Hungry for More UX with IxDF

How Interaction Design Foundation’s Education Confirmed My True Calling. An in-depth review.

I have been circling the Interaction Design Foundation membership like a cat rubbing your legs marking his “territory”, but a busy job did not leave me time nor capacity for studies. Then an unexpected turn happened. “When one door closes, another window opens”: As a senior UX professional on a career break, I am graduating from the entire Visual Designer and Product Manager learning tracks with top performer and social impact member recognitions. You can do it too - let me show you how.

I’m Sonia Kaukonen, a polyglot and user experience advocate with almost two decades of tenure as a UX specialist, iconographer, and senior designer in a large US tech corporation, first in Finland, then in Spain. Until last year, I facilitated cross-functional initiatives contributing to a design system, the so-called Tiger Teams. I am an Alpha Tigress with a fierce passion for bringing UX collaborators together between the most distant spots of the world. I have a sweet tooth for visual design.

This is my emotionally loaded story about the Interaction Design Foundation and its countless opportunities for newbies and seasoned experts to grow professionally and earn UX-industry-recognized certificates.

Landing on Four Paws

Last year after almost two decades with my former North American employer, our ways unexpectedly parted.

I have never needed a professional portfolio before. Now what??

A cat always lands on four paws, you know? So does the Alpha Tigress.?

I turned a new year’s 2024 resolution “A year just for myself”? into redefining how my passion for user experience will be part of my professional future. It certainly will.

Put My Paw on It

I could not wait to start with Design for a Better World and Design for the 21st Century courses by Mr. Don Norman whom I met in person at the Human-Computer Interaction conference in Helsinki in 2014.

As expected, his courses enabled my own portfolio projects and were packed with practical knowledge for sustainable design which I considered as a potential future focus. Scoring as a top performer made me hungry for more.

Curiosity Didn’t Kill the Cat

No designer can know it all. We need to stay on top of a constantly evolving discipline feeling the power of community. Even a seasoned expert can brush up, learn, reflect, and discover more.

The IxDF provides a useful feature to filter for a learning track of interest. I have chosen the entire Visual Designer track spiced up with some supplementary business strategy topics in Product Management aligned with my seniority in this field. Recapping (almost fast-forward) the basics, foundations, and my core expertise in visual design gave me a boost of self-confidence in how deeply ingrained this discipline is in my brain. In less than half a year, I completed twenty courses worth over 400 learning hours.

For UXers in a similar situation, I would recommend these top 3 most practical courses:

1. Design Thinking: The Ultimate Guide - A comprehensive brush-up with an opportunity to reflect on an extensive portfolio project demonstrating a UX generalist literacy.
2. Artificial Intelligence for Designers - AI might not take over our jobs, but those who understand AI concepts and how to design with and for AI might take over yours. The lecturer, Ioana Teleanu ignites curiosity for more.
3. Build A Standout UI/UX Portfolio: Land Your Dream Job is helpful if you draft the first portfolio or want to optimize yours.

Additionally, the following courses provide sound tools for backing up design decisions with neuroscience:

• Perception and Memory in HCI and UX
• Design for Thought and Emotion
• The Ultimate Guide To Visual Perception and Design

Imagine: my curiosity for cognitive science brought me full scores!

My special mention goes to Agile Methods for UX Design. It helped me critically review what I was presented with as the truth of Agile in just one single corporation. Next time I want to call out deficits with smartness and wit like the lecturer, Laura Klein .

And next? I will wrap up the year of this educational but (badly needed) recreational career break with advanced topics in Mobile UI Design, Virtual Reality, and Augmented Reality (all offering guided portfolio projects to beef up yours), and an extensive Accessibility guide.

You don’t need 9 lives

Don’t get me wrong. You don’t need to give up your job to rush with the IxDF courses as I did, but always prioritize your professional growth and keep your resume and portfolio up to date along with your career. The Interaction Design Foundation membership is a way to do it.?

To sum up, here is what I appreciate most about being an IxDF-er:

• Top-notch materials and speakers, such as Alan Dix, Frank Spillers Marc Hassenzahl, Vitaly Friedman, and of course Don Norman, to name a few.
• Downloadable checklists for various methods.
• Learning units split up into digestible, short, and paced lessons.?
• Instructor-graded tasks, portfolio projects, and community support. If you are bound by a NDA or want more variety in your portfolio, get inspired by the IxDF’s case studies.
• Empowerment through direct interaction with the founders of the IxDF or on social media. Whenever I shared my achievements on LinkedIn, the IxDF left motivating comments bringing more visibility to my LinkedIn profile.

What do I wish for at the IxDF?

• More interactivity, for example, community submissions for course visuals according to the newest standards.
• Better forum interaction.
• Educative feedback on task submissions.
• Practical courses on soft skills for designers, such as negotiating and persuading in non-managerial positions and on industry standard tools. The master classes about Figma tokens and error messages were a good start.

And do poke us to become contributors!? For example, the Visual Design course touched on iconography superficially. I would love to become a contributor if a stand-alone iconography course was on the radar.?

I owe my sincere thanks to the Interaction Design Foundation, and its founders, Rikke Friis Dam and Mads Soegaard , for my professional growth while busy reclaiming myself after a setback.

In a Cat's Eye All Things Belong to Cats

So, what’s next? The UX discipline is broad enough to find a very own Alpha Tigress niche. “If you don't know where you are going, any road can take you there.”, said the Cheshire Cat in “Alice in Wonderland”. No matter what situation we find ourselves in, we can still accomplish our goals if we explore and stay determined enough - with the IxDF!?

To wrap up, walking through the entire learning track from the basics was not a sign of self-doubt but a recovery process from a corporate tunnel vision while exploring new, greener pastures and networking in the global and local (Spanish) community.

In the meantime, I keep pouring my heart into volunteering in feral cats care here in Spain. After all, aren’t cats the best at teaching us how to satisfy a demanding customer?