The IDSA Needs a better User Experience

Its that time of year again when many industrial designers start thinking of ways to afford the International Design Conference, and start making plans. Myself included. Being that this year's conference is being held in Austin, TX, I am very interested in attending. Austin is one of my most favorite cities. The vibe there is like no other, and is a wonderful creative community.

My membership to the organization has lapsed. A previous employer paid for my membership, but working for myself makes me think critically about expenditures. However, it could be a great opportunity for me to reconnect with so many professional friends and perhaps drum up some business. At the very least I would have a good time in Austin, and maybe become inspired at the conference.

Let me reinforce something: I have always appreciated the IDSA's mission, and making itself responsible for being a source of excellence, growth and advocacy for our profession. There is great value here, though at times we may not totally see it. I believed in the mission so much that I have been an officer for two separate chapters, advocating for the organization itself, and attempting to create the value that our members wanted. The IDSA has always meant a lot to me.

Okay! Time to investigate membership prices, and sign up! On to IDSA.org to start the process.

This is where one would insert the needle scratch audio meme. I ended up having so many challenges with the process that I have decided to give up. I wrote the letter below to an individual at the IDSA, who will remain anonymous.

It is important that this message gets out there and is discussed amongst our peers. Because if the IDSA is to continue to be the central repository of our profession, it has a great deal of relatively simple things it needs to achieve first. How can the Industrial Designers Society of America continue to advocate for Industrial Design, if it cannot even get its digital front doors working correctly? Its 2024. There are no excuses left.

Herein is the letter, and description of my experience attempting to renew my membership:

As I was logging in, the site was asking me to establish a new password.? Like many people I have a password manager, and it suggested one that met the criteria of the IDSA site.? It filled?both the primary and secondary location with this password, but the "Next" button was still grayed out.? And I couldn't click on it.

Since there are no other options available on the interface, I went through the process again, also to no avail.? And again.? You might recall it being said that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result.? But, as with most poorly designed interfaces, this was seemingly my only recourse.

I had the wisdom to realize that perhaps if my cursor actually entered the second box, it would somehow fix the problem.? Fortunately I was right.? I do realize that a safety feature of the site is to prevent bot generated profiles?from forming, so insuring that the mouse cursor actually entered the entry box is somewhat of a "smart" idea, but it completely ignores commonly used password managers out there. So, the site is expecting me to have some level of knowledge that is out of the ordinary for a common user.? Knock #1

After passing this tollgate, I was immediately presented with my profile.? Not sure why but there it was.? So I took the opportunity to update my phone number- nothing fancy. As per the interface, I clicked on the Edit button, and was given the common opportunity to add information into text boxes.? I entered all 10 numerals of my phone number.? Then I clicked the bright red button marked "save."? An equally bright red dialog box popped up at the top with the following message: "Unknown error" with the classic slash through the circle to insure that I knew I was in the wrong. Below the first line read a question: "Use one of these records?"? and no ability to respond to this question, other than to click on the "x" to close the dialog box.? Uh, yeah, use the "record" that I just entered. This has to be a formatting issue.? So now I have to guess as to which of the worlds phone number formats the IDSA has chosen to adopt, because clearly the 10 digit US one did not serve.? So I typed it again, this time with all dashes. Hit save. Same message as before.? Okay, Parenthesis around the area code, a proper space before the leading exchange number and a dash leading into the last four digits.? Nothing.? Add a 1 in front of the entry.? Not it.? Use the international formatting of?+1 then the digits. Nope.? Now how about as before but with dashes?? Wrong.? I am getting tired of this.? Knock #2

So I moved away from that page and actually went to sign up for a membership.? Surely this section would not give me any difficulties.? IDSA.org needs membership to help fund the organization.? Having a commerce site without the ability to complete a transaction would be foolish, yes?

The Membership page starts as many do, asking for some basic details, like address, phone number, email address.? Which is weird because IDSA already has all of this information.? Why do I need to enter it again?? Ok, whatever.? Filled it out.? Clicked on some dropdowns about type of designer, etc.? Then, as politely stated at the bottom of the form "Please click Next to proceed," I did indeed click that Next button.?

This time an orange message banner appeared across the top, asking a similar question to my last entry experience.? "Use one of these records?"? Not exactly an error, but no ability to respond to the prompt.? I can either close the prompt with the "x" in the far right corner, or I can click the "Next" button again.? Or both, sequentially.? Either way, no results.? Knock #3

Andy really we cannot forget about Knock number Pre 1, which is, when I originally tried logging into the IDSA site yesterday, to no avail (despite indeed having a recent password stored in my password manager), I clicked on the all too familiar "Reset password" link, and waited for an automated email from IDSA.org allowing me to begin the password reset process.? But it never came.? I waited a few minutes longer.? Nothing.? Checked all of my folders, spam folders, used the search function in gmail to insure that my old eyes may have just missed it, but nothing.?So I did it again. 10 minutes later, nothing. I tried one more time, and allowed an hour to lapse. Nada. (Remember that part about doing the same thing over and over again?) Which is what lead me to send an email directly to the idsa.org link for help. Which, did indeed help me login, but as mentioned above, only progressed me so far.??

I do still have a soft spot for an organization that is supposed to be the central pillar of representation of Industrial Design (a crap name but that's another diatribe).? IDSA's mission has always been and continues to be the housing of what excellence in design is supposed to be. ID is really Physical User Experience Design, and many of our profession now participate in the massive UX/UI industry, because the tenants of good design are the same regardless of what they are applied to.

So my point, at last, is this:? Why should anyone become a member of a design organization if it cannot even create a working website?? Our profession does need a strong central organization, but this experience has me doubting anything the organization does.

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Maybe I'm just an old man complaining. Maybe I had a bad web experience that was totally random. And no one person's fault, really. Yes the letter is kind of funny, and makes some solid points about violations of basic usability heuristics. But it is a very visible reminder that something more is not working here. Its not really about the website.

What this experience has done is remind me of many of the reasons that I did let my membership lapse. While we can easily repeat all of the old chestnuts, there is one unsettling behavior that the IDSA has never resolved. Its inability to create a good user experience for its members.

This is my core point. IDSA is the organization that has been trumpeting User Experience from high atop the figurative Mountain for decades. But it cannot seem to design itself. It has been warned of this tendency repeatedly and nothing has changed.

If an organization is going to charge literally thousands of dollars for an event, or hundreds of dollars for membership, there MUST be a return on investment. And its not putting a few letters after your name on LinkedIn.

Spread the word. Discuss. Call me Andy Rooney reincarnate. But THINK about this experience. How do we move forward as a profession, from here?

-Tony Shoemaker