Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky, two highly regarded academics in the field of economics are responsible for much of what we know about heuristics. In psychology, a heuristic is simply a fancy word meaning mental shortcut. We have so many decisions to make on a daily basis; there is no way we could think about all of the pros and cons of each option. Our minds would be overloaded and we would stop functioning. People frequently use heuristics to make decisions; you should use them to your advantage in your design. Here, we’ll discuss four common heuristics that researchers have identified, with examples of how to address them in digital design.
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Publishing is cheap. This seduces you, encouraging you to put more and more content online. But you will soon discover hidden costs. Costs that are crippling larger organizations. Dealing with ROT can feel intimidating on a large site. In fact, it can feel impossible. But it isn’t. Often it is just a matter of putting some processes in place to deal with it. If you create a prototype that gives people a sense of how much better the site could be, they are often more amenable than you think. Now is not the time to be timid. Now is the time to confront the ROT.
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The “learn to code” movement is gaining momentum among designers, but you’d be hard pressed to find a similarly strong movement for other disciplines within a team. Perhaps there should be. We should all be striving to learn, but… what exactly should we learn? Maybe it it’s about learning to communicate and collaborate, to respect the nuances of each other’s craft — and the artistry and reason that they both demand in equal measure — without attempting to master it for oneself.
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No matter your status or situation, whether director or loner, you are in a position to lead, to raise the bar in a place where it consistently sits lower than you think it should. As an in-house UX professional, Robert Hoekman Jr has formed and run UX teams for multiple companies. As a consultant, he has worked with dozens of clients on hundreds of projects. In this article, he will share what he learned about how to get what you want. Most of these things can be applied whether you’re inside of a company or consulting for one, whether you’re a fledgling designer or a veteran leader.
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The diffusion of innovations is a complex process; design teams can use their knowledge of the theory to create a road map for how they will address critical factors in the design and marketing of their product. In this second part, Victor Yocco presents the five characteristics of an innovation that determine its use. According to the diffusion of innovations theory, how well an innovation addresses these characteristics will determine people’s long-term adoption of an innovation. Design teams can address many components of these characteristics.
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Producing creative, fresh projects is the key to standing out. Unique side projects are the best place to innovate, but balancing commercially and creatively lucrative work is tricky. In this article, Danny Bluestone will look at how to make side projects work and why they’re worthwhile, drawing on lessons learned from our development of the UX Companion app. Many of the tips covered in this article share some common ground — if you manage your side projects with as much professionalism as you manage client projects, then you’re likely to succeed. Achieving the perfect balance with client work isn’t easy, but we’re confident that following these lessons will be great for your next project, and hopefully they’ll help you on your way.
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Users don’t automatically or simultaneously accept even the best ideas and most useful technologies. Acceptance and adoption happens in stages, and in order to stick, it has to happen the right way. In this two-part series of articles, Victor Yocco will explore the application of the diffusion of innovations to digital design and will provide examples of how design teams can account for these principles. In this part, he will give a basic overview of the theory and then discuss two main components of the theory: the different types of adopters, and the key steps in the process of adoption.
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Today, Brian Casel is proud to own and operate a business that does not revolve around billing for time. Instead of writing proposals and taking on client work to pay the bills, he’s building an asset that grows in value year after year. In this article, Brian will share five key lessons he learned from making this transition. He’ll share the story of how he iterated and improved the business because of them. His goal here is to show you that you can still find success by doing a lot of things wrong. That’s how you level up from freelancing to owning a thriving, growing business.
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Storytelling is not just a tool to engage users. It is also a powerful way to teach organizations more about their customers. Most organizations are reasonably good at gathering data on their users. But data often fails to communicate the frustrations and experiences of customers. A story can do that, and one of the best storytelling tools in business is the customer journey map. Think of the customer journey map as a poster pinned to the office wall. At a glance, people should be able to see the key touchpoints that a user passes through. It should remind them that the customer’s needs must always be at the forefront of their thinking.
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Web designers usually lose money on a project as a result of the client endlessly iterating on the design. After a few bad experiences, we avoid consulting with them. Unfortunately, this often makes interaction with the client even worse, so they interfere even more, creating a vicious cycle. But there is a way that enables you to produce outstanding design and maintain your profit margin! The answer lies in involving the client in the process, rather than excluding them. It involves collaborating with the client to produce a design. In this article, Paul Boag will show you how.
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