I’m tired of having to explain the importance of UX to senior tech people
Buckle in friends, we’re going ranting.
Earlier, I saw one of those LinkedIn infographics where someone working in UX shared a breakdown of how they spend their time at work. The chart showed 76% of their time was spent explaining what they do to try and get stakeholder buy-in.
I laughed, and if you work in UX, I’m sure you know I wasn’t laughing because it’s an example of humourous hyperbole. It’s because it’s true.
Every time I have to explain UX to a senior person in tech, an AI-generated pencil snaps.
We’ve all had those discussions, haven’t we, where we discuss how best to advocate for ourselves and place ourselves within organisations and workflows to do our thing and deliver value. Whether I’m a Product Manager explaining UX exploration topics on a proposed roadmap, or I’ve been explicitly hired as a UX professional, I’ve found myself in this situation a lot.
The thing is: I’m tired of needing to do this, and I’m tired of speaking with others in the field about how we can explain the value we can bring and get buy-in to be allowed to do whatever it is we are paid to do in the first place.
There’s a plethora of people, information, resources, and evidence as to why UX is essential. This begs the question: why does the burden of explaining what we do fall on us, and why do we not instead ask why it’s 2023 and there are senior people in tech who continually need this explaining to them?
🔎 Related: Why UX writers need to work on their negotiation skills
Good UX is hard to achieve, but not hard to understand
I’ve noticed that a lot of times when someone asks someone working in UX to explain what it is, they’re given the same answer: that it’s difficult to explain. Then they might be given some analogy, which may or may not involve buying ice cream or deciding between chocolate bars.
So this AI-generated mess of ice cream is like UX because…
I’ve been this person too. Especially with UX Writing. It’s hard to succinctly give an explanation that encapsulates the whole multifaceted process of all things UX.
The problem is, I think we do ourselves a disservice when we say that UX is tricky, and even more so when we give unhelpful comparisons to try and make it seem relatable. Everyone interacts with digital products and interfaces, everyone experiences UX — including my grandmother — so it’s hardly relatable to compare it to some “real world” scenario when nowadays, I’d wager most people don’t do much at all in real life more than they do online.
As soon as we say it’s difficult, we put a barrier up, and more importantly, we permit whomever we’re chatting with to not understand.
I’m also not going to say there’s just one simple definition we can all give. I think it depends on the context of who you’re speaking with, for example, the way I’d explain UX to a potential CPO client and my mum would be hugely different.
Equally, we each have our different approaches, so I think it’s important to develop your own unique way of explaining UX from your context and point of view.
For me, I say broadly that my job comes down to making sure users can easily do whatever it is that they set out to do with your product. Depending on the context, I might talk about building trust or a relationship with the user. I might talk about how good UX feels and what it means for product KPIs or delight of use. For UX Writing, I might talk about finding the right place to bring up the right words in the right way.
The point is, I’m not giving the listener any excuse to ignore what I’m saying under the guise of it being difficult. If they choose to ignore it, it’s because they don’t want to hear it, and then I question why they’re in a stakeholder position in the first place, but that’s another conversation.
Good UX is taken for granted
Ariana Shives states the reason why perfectly:
“The biggest indicator of good UX is when users don’t notice it at all. On the other hand, users recognize bad UX almost instantly.”
Invisible but kinda not invisible…
I’d argue that you can see evidence of good UX in user feedback and engagement metrics, but it’s not always easy to point down. A few times, I’ve had app store reviews on apps I’ve worked on referencing UX directly. In the past, I’d be fairly certain these come from other UX folk, but recently, I have noticed the term being adopted more broadly.
Just last week, I carried out a round of 10 user interviews, and eight of the users confidently gave feedback using terms like UI and UX, ranging from experienced test-takers with backgrounds in retail and dentistry to a 60-year-old military spouse with 27 grandchildren.
So, I think we may be seeing a shift where non-tech folk do talk about UX and UI and recognise that this is something that impacts whether or not they want to use your products.
However, good UX being taken for granted for the time being still renders the whole process it takes to make it good in the first place invisible.
