Design for the Conversation

About 15 years ago, when the internet was new, I worked directly with the newly appointed CIO of a large Swedish organisation. My role was to facilitate the development of a ‘Internet Strategy’ for the company. No small task, but it was just the internet, how hard could it be ? To assist me, we had enlisted the help of a very large consulting company.

The project was one of my most successful, but not really for the end product but more for the process that was we used. The process comprised of a great deal of interviews with stakeholders, but also with a number of end users. We conducted collaborative sessions with the team to discuss and prioritise outcomes, develop the strategies and make a number of ’Straw Man Proposals’ to discuss and modify. I was particularly struck with the value of 'Straw man proposals ' in that encouraged the team to think in terms of 'unfinished'  that could be iterated upon.

Thoughts of a UX mentor (part 2)

This post is a continuation to my previous post Thoughts from a UX mentor (part 1). This will list will likely grow.

Critique: Give and accept

Critique is a integral part of the design process. As a UX designer you will need to effectively and receive critique. This can be tough, especially if you are on the receiving end of things. When I was in Architecture school the ‘unofficial’ objective of students in the class was to deliver such harsh critique that other students would eventually drop out. The logic was this led to less competition that way. Yeah, we were young. Looking back this was all wrong and we really didn't understand the role of critique in design. Today, I view Critique as a type of critical thinking. It is a way of determining the direction of a design and how well the design meets the goals.