Experience This!

This last entry is supposed to answer the age old question of questions, an exam of sorts where the question goes something like this:

In 1000 words or less, explain what in the world is User Experience?

From this wonderfully fantastic module where nothing is set in stone, I have come to one conclusion, User Experience (UX) is about what the user needs, wants and what the user doesn’t know that he/she wants until you give it to him. Though you can segment and sub-segment and ‘persona’ your target user to death, what people want changes as time goes by, hence attaining UX nirvana is like chasing a moving target. You might be able to grab hold of it for a while before the engine revs up again and you are left, all lost again in a cloud of smoke. It is only when you can understand this that UX ceases to have a balding effect on designers and products can be better designed to be suited for the ever important USER and not the often self-inflated DESIGNER. The golden rule here is User is KING.

In the course of this module many theories and methods of quantifying UX have been introduced and proposed, some of which overlap each other whereas others seem to contradict one another. The mini assignments documented in this blog have succeeded in teaching me about the various theories and approaches while the final project has taught me to throw everything out of the window if it conflicts with the golden rule.

I could proceed with a summary of all the assignments and what I have learnt from them but I would merely be repeating myself in many of the reflections. My personal reflections are perhaps best expressed in my thoughts about Christopher Faley’s article, ‘User Research Smoke & Mirrors‘ which incidentally, is a touted die die MUST-READ article.

One sentiment in his somewhat lengthy (if you think about it in web terms) article which I can relate to is his cynicism towards the attempts at a scientific quantification of UX. As with most new tools, humans tend to get carried away with using them for everything. The ‘pesudo-science’ described by Farley is a brilliant example of this as technologies can sometimes hinder rather than help the design process by adding to the burden of designers to not only please users but also their superiors which quantify ‘good design’ in the form of checklists of tests which technologies provide. An overcrowding of any design industry by these examples of peudo-science can end up with the golden rule being neglected for the cheaper gold plated stuff resulting in BAD Design.

That is not to  say that user research using quantitative methods is unimportant. On the contrary, from Farley’s article and from personal nerve wrecking experience with the final project, I surmise that user research is the most important. It is after all, the foundation of all design processes and evaluative processes, and it does build upon the golden rule of USER is King. The important thing here is not to get carried away with tests and rules and formulas and neglect good old common sense. Farley mentioned that user research can be and is often more of a political move to prove to non-design minded people that the design is a good one.

I concur with this point as the people who stand between your design actually getting to the hands of your target user and your design being another one for the paper shredder, are often non-designers who are there to protect their investments rather than create user-centered products. However, I would like to propose that there is more to user research, especially for non-experienced designers (like us) who need all the help we can get. User research may not always be as ‘common sense’ as Farley pointed out. Even within a group of assumingly like minded university students, this ‘common sense’ is not so common with us getting a range of opinions various prototypes from within our group itself. If we cannot decide on what makes sense to us student designers, it hardly can be used as a rule of thumb amongst designers around the world who come from diverse cultures, backgrounds and tastes. Therefore, user research is useful in determining what users need, want and might want.

That said, I agree that user experience does not have to be scientific for it to be accurate. The sterile uniform standards of utmost scientific calibration is often all pomp and no substance where UX is concerned. This is because once we invoke the golden rule, we see that since USER is King, the design should also be tested in the king’s castle, within the context of the user. Therefore, user research if too scientific, retracts from the usefulness of it being user-centered and all that is left is often numbers which everyone pretends to understand.

From this module, the main thing I have taken away with me as a budding (and hopefully profitable) designer, is that there is no pinnacle of good design. Rather, the road to UX nirvana is littered with skeletons of bad designs. To create good designed products the user must be central to the process and designers should never rest on their laurels as designs are like milk, they all have expiry dates. What is good one day can turn sour the next, depending on the user.