One of the most important lessons I’ve been learning and relearning as a UX professional is to not be legalistic about the UX design process. Empathize, Define, Ideate, Prototype, Test and Iterate….in class, I was taught these steps in this order. It’s explained, for good reason, that this is the process to uncover the true needs of the users and drive innovation. I, like many young designers, hold this process as gospel and can end up focusing too much on sticking to the steps rather than exercising the theory behind the steps. I've found that this posture is not pragmatic. It can become a bottleneck to businesses and ineffective for our users. I've come to believe that UX design can and should be more flexible and business friendly.
UX needs businesses as much as businesses need UX. Viable businesses, especially nowadays with the prevalence of technology, are the channels through which UX can have a sustainable and meaningful impact on users. And businesses can utilize UX to be better adaptive to the needs of the customers (and happy customers often bode well for the bottom-line). The two are functions of each other and should work as a team.
The UX design process presumes the one-size-fits-all fallacy. Each business deals with different levels of financial, physical, human and process restraints. No two businesses are the same. So how can we expect to apply the same methodology in the same way to all organizations? Moreover, every organization engages with UX differently. For example, Airbnb was started by designers so the design is a natural fiber of the business. In contrast, many insurance and financial companies are nascent in embracing UX. All these factors determine the type of role a designer can play for the business and how effective they can be for the users.
So… how do you make this perspective actionable? What does it look like to make UX work for the business?...
Check out the chart that I adapted from a presentation by Malini Rao from the 2016 UXPA|Boston Conference. Consider that UX has a spectrum of roles it can play for a business and juxtapose that to your assessment of how engaged a company is with UX. The comparison sets the board for how to strategically tailor your design process for your business. You may find that you can only play one role or that you have the opportunity to have a wide variety of roles. Alternatively, you may have to play different roles every day or plan to gradually grow your position over time. There's a UX setting for all businesses.