How to make it into UX when you know nothing
Top tips and resources for beginners
UX brings value to customers and businesses
UX helps the users get a great experience in accomplishing their tasks at all stages: before, during and after the task. This could affect drastically the reputation of a business and prevents you from wasting money in bad decisions.
Who’s this article for?
Whether you are a designer or a developer who wants to take UX in consideration or just a curious fellow who landed here for no particular reason, these tips will help you improve the way you do things or at least open your eyes on aspects of UX you haven’t noticed before.
For those who don’t know what is UX, you might want to start here What the hell is UX and why you should care.
Top tips
1. Read
Reading is one of the best ways to learn more about UX and the value it brings to companies and users. This is a list of books I have read when I first started getting interested in UX. This was very helpful to me, I hope it will be for you.
The must read
The Design of Everyday Things by Don Norman.
This book has changed my way of perceiving things! I read it for the first time 4 years ago, I haven’t been able to stop thinking about UX since. You’ll learn about UX principles and jargon. Next time you’ll hear the Norman door, you will know what is it about.
Don’t Make Me Think: A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability by Steve Krug.
This book is short and meaningful. You’ll learn about keeping things simple and easy for the users to understand.
“Get rid of half the words on each page, then get rid of half of what’s left.” ― Steve Krug, Don’t Make Me Think: A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability
A few extras
Get Started in UX: The Complete Guide to Launching a Career in User Experience Design by by Matthew Magain and Luke Chambers
Simple and Usable Web, Mobile, and Interaction Design by Giles Colborne
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2. Sign up to newsletters and blogs
Medium
Sign up with medium and set your preferences to UX. You’ll receive valuable content every day.
The UX Blog
The UX Blog was founded by Nicholas Tenhue in 2016 as a resource for user experience design, user research, and UX strategy.
UX Booth, their readership consists mostly of beginning-to-intermediate user experience and interaction designers.
UX and Tollerei
Good content, curated by @kaibrueckers. Weekly reading list of noteworthy articles, resources and news about UX.
Usability Geek
Founded by @justinmifsud, content about usability, UX, accessibility, HCD among others.
UX essentials
Curated by @markjenkins, you’ll receive 5 curated UX, UI and Product Design links every Sunday evening.
3. Follow the right people on Twitter
If you don’t use twitter, it’s time for you to get started. Twitter is a huge UX library. Once you follow the right people, you won’t miss any new information about UX. Don’t forget to follow me!
Here’s a list of people to follow on Twitter by Rajit Dasgupta: 20 UX Designers to Follow on Twitter
4. Study
Online courses
There are plenty of courses available online. You can just browse on Udemy, Treehouse or Coursera and you’ll find loads.
I did these two online courses that I recommend:
User Experience (UX): The Ultimate Guide to Usability, 3 weeks course by Davis Travis. It’s 144 short videos (5 min on average). You can listen to them as a podcast. Be prepared to hear Davis Travis, reminding you to do your homework in almost each video.
Learn How to Design Great User Experiences, 41 weeks course by University of California, San Diego. I highly recommend this one. Great structure and rich content.
Bootcamps
Many schools offer short bootcamps nowadays. I did the General Assembly one day UX bootcamp. It’s great if you are just curious and you want to have a global understanding of UX.
Immersive courses
UX design immersive courses are great for those who want to do a career change in a short period of time. I again opted for General Assembly 10 weeks UXDI course. I enjoyed my time at GA. It was a great experience with a valuable program. However be prepare to leave aside your social life during the course.
5. Work on your Network
And finally network! Meet people from the field and ask as many questions as you can. Just search UX in www.meetup.com, you’ll find plenty. For people in London, I recommend:
The UX Crunch, good quality meet-ups and interesting talks. The organizers are friendly and welcoming. I have been to many of their talks and workshops, it’s a great value for what you pay.
MaterialUp, this meet-up was started to create a sense of community among designers in London. They have had speakers from Lifecake, Monzo, Deliveroo and Google.
UXPA provides UX practitioners with opportunities for learning and professional growth.
Mobile UX London is not only about mobile, they also explore UX for virtual reality and other areas.
I facilitate workshops for a bench of startups in London. It has a lot of tips and links to frameworks and articles that might be useful for you. Get in touch if you want a copy.
6. Get your hands dirty
I took this one for granted. Thanks to you and your feedback, someone read this article and told me, Chaymae, you forgot the most important point:
‘Get your hands dirty. Work on projects. Theory is great, but only through experience do we truly learn’ — Doug Collins
That’s a 100% true, without practice, theory stays theory. You can start by pet projects or by helping friends out with their products. Internships or entry level positions could be a good option as long as you get support and mentorship.
7. Don’t let your learned skills go waisted
Use your previous experience to position yourself in the UX ocean of definitions. Try different frameworks, see what works best for you and for your company then adapt them to your way of working. The Spectrum of User Experience is large.
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In your previous professional life, you must have learned a broad range of skills that you can reuse in your UX career. There is a blurred line between all the specialities that fall under UX. It’s hard to define which makes it exciting and challenging.
8. Last but not least
Anything’s possible if you’ve got enough nerve.”J. K. Rowling
Keep the focus going and the motivation high. It’s never too late to switch careers -unless there is an age limitation in the job you are targeting.
Before you go!
If you enjoyed this article, clap it, share it, and talk about it. Your shares and claps motivate me to write more. Your feedback and interaction make all the difference.
I facilitated a workshop for a range of startups in London. It has a list of tips and links to frameworks and articles that might be useful for you. Get in touch if you want a copy of the deck.
If you liked this article you might also be interested in:
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All that you need to try Google Material Design
Lastly, I created www.idir.co.uk to help people reduce stress and unwind using highly concentrated CBD products. I’m working on our case study and I will share the tips of dealing with e-commerce platforms as soon as I finish it. Stay tuned ;)