Yes, there are ways you can measure the impact of UX improvements, but at least in my own experience and due to the size and resources of companies I’ve worked with, analytics have been sorely lacking or misunderstood.
This of course leads to a culture of blind gut-feel product and UX development where we can’t tangibly tell what the impact of changes is and leads to the impact of UX further being taken for granted.
Instead of having to explain good UX, I’d rather stakeholders listen to the ways and metrics that we’d need to measure improvement, that they’d listen to our ideas to experiment and approach product optimisation incrementally and learn from data.
UX folk are spread thin
In my current day job as a content designer, I support eight different product teams; each working on a different product within the same ecosystem.
In my previous roles as a product manager, I’ve focused on a small range of products, but also had little to no UX design resources, having to take on the task of everything from content and interface design to usability testing myself — in addition to PM duties.
More UX, more butter!
I’m spread thin, and I do my best, but with the need to context switch multiple times a day, I know realistically, the overall impact I could have is diluted, short of working to the point of burnout. And it’s the same for many UX folks.
Unfortunately, this is something that only seems to be being amplified by the current tech layoffs. I know in my case, whereas before there may have been potential to build out a team, that’s not going to happen any time soon. So, realistically, I know there are limitations on the impact I can have.
This is an organizational issue. I know the sheer wonder and user delight that would be created if all tech companies hired one (or more!) dedicated UX person for each team or even product, in some cases. Y’all aren’t ready for the amount of experimentation and learning that would bring, and your KPIs? To the moon.
Of course, it’s a big investment. And the UX folk you already have are spread thin for the time being and still have to fight the good fight when it comes to clarifying what they do and getting buy-in. See my point here?
(Check out this article from a product perspective on what to do when your UX team is overextended — may contain peanut butter.)
UX faces semantic challenges
UX design? Cool, so you’re a graphic designer, and you can design the assets marketing needs for this cool sizzle deck they’re presenting internally next week.
UX research? Cool, so you can also take on this SWOT and competitive analysis, and surely you can also design too? There’s not enough time and budget for *just* research…
UX writing? Cool, so you’re a copywriter, write this email campaign and make it quirky and actually could you just proofread these screens we’re releasing in 5 seconds?
My point is, that each discipline in UX comes with a word that’s already associated with something else in people’s mental models, and when you combine it with something as poorly understood as UX, it doesn’t help.
Again, not an excuse for senior folk to not make the time and effort to understand what each role can do. (I wrote this piece to let potential clients know what UX Writing encompasses, for example, and I can tell whether or not they read it.)
Personally, in my own freelance business, I state that I do Product and UX. I avoid using terms like writing and design on purpose because I find it instantly sets up false expectations. Besides, UX strategy is product strategy. However, in workplaces, where you don’t necessarily get to decide your labelling, beware of the mental model semantics conundrum.
UX shouldn’t just be *our* job
This is the biggest reason I get frustrated by senior folk not making the effort to understand UX.
Yes, I have UX in my job title. Yes, it is my responsibility. However, everyone on the team contributes towards this responsibility, from product managers and marketers building webpages to developers and translators. Each person in a company does something to impact a user’s experience of your product, and as such, UX needs to be everyone’s responsibility.
🔎 Related: Rise of the UX evangelists
Look at these happy not at all AI-generated folk around a campfire in harmony…
That’s not to say I’m here just to kick back and relax. Ideally, I’m here to lead UX strategy, implement improvements and experiment and learn in partnership with product teams. I’m here to coach and educate and highlight what good UX is, how competitors approach UX and what current and future best practices in the industry are so that I can spread awareness and empower everyone to feel able to contribute positively.
But that requires a base recognition and understanding of the value of UX in the first place.
What’s my point?
My point is, I’m tired. I love working in UX. I do not love constantly having to fight for buy-in. I love chatting about UX, educating people about UX, and sharing resources and examples. I do not love having to explain the importance of UX every time I propose a project.
And increasingly, I’m frustrated that the burden of education falls on us in UX. I wanted to explore why this is, and objectively there are reasons, but I don’t think that makes it ok for there to be senior people in UX in 2023 who don’t take accountability or see it as an issue that they don’t understand the power and possibilities of the UX field.
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