The following experts have contributed answers to Ask UXmatters this month:
- Leo Frishberg—Principal User Experience Architect at Tektronix Inc.
- Pabini Gabriel-Petit—Publisher and Editor in Chief, UXmatters; Principal User Experience Architect at Spirit Softworks; Founding Director, Interaction Design Association (IxDA); UXmatters columnist
- Whitney Quesenbery—Principal Consultant at Whitney Interactive Design; Past-President, Usability Professionals’ Association (UPA); Fellow, Society for Technical Communications (STC); UXmatters columnist
- Robert Reimann—Lead Interaction Designer at Sonos, Inc; Past-President, Interaction Design Association (IxDA)
- Daniel Szuc—Principal and Cofounder of Apogee Usability Asia Ltd.
Q: What skills should one look for in a UX Designer and why?—from a UXmatters reader
Defining UX Design
“Let’s start by defining UX design,” suggests Pabini. “In our UXmatters Glossary, I defined user experience design as follows:
‘A holistic, multidisciplinary approach to the design of user interfaces for digital products, defining their form, behavior, and content. User experience design integrates interaction design, industrial design, information architecture, information design, visual interface design, user assistance design, and user-centered design, ensuring coherence and consistency across all of these design dimensions.’
“Depending on the type of product or service you’re designing, UX design encompasses most or even all of these different aspects of design,” continues Pabini. “For example, the design of application software requires all of these skills except industrial design. For specific types of products or services, the emphasis on particular aspects of UX design varies. For example, for most applications, interaction design is the primary skill a UX designer must have; while, for information-rich Web sites, information architecture is key. In some companies, a UX team accomplishes the work of UX design; in others, UX Designers do. These UX Designers typically play an integral role on a product team.
“In my opinion, to earn the title UX Designer, one must have strong skills in most, if not all, aspects of UX design. UX Designers aren’t specialists; nor are they generalists. (For more about this, see my UXmatters article ‘Specialists Versus Generalists: A False Dichotomy?’) UX Designers should have deep expertise in several aspects of UX design and fairly comprehensive knowledge of the other aspects of UX design that are relevant to the domain in which they’re working. Yes, I know this is a high bar for UX Designers to attain, but to autonomously devise great, holistic UX design solutions, one must have all of the requisite skills.”
Looking Beyond UX Design
“I’m not sure how to take this question,” muses Whitney, “so perhaps I’d better expand the question to show what I’m really answering: What skills should one look for in a designer—of any kind—to show that their focus is on user experience, not just having expertise in their discipline or skills? Because the question I’m not answering is: Does a UX Designer have to be a graphic artist?—or any similar reductions. There are some obvious answers that show up in discussions of this topic, covering the soft skills of listening, collaboration, and teamwork. But I thought I’d take a different approach and look at how some of the disciplines within user experience define themselves.”
To help us understand what plain language experts bring to a UX team, Whitney recommends our taking a look at Ginny Redish’s “What Is a Plain Language Expert?”
on the Web site of the Center for Plain Language. Ginny’s article outlines the main points you should consider when assessing whether someone is a plain language expert:
“How to Recognize a Plain Language Expert”
- “Ask to see a portfolio.”
- “Ask the plain language expert to explain some of the examples.”
- “Expect the plain language expert to focus on the users of the document.”
- “Expect the plain Language expert to talk about the context in which the document is used.”
- ”Plain Language experts focus on more than sentences and words.”
- “Plain Language experts help users skim, skip, and find quick pathways through a document.”
- “Plain Language experts write clearly.”
- “Plain Language experts are also information designers.”
- “Ask the plain language expert how they know they have succeeded in creating a useful and usable document.”
- ”Review the expert’s work yourself.”
From “What Is a Plain Language Expert?” by Ginny Redish
“Ginny Redish wrote this document, so it is no surprise that it sounds a lot like a description of a UX expert,” remarks Whitney. “In fact, the only points that are specific to the writing part of a plain language expert’s work are #5 and #7. I especially like #6 and #8, which remind us that—especially in any digital medium—none of the design skills stand alone. All depend on each other. If you can’t find it, you can’t read it, if you can’t read it, you can’t use it.”
Whitney also suggests that we peruse “What Is Graphic Design?” and “What Designers Need to Know,” from the AIGA career guide, Graphic Design: A Career Guide and Education Directory. Here is their definition of graphic design:
“Graphic design is a creative process that combines art and technology to communicate ideas. The designer works with a variety of communication tools in order to convey a message from a client to a particular audience. The main tools are image and typography.”—From “What Is Graphic Design?”
“Only one of these three sentences is specific to graphic design—but the general focus of these guides is more on the designers themselves than on UX,” notes Whitney. “Okay. I’ll stop. Point probably made: similar goals met through different UX discipline skills.”
“I totally agree with Whitney’s point about the interdependency of design skills,” responds Pabini. “But graphic designers may or may not work on UX teams, creating user interfaces. In fact, the great majority don’t. I prefer to call those who have graphic design skills and do work on UX teams visual interface designers, because there are considerable differences in the skillsets of graphic designers who work in marketing communications versus those of visual interface designers who must be able to design effective user interfaces. Plus, working on a product team presents significantly different challenges. In addition to typical graphic design skills, visual interface designers should
- know how to work collaboratively on a multidisciplinary product team
- understand the rendering capabilities of the platform for which they’re designing
- know how to design for accessibility, accommodating the needs of people with color-deficient vision and low vision
- provide iconic representations of objects and actions, as well as other graphic elements
- be able to visually express hierarchy, grouping, and workflows for applications
- have a mastery of information design and be able to clearly express complex information
- design for consistency with standards rather than creative expression
- and I know Whitney would agree with this… They must take a user-centered approach to visual design, knowing who a product’s users are and understanding their wants and needs, so they can create an optimal design for them.
“Visual interface designers can play an important role on a UX team and make significant contributions to a team UX design effort, but they are not UX Designers. Being a UX Designer comprehends all of this and so much more.
“For more information about the competencies of specialists in various aspects of UX design, I suggest you read ‘The Five Competencies of User Experience Design’ by Steve Psomas. (It’s #2 in our ‘UXmatters All-Time Top 25.’)”
