The UX Intern was a podcast series from 2004 that lasted for a year during which a new UX intern was interviewing experts in the field for general advice, hiring tips, and their own journeys. After a year, he decided to wrap up his series and it was poetic as he had moved up as a junior UX designer.
While most UX podcasts talk about current trends, their audience is wider and topics have to appeal to both seasoned veterans and burgeoning neophytes. As a result, digger deeper into certain subjects, like how to get noticed or hired starting out, are rare occurrence. That was not the case with The UX Intern.
Below, you’ll find some highlights and quotes from this excellent series made for aspiring UX designers. Note that I did not attribute quotes to the wondrous designers offering the advice as the episode did not identify each and every person that spoke and I don’t want to attribute credit inequitably.
Beginner’s doubts
“Remembering it’s ok to not know everything. Even the really great experts know they don’t know everything. And that not knowing everything is a gift. Understanding that is really valuable.
My father said the moment that you think you know it all and that you have nothing else to learn well you might as well just be dead. There’s no point to living…
So it’s okay to just be starting out. It’s okay to say I don’t know. I’d love to know that. I don’t know it.”
– Failure is inevitable, acceptable, and a great a way to learn. Fear of failure could be a sign that UX design might not the right career.
“Stay open. Don’t be afraid to make yourself vulnerable. Don’t expect yourself to have all the answers or to know everything now.
Recognize that you are a beginner, and that’s a beautiful thing, and there is so much to be said for beginners’ mind where you are going to be able to see things that the experts simply can’t see anymore. Because their patterns of thinking have been so defined. And everything is new to you. And there’s a lot of power in that.
So as I was saying earlier. Recognize the assets that you have and don’t be bobbed down by everything that you don’t know. Because it takes time and experience and commitment to gain competency.
You’re not going to become a master overnight. And if you’re going to become a master overnight, you could become a beginner again just as quickly.
So take your time. Allow yourself time to grow. Be gentle with yourself. Enjoy it. Because if you’re not having fun, there’s absolutely no reason to be doing it.”
Getting Feedback
– Thick skin is needed in this field. You need to be able to take criticism and harness it to improve your designs.
“It’s okay to ask for help. It’s not such a great thing to ask for huge… if you’re going to ask help from a mentor, start small. Don’t ask, can I have 100 hours of your time.”
– Join a great design team, the dynamic and constant challenging forces you to improve quickly
– When you can’t find a team yet, find a mentor. You need someone to provide you with regular feedback, to highlight your weak spots so you can improve them.
About Working
“Just keep designing”
– At the beginning of a project, ask “How will we tell that we’ve made things better for the people we are designing this for?”
People rarely explicitly discuss what would be better in the world were their project to come to fruition. However, if the destination is unknown, it’s incredibly difficult to get there. Without that conversation, it’s hard to know what to “levers to pull” to get users to do what is needed for these better experiences
– Be curious about the world and different industries. Don’t stick with one aspect as diversity brings rich experience that allow designers to solve problems. New designers that have chosen their predilections early on deny themselves the opportunity to learn and grow, to come up with innovative solutions.
– Be empathetic and impartial as necessary. We need to understand the user and use that knowledge to create solutions but also become impartial to weight solutions with tradeoffs.
The Community
– Take up offers for coffee dates/ informational interviews. Write a thank you note afterwards. Kind and polite people nurture good relationships that lead to future prospects directly or indirectly.
– Be curious. This profession is complex, multi-faceted, and requires skills in different domains. Read up. Meet up. Be part of the community. Attending conferences is a great way to do all this in one go. Twitter is a good way to connect with others. Blogs and newsletters are great, even if just curation and just for you. By blogging, at the very least, you’ll create a great reference for yourself.
Finding a job
– Dream jobs are not only available through recruiters and job boards (they require more experience). Gumption is key. Exhibit passion. Without a large portfolio, energy is a beginner’s stronger asset. Even if work isn’t the most attractive or elegant, by getting your foot in and learning from others, you get better. Don’t wait for a career to unfold, make it.
“Take matters into your own hands.”
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If you’d like some more detail on these tips and others, I highly recommend listening to the complete series The UX Intern at your leisure.
At the very least, it’s comforting to hear professionals encouraging beginners, even if that often involves reminding us of the importance of stepping beyond comfort zones.
Visit their website at: http://theuxintern.com/