Getting the UX Design Implemented Right!

The User Experience Design (UXD) is a process for ensuring that the customer gets great satisfaction and pleasure while using a product/solution/service. That means that the designers need to think every touchpoint in terms of creating value for the customers and stakeholders. This cannot happen by just putting a wireframe or prototypes. Ensuring a great experience is an organizational responsibility, and everyone involved needs to collectively and passionately ensure this.

At the highest level, any good UX design and implementation shall involve the following:

1. Right Strategy, by considering the various aspects like Customers, Brands, Vision, Goals, and Overall Business.
2. A Solid Research, robust Analysis, and a careful Synthesis guided by the right strategy to understand user persona and to define the Use Cases, Stories, Interactions, and Workflow.
3. A Design achieved through iterative approach for the agile development to ensure that wireframes, mockups, prototypes, and workflows are in place for people to use, feel, compare, give feedback, incorporate feedback and select the best possible options.
4. Effective Communication among stakeholders to ensure that the essence of the design is completely understood by the Developers, QAs, Product Owner and other stakeholders  
5. Timely Usability Testing and Review of the Developed Product to ensure compliance with the design during every Sprint
6. Consciously Seek and Incorporate feedback from the real users

On the outset, the points listed above sounds obvious. However, the success of UX initiatives depends on getting all six points working together. The absence of any of the above steps will result in either substandard solution, or rework during the implementation. It can even lead to believing that the design is not feasible to implement.

And to be able to meet such needs a UX designer must

1. build a culture of UX within the organization, including the development team
2. have excellent empathy to be able to understand what different types of users and key stakeholders of the application are looking for
3. have a tremendous problem-solving skill
4. be able to think in terms of satisfaction and value creation for the actual end-users, which may eventually lead to better retention and conversion
5. keep an eye on the environment/frameworks that will get used and any limitation around them so that feasibility and viability don't get challenged

That does make it look as if the designers must be a superman. However, when everyone involved is looking for a quick outcome, and it often takes time to realize the benefit of UX, someone has to bring sanity. Who is better placed than the designer himself?

Management's belief in the benefits of UX

While the UX designer can come up with the best design and solutions through their commitment and passion, the true implementation depends on whether the key stakeholders value UX in the true sense or not.

UX team should be allowed to focus and drive experience, and they should NOT be put under the development/technology leads. While they still need to respect the timelines, scope, and cost guidelines, they should be given the required freedom to ensure the best possibilities within given constraints, and their voice must be valued and heard so that they can influence the solution in the right way.

Building a UX team that is more close to the business compared to working under the technology team as just another role will be a good idea for UX-driven solutions! That way, the UX Design will be more user research oriented!

The convergence of two extremes for the common goal

There is no doubt that engineering skills are eventually needed to get the design coded and implemented in the best possible way. However, the level of collaboration between designers and developers heavily depends on the ecosystem created by the product owner and key stakeholders. While the engineers are usually known for their pride and occasionally ego too to produce technically excellent solutions, many times, the designers also end up getting stuck with their pride and ego, which makes the collaboration very tricky. That is why I strongly feel that significant attention must be given to this softer aspect. We must ensure the convergence of two key stakeholders to ensure that the common goal is achieved in the best possible way.

If you are creating a culture of here is the UX Design and get the work done - let's call it Hand Over approach - then at best, it may get professionally delivered. Neither designer and nor the developer's love will be ingrained in the final product.

It is crucial to create an environment where the most logical engineers and the fantastic empathizer of the users can put their love into the application, which touches the feeling of the users. They should have common goals that the user should adopt their solution passionately. They must work together so that the end-users should become the ambassador of their solution!

Get rid of inelasticity in the UX Design Team

Well, this article may look like as if UX designers are sages. However, the fact is that even though they may be trained in Design Thinking, and they can apply the UX principles to come up with an excellent design solution, they become inflexible during the collaboration. The empathy shall not be just exhibited for the users, but it shall be applied to other stakeholders as well. You must listen to challenges during the implementation and make the minimal needed adjustments to ensure the best possible implementation of the design.

Don't become a "Usability Police" and don't try enforce the law, somehow!

Instead of looking for perfection and being inflexible, look for alternate options by reevaluating the new constraints which may get uncovered during the execution. Most likely, you will come up with a solution, which will have a higher overall value than what you had before!