feel free to get in touch or check out my website.
