The Nuances of UX - LA UX 2013

This presentation was given at LA UX in Santa Monica, CA, USA

When doing any kind of design work, the devil is always in the details. It is easy and often important for us to quickly rush through our wireframes and prototypes to meet a client deadline, but as professionals we must not overlook the subtleties that can turn a good experience into a great experience. This talk is about the little details we see in apps and websites we use every day, but often fail to notice. We fail to notice them because they provide for a much smoother user experience. You will learn how to design for these experiences even with a tight deadline and within an agile workflow. After this presentation you’ll never look at another app or website the same again.

Transcript

1. Presented by Nick Finck December 9th, 2013 The Nuances of UX
2. Who the heck is this guy?
3. Photo credit: Jeff Croft Employer Amazon AWS Role Senior Manager of User Experience Personal Site NickFinck.com Twitter @nickf Notable UX toreador
4. #UXnuances
5. Overview • Details • Simplification • Process • Research • Our Job
6. A quick note about UX UI &
7. User Interface (UI)
8. User Experience (UX)
9. Design Details &
10. Good design is thorough down to the last detail. Nothing must be arbitrary or left to chance. Care and accuracy in the design process show respect towards the user. - Dieter Rams
11. Pinterest
12. Mint app
13. Paper app Paper app
14. CNN Money app
15. CNN app
17. Attention to detail does not mean it will bear the burden of complexity.
18. Design Simplification &
19. Good design is as little design as possible. Less, but better – because it concentrates on the essential aspects, and the products are not burdened with non-essentials. Back to purity, back to simplicity. - Dieter Rams
20. Showtime Anytime app
21. When we over-simplify, we tend to miss important details. The work still needs to be done, just someone else now has to do it (or worse, no one does).
22. Winchester Mystery House
23. Disney World
24. Design Process &
25. Most of our processes are feature- driven. We operate in a world driven by features and version numbers.
26. Features and version numbers are simply common ways to market a product, yet they are rarely a means to improve the experience for the customer.
27. A good experience sells more naturally than features and version numbers.
28. Design Research &
29. Observe how people use it
30. Know the context of use
31. Look for hacks
32. Service Blueprint
33. It’s our job
34. It’s not enough that we build products that function, that are understandable and usable, we also need to build products that bring joy and excitement, pleasure and fun, and yes, beauty to people’s lives. - Don Norman
35. Our work is so much more than just evoking emotions, it is about life.
37. It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent that survives. It is the one that is the most adaptable to change. - Charles Darwin
38. We are not surviving, we are barely existing.
39. When design is practiced without responsibility what we get is not creation but destruction. - Mike Monteiro
40. We’re in a technology tsunami. Whether you love it or hate it, ultimately we have to figure out how to survive it and make it work for us. - Peggy Klaus Photo by Jean Guichard
41. We used to seek a Work/Life balance, times have changed and now we seek a Work/Life/Technology balance.
43. We are mired in a design culture that either doesn’t understand its responsibility to the world we live in or worse, it doesn’t care. - Mike Monteiro
44. STOP We owe it to ourselves to this way of thinking. It is DESTRUCTIVE
45. We can't solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them. - Albert Einstein
46. We must not think of our job as designing for someone. Photo by Håkon Dahle
47. Photo by James Cridland Instead we must think of it more as designing for the good of humanity.
48. Design works in the service of a better world. Always has, always should. - Mike Monteiro
49. We are the makers of our own state and… individuals who realize the fact need not, ought not, to wait for collective action. - Mahatma Gandhi
50. We must take it upon ourselves to find ways to better collaborate with each other and craft experiences together that balance work, life, and technology.
51. WE can change the WORLD
52. Thank you!
53. Questions?
54. • Personal Site: NickFinck.com • Email: nickfinck@gmail.com • Twitter: @nickf Contact me
55. Mike Monteiro Cameron Sinclair Victor Papanek Design for the real world Design is a job Design like to you give a damn