How does a writing background help with user experience?

I was recently asked to participate in a panel discussion about writing and user experience. The IxDA Chicago event, "From Crafting Headlines to Designing Experiences: A Discussion of the Writer's Role in UX," is Thursday, September 22, 2016. If you're in the Windy City and available, I hope you can attend.

When Richard Verne, the panel moderator and a former web development client of mine (from the early Jurassic period of website building), asked if I was interested, I was a little apprehensive. While I still consider myself a writer, it's no longer my primary focus. I used to write a lot -- for work, writing for Edmunds.com and BuzzFlash.com; for entertainment, writing sketch-comedy material for my last theater company; and personally, writing blog posts about and for my kids. But, I'm not writing much more than for personal reasons these days. The last decade or so, I've been steeped in building digital products and, having recently completed the work for my UX Master Certification, allowing user experience to guide my hands.

As I've been considering what I thought I could add to the conversation, the following seems to keep popping up: story telling. One talent a good writer can bring to the UX table is the ability to weave a narrative around a user experience. A writer can tell that story in a way that everyone -- business managers, developers, the CEO -- can understand, so it's clear what needs to happen to create a great experience for your customers.

Writing, and, in particular, writing news, trains you to work in the inverted pyramid format, writing a concise lede with all the Ws, and putting the important information in the first paragraphs to avoid having something vitally important to the story snipped by a restrictive word count. More importantly, the writing process is often about eliminating the unnecessary plots in a story and finding a clean, clear through-line that helps pull your reader through the story.

By focusing on the prioritization of the features of your UX, your MVP can contain only the important, value-adding features of your product. The rest can go in your backlog while you make sure the product is delivering the value you imagined. By rewriting your story until a clear through-line appears, you won't leave out a part of the experience, no matter how small, important to the completion of the user's journey through your product.

I'm sure my IxDA Chicago panel mates will find many other ways a writing background can benefit a UX career. But, for a user experience professional, knowing how to focus your story on the important features and how to tell a great story, from the first interaction through a conversion, can go a long way to creating a great user experience. And that benefits everyone, especially your end user.