Samuel Ericson
Interaction designer
Filed underux
The Virtues of a UX Professional
Too little The Golden Mean Too much Muddled. Will create as many problems as you solve. Clarity Is it possible to be too clear? Remote, distant. Unlikely to truly understand either your clients or their customers. Empathy A bleeding heart. Will try and please everybody. Pushover. Will acquiesce to client demands under slightest pressure Integrity: you believe in what you do and will stand up for it Prima donna. The Michelangelo of UX design. No client, customer or colleague must interfere with your singular vision. A dullard. Perhaps you should consider project management. Creativity: as well as problem-solving skills, you should have a certain amount of design flair Unrealistic, an artist Unrealistic, an artist Practical Lacking nuance. Project management material. Charlatan Passion: you need to care about UX design because you’ll be defending it every day Zealot Sloppy. Will forget important details and somebody will pay for it later. Detailed Not possible. You must be a detail freak. Ponderous, a ditherer. Your project manager will hate you. Decisive: you consider all the angles and then you make a decision Rash. You’ll make a decision but you won’t really know why. Clients will hate you Flexibility: the ability to give and take, to keep clients happy without compromising on quality Clients will love you (but won’t respect you) Clients and colleagues will feel the heat of your frustration. Nobody will enjoy working with you. Patience: not everybody shares your brilliance. You must be kind to slow learners and clients who “just don’t get it”. Not possible. Patience, after all, is a virtue.
via iqcontent.com
“User experience is everything”
What the hell is UX?
via flickr.com
My Euro IA 2009
As you may have noticed I spent a few days last week at Euro IA in Copenhagen. It it called a conference, but I'd rather call it something of a festival - that's more what it felt like it was. Everyone was really laid back and open about everything, almost all speakers were great and it was more or less impossible to choose the "right" room every time.
The speakers who made the biggest impressions on me were keynote speakers Scott Thomas and Marianne Sweeny who talked about the Barack Obama campaign (Scott) and Search (Marianne). Sylvie Daumal also made a great presentation about surviving in the real world as an Information Architect.
Next year the "conference" is going to be in Paris. I'm really planning on being there already. See you then?
Use these links for more about the "conference":
- The Euro IA group on Slideshare
- A great summary of all presentations at johnnyholland.org: day 1 and day 2
People don't know what they want, so don't ask them!
Look at this great TED talk by Malcolm Gladwell about what users think they want compared to what they really want. The thing is, people don't know, not even when it comes to spaghetti sauce. So why bother asking them? The right way to find out what they want is obviously observing them, not asking.
Nine Essential Characteristics of Good UX Designers
Check out this website I found at konigi.com
I'd say you come a long way with #9.
