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My Design Philosophy Statement
The meaning of designing technologies has emerged from creating a practical machine to humanizing these machines to creating user experiences. In this essay, I am portraying my current design philosophy, as a reflection upon my design practice over the past four years. Through this essay, I impersonate myself as a design critique and share my speculations about designing, so that I can build a strong rationale about where I want to see myself in the future as a UX Designer.
#1 Designing is understanding user perceptions.
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The meaning of designing technologies has emerged from creating a practical machine to humanizing these machines to create user experiences. In my previous office, my boss always reminded me to connect technology with the human aspects of design. Designers are observers, who examine if people interact with technologies as they perceive. The best way to understand the user needs (the needs that can’t be expressed or explained) is by observing their interaction with design/tool/software in their natural environment [1].
What if our designs have a contradictory influence on the user? The initial concept of social media application was to connect people but on the contrary side, people are so indulged in it that they miss celebrating with their own families. As a designer, I challenge and ask myself, “How can I be sure that my design doesn’t have a negative impact on any user?”
#2 Create a design for users, not stakeholders.
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By now, everyone has a concise idea about what a “persona” is referred to as. As simple as it sounds, user personas are equally powerful. It partially answers the question that I raised earlier as well. Designers at MSN had a major difficulty in creating the MSN Explorer Persona [2]. I have also failed a number of times with my design solutions due to the lack of a good persona.
Time and budget plays a significant role in the process of researching. Due to these constraints, designers often tend to misunderstand their target users since they never get to research about them. Even if we create a design that is best for the actual user, there is always an ideal user who opposes it, the stakeholder!
#3 How can we judge a design as good?
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As a designer, satisfying the stakeholder has become more challenging to me than learning a new method. How appealing is your design? Is it appealing enough to satisfy the client? Is it appealing enough to create a good user experience? In the reading “Interacting with Paper” by Bill Buxton, the author talks about how user’s feedback can be manipulated based on the aesthetic presentation of the prototype [3].
A good designer is someone who acknowledges the existing solutions and considers future implications while creating a new solution. I believe that designers are able to research well so that they can build a strong rationale for their design decisions. Good designers are responsible for the outcomes and are able to justify them whenever and wherever required.
#4 Design criticism is an art of improvement.
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I always thought design critique was a negative impression until I realized that it reflected the sign of professionalism. “Critique is a team effort, not a one-person show. Critique truly becomes valuable when we come together with the intent of understanding, identifying opportunity, exploring, and building up those we work with”[4].
Vadim Grin says, “After being a designer for a couple of years I realized that this flow of criticism would never end. I saw myself getting better and better at what I’d been doing” [5]. The manner of learning how to accept criticism takes time. While constructive critique can be very difficult to accept especially when designers have put a lot of effort into their design, it is equally important for them to positively accept the critiques. Not only does it help to improve the design, but it also helps to avoid similar errors in the future designs.
#5 Design is self-explanatory.
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“Good design is actually a lot harder to notice than poor design, in part because good designs fit our needs so well that the design is invisible” [6]. Good design is like a joke. If you need to explain it, there is an error. A good designer creates beautiful interfaces for two main purposes: make the look and feel aesthetically pleasing and making it easier for users to use a product. E.g, the icons, and buttons used on websites and apps, shortcut keys on different tools, etc.[7]
#6 Users don’t read the content, they scan it.
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In my Interaction Design Practices course, I noticed something that I had known for a long time but never realized it. The Cognitive Aspects of design. “In the field of user experience, we use the following definition: the cognitive load imposed by a user interface is the amount of mental resources that is required to operate the system”[8]. As a designer, my focus always remains to reduce the memory load of users through a design that can be memorized easily.
#7 Design is a speculative and reflexive profession.
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As I mentioned earlier, as a designer, I always consider future implications. I believe that design is a speculative process, that I can think outside the box. “If our belief systems and ideas don’t change, then reality won’t change either”[9]. The legendary artist, Leonardo Da Vinci sketched the structure of the plane much before the first plane was invented. Who would have known that a simple sketch could turn into a reality one day?
#8 Virtues that I nurture as a UX Designer
As a UX Designer, I aspire to create changes. I seek to receive more and more critiques from multiple users, in order to analyze why the same solution works for one group of stakeholders and users but does not work for the other. I strive to better understand the users to incorporate the human aspects of design to technology. I aim to create and ideate new solutions.
References:
Moggridge, Bill. “People(Links to an external site.)” from Designing Interaction. 2007. pp. 664–681
John Pruitt and Jonathan Grudin. 2003. “Personas: practice and theory.
Bill Buxton, (2007). “Interacting with Paper” in Sketching User Experiences. pp. 371–392”
Tanner Christensen, (2016). https://medium.com/facebook-design/critique-is-an-important-part-of-any-design-process-whether-you-work-as-part-of-a-team-or-solo-ef3dcb299ce3#.8bte1qnox
Vadim Grin, (2018). https://uxplanet.org/the-art-of-constructive-criticism-e8addcfd9e18
Norman. (2013). The Design of Everyday Things.
Wiley & Sons. (2007). Interaction Design beyond human-computer interaction. The Atrium, Southern Gate, Chichester, West Sussex PO19 8SQ, England.
https://www.nngroup.com/articles/minimize-cognitive-load/
Anthony Dunne & Fiona Raby, 2013. Speculative Everything: Design, Fiction, and Social Dreaming. Chapter 9