The UX conversation: Why we can’t keep asking if we should or shouldn’t do it!

The other day i had that conversation at work again. The "UX conversation". Why are we doing it? It is so hard to sell. Clients don't want to pay for it. No they don't. They expect us to create top notch services without them having to ask for it. It's not them. It's us. And also: the question is all backwards. We can't ask if we should be doing it or not. It's an impossible question. We should be asking how. And i need to get it out of my system. So. Here we go.

First of all: UX isn't a discipline or a single persons role or responsibility we can sell like that. It's a way of thinking. A world view. A mindset everyone involved in designing digital have to embrace. Or be doomed.

Often quoted Internet guru Clay Shirky once said “A revolution doesn’t happen when society adopts new tools. It happens when society adopts new behaviors.” Which is so true. And to intentionally do that whenever we design digital services we have to have actual users participating in the design process. All the way. Not just experts. Or testers assuming roles. We need to follow the users around. Walk a day in their shoes. See the full context in which they live and work. We can't forget users are humans.

Surely we can design services without bringing the actual users into the equation. We can just assume things and hope for the best. And we can imitate other previously successful formulas. It’s quicker. It’s cheaper. But it doesn’t always play out the way we hope for. It doesn't always create the intended effects. Maybe we end up not saving time or money. Maybe we don't make people happier. Maybe we just made a fancy new something that no one really needed.

Sometimes we try to apply solutions to problems we haven’t yet figured out. And by doing that we may just end up pushing the problems around or ending up creating new problems.

Maybe we try to fix something that isn’t even broken. Maybe people loved that old system that let them have their coffee break while they were waiting for it to start up. Maybe it in addition to the coffee break functionality had outstanding quick-commands that got the job done in no time. Maybe the problem was with the coffee machine that made them wait for their espresso like forever. Or maybe we ended up creating new behaviour unintentionally by adding that extra workflow that made people less empowered and motivated and added that extra administrative burden to some other people as well causing annoyance in the team. We should have thought of that earlier right? Maybe we should have talked to all of these people? Maybe we should have walked a day in their shoes.

Delivering valuable digital solutions requires good knowledge about both what problems we aim to solve AND about the people we are trying to solve them for. We need to be able talk about what it does and not only what it is. Without that conceptual image of what the solution solves the users wont be able to comprehense the fullt potential of the solution, and it will also take much longer for both designers and the clients to realize the solution didn't solve anything.

I am a #gamification enthusiast. But that doesn't mean I want people to play games all day. It simply means I consider game design principles to be the perfect guidelines for great design, no matter what we are designing for. I believe that life and it’s different situations can be viewed as games that can be upped with design improvements.

Also I consider game design to be the role model when it comes to making good use of cognitive psychology in design. It focuses on action and incentives, the players autonomy, feedback mechanisms and the possible moves in a specific context.

Unintentionally or not, games (or at least good ones) are great at using cognitive psychology to create immersive and flow-like experiences that will keep us going no matter what. There are no excuses for a bad game. Either it engages us or we quit playing. Unlike most work contexts or service designs in our everyday lives, we don't have to play games to get by or to earn our pay. Games use psychological triggers and methods to help us stay engaged. And we play them because we like to. Not because we have to. Core drives such as epic meaning, accomplishment, feedback, narrative/storytelling or scarcity/exclusiveness keep us engaged. When we design we can address people’s inherent drive to collect stuff or to be curious about new and random things. A dynamic design that considers some of the core drives mentioned above can help us create engaging user experiences. We can use our knowledge about these aspects of human psychology to find engaging ways to keep our users engaged and entertained while we get things done and move forward. We can design in certain ways to trigger certain behaviour and to create value for the user. And also game design always involves a lot of iterative user testing. 

I am also a #ux enthusiast. Which means I am all about the experience. And that does not necessarily mean I consider tech to be unimportant. On the contrary. It just means that I think behaviour is more important. Tech is supposed to be that smooth and seamless connection between the digital and the physical world. That layer that supports our actions and behaviour in our everyday lives. And great designs succeed in providing great experiences. Such as my first iPhone. My mission and passion in life ever after has been to amplify people and services in their technology use by designing for real value. We rarely succeed in our mission. But we have to keep trying. Always. No matter what.

The reason people use digital services in the first place is because they believe it will serve them and add value to their lives. If it doesn't - people will eventually stop using it.

I remember the first time I got my hands my first iPhone. It was a shiny, heavy and rounded iPhone 3G. Just feeling it’s smoothness was unlike anything I ever experienced before. The pure joy and the revelation of the design perfection made me love my new phone. The touchscreen. The app way of designing. And that love has remained. Only the subject of it has changed.

I am certain that UX can accomplish that magic feeling of design perfection. By creating insight about the users and their behaviour in a specific context, by making strategies for how to meet that beyond need, by designing and building concepts and by testing and improving the artefacts. And by keeping the users in the process from start and throughout the lifecycle of a product or service. Not making qualified guesses or having experts assuming how users would or wouldn’t react to using services , or how they would or wouldn’t use it, or need your service - but by actually observing and testing with real users. That is what UX really means. Involving real users. And making informed design choices throughout the process.

Nothing creates a better understanding than real users making real use of technology. Managers who think they know how and what and that dictate how users should use new tools know less than they think. Because they often miss the bigger picture. Managers could and should argue what and why certain actions need to be taken and services should be used. But users need to inform us about their actual use. Not by telling us but by showing us.

But then again. This is nothing new to the digital business. We have always been doing this while specifying user requirements, making strategies, prototyping services, creating concepts, designing and developing artefacts. But the thing is: even though we’ve known better, most of us have been sloppy about bringing in real users and unaware of the cost of cutting corners and taking shortcuts when it comes to verifying user needs. This have to stop. We have to be better. Right now! Putting the users in the center from the start and keeping them there throughout the life cycle is a non-negotiable.

I’ll say it again: UX is not a discipline. It’s a way of viewing the world. And, mind you, it’s the only way.

This article was first published at https://bidnerdonethat.wordress.com - Visit for more stunning content! Both in English and Swedish.