UX has become so complex.

As UX Designers it's our job to make simplicity from complexity. We strive to give users what they want just as much as what they need. While at the same time making it as simple for them to do. Yet, the industry has gone off the rails somewhere and not for the better.

My background with UX started before it was even called "UX". This was in the early 90's when I was designing for basic sites and flip phones. I found that after doing freelance projects enough and the client not knowing what they really wanted and me redoing a design 3-4 times that something had to change. I needed to get smarter and start asking the right questions. Not to the person paying me. But to the people they were paying me to put something in front of. I learned how to simply have conversations with people on what they wanted and what they needed. I learned how to take what I was hearing and convert that into a wireframe that I could show and also sell to the person paying me as to why I was going that direction. The process was simple. The output was as clean and simple as possible. I was doing UX, I just wouldn't know it had a name "officially" for a few years down the road. I also sold UX into companies, created teams, built practices and created a UX culture in more companies than I can count over the past 28-years.

Yet, over the past 5-7 years or so. UX has become more complex by a huge amount. Companies are creating "DesignOps" practices without really knowing what they are or how to run them. They also might hire a Jr. designer and within a year make them a Lead, Principal or some other elevated title, well. Because they were the only person there, and they knew more about UX than someone else. I also have to say that through the years. Myself and others who have 20+ years in UX had been pushing companies to get a UX understanding and then mature it if possible. UX has always been seen as something that was expensive and difficult to recoup the cost from doing. A lot within the C-suite just didn't get it. Design systems came to be in an effort to standardize for the business the act of creating UX and the components that drive it. I'm old school and while I see the value in design systems. They drive me crazy. Is a designer really a designer if they're using pre-baked components that they just simply drag-and-drop?

Junior designers are being pumped out by the thousands and all trying to figure a way in. They're all over social media and are getting bombarded by "Ninjas, Gurus" and others who barley have more experience than they do. The insights are they should learn these tools and/or X process. They should build "Y" type of portfolio. They should learn how to write user stories (btw, no you shouldn't. Knowing what they are helps overall).

Junior Designers, Keep it Simple

This is not the fault of Junior designers and others coming to UX. There's a lot of factors overall. "UX" education, certifications or whatever haven't helped. They have given a false sense of this is how things are going to work. Well, guess what. They never work that way. There is never enough time to do user research. If there is time. You won't be able to get the right people. There is no formula for UX that is going to perfectly add up. 1+1 = (?) You deal with what you're given and in most cases. "Education" has not set people up to adapt and overcome. Recruiters and hiring managers don't make it any easier either. For me as a person that hires. I want simple, short and sweet. I want to get interested in YOU as a person. Then what you can do.

Junior designers. Remember. It's your entire job to take something that can be very complex and make it as simple as possible. You need to do the same thing with yourself. Try not to absorb everything UX related thinking it will get you hired over someone else. It won't. Look at the image at the top. If you know it. It's backwards. We should take complexity and make it simple. Have simple easy conversations with users. That insight you get is simply going to get used by you for creating what they need. over the years. Very few clients really care the journey you took to get to the design. Just that you did and if you can speak to why. Then their next quest is when can we have it?

Your journey as a UX designer should not start out with a bunch of complexity. It should start out simple and get more complex as you gain greater experience. Then that experience will tell you to "make it simple".

I'm not going to tell you tools to use, processes to implement. I'm just going to leave you with the thought that instead of trying to absorb all things UX. Simply just do the work, even as a side hustle to gain experience and keep it simple.

You can't create a simple solution for your users if you, yourself or living in a world of UX complexity. Practice what you preach.