Prepare yourself for a little Q&A session with our Head of Design, Pawel. In this episode of Experts Zone we will try to answer the most asked UX/UI design questions. Are you curious? Let's start!
Hope you will enjoy the episode. Share with us your impressions and feel free to share with us your own design questions. We will be more than happy to answer them. It's the final time to create an episode together.
Transcription
Hello, my name is Pawel Ingielewicz and I'm your host as well as Head of Design here at Frontend House. And today we will be answering web questions regarding design. So stay tuned for this. It’s Design Aid.
Question no 1. Why are UX designers paid so much?
Why are UX designers paid so much? I've recently heard of UX, and UI and been researching about it, and for the life of me I can't seem to understand why they are paid what they're paid. I see the value of having good user experience, whether it's picking the color scheme or figuring out how best to hold a product for maximum user satisfaction but does that really deserve to be compensated nearly as much as a programmer who built the app and all its functionality? It just seems like a much easier thing to figure out (the right font size, the right whitespace amount) than learning Python or Java. I'm deciding which of the two (UX designer or Software Developer) to choose and UX pales in comparison in terms of value in my eyes. Edit: This isn't a statement, it's a question. I would like to know.
Okay, so this question was by cscareerquestions posted by Skyline952 one month ago. So well, long story short, because good designers are worth it. So from what I understand your question, you are wondering why, despite UX being easier than software development, designers earn almost as much as the programmers. So the first thing to point out here is basically that designing, well not designing but creating an application or a website or whatever, in terms of software development is a team effort.
It's not like the programmer comes and builds it by himself. And if there was no designer, trust me, your app would look like a terminal in a MacBook or in Windows. So you would just type in commands and you wouldn't have any interface. That's how it would look. And, as well as QA, quality assurance, if you don't have quality assurance then your app won’t work. But maybe it will work in the basics, but it won’t work, for example if you type in your email address without an at.
So this is a great team effort of a lot of people. But UX designers, and basically designers of any kind, people that are working on user experience, have different responsibilities than software developers. Because software developers get the design and this design shows him exactly what and when might or will occur, what will happen, what must happen, how would it look like and all of that. So he doesn't have to think about it for himself. Later on, he just builds it when it comes to software development.
So different responsibilities means that you require different skills from different people. Actually, for some people, software development might seem a lot harder than designing, but also for a lot of developers, being a UX or UI designer is a lot harder than just program stuff, because they think that programming is easier. It might be, because for some people talking to a computer is easier than talking to a normal person, normal people. And designing actually means that you have to talk to a lot of people.
So long story short, all of the people in the IT Department are paid well because they have their different responsibilities and their skillset must be really high. It doesn't matter if you are a software developer, designer or quality assurance specialist. It just matters that if you do your job well, then you are part of a team. You are part of this great team effort and you deserve to be paid well. So yeah, that's basically why seasoned UX designers are paid almost as much as software developers.
Question no 2. Need some help with the UX/UI Guide
Okay, next question, UI Design, posted by Muaviyah_mughal 25 days ago.
Need some help with the UX/UI Guide. Hello, I've recently started taking interest in UI designing. I've been learning and watching tutorial courses on YouTube. I'm more focused on UI for now. I'm quite confused about UX. Is it necessary to learn both? Should I learn user experience too? Seeing UX talks makes me confused. Should I focus on UI then learn UX?
No, you don't have to learn UX to be a UI designer. Basically it's good to posses some basic knowledge about UX when you are a UI designer, as well as about UI designing if you’re a good UX designer. Basic knowledge is much appreciated, but you don't really need to know both at the same time. Actually from now a lot of companies are getting out of this scheme that this should be UX/UI designer. Most of the companies are now hiring specialists in a very specific field. For example, a user experience designer is working with a user interface designer. And they work obviously together, but the user experience designer doesn't do UI stuff.
And also in the opposite way, UI designer doesn't do UX stuff. They are just simply doing the other things. And basically, when it comes to UI, it's more about the graphical styles, a lot of aesthetics, and stuff like that. But from the user experience perspective, it's more about psychology, research, talking to users, and stuff like that. So whatever is your thing, just pick one. You don't have to learn both, but it's good to know the basics of everything. Simply, if people are talking to you, you know basically what they are saying. And for sure it will be a plus during any UI our UX designer interviews you will have.
Question no 3. UI/UX Resources to get on track?
Okay, next question, UX Design, posted by GeologistLegitimate6 one month ago. UI/UX Resources to get on track?
Okay, so to get on track, obviously, you can read a lot of blogs or watch YouTube. But if you are reading blogs or watching YouTube or listening to podcasts, keep in mind that it's good if those people who are writing blogs or making YouTube videos, content, or podcasts, they do write some links with sources, down below the videos of the content. Because it's very easy to just write a statement based on your instincts, not based on science or research. And then if it's your instinct then it might happen you were right in your own case, but in different cases, it might simply not be the right choice. So if you are going for a blog or something like that, just go to see the sources.
If they are posting sources you can go to them and just research what they are saying, about what they're talking about. That is a very great habit to do if you are learning from blogs and just people from the Internet. Otherwise, and this is my personal favorite, books. Books are really great. It's a lot harder to write a book than a blog post. Obviously, you also need to do some research but it’s worth it.
There are great psychology books, books about UX design, great books about UI designs. And obviously, there are some sort of Bibles, like Design of Everyday Things or Don't Make Me Think. Those two books are very often mentioned as those Bibles, like on the must-read list. But of course, there's a lot more. So to sum up, I would go with the books and with blogs after some research. Well, actually to get on track, it's best to do research on who to listen to or to read.
Question no 4. Is it better to learn UI or UX?
Okay, next question. Is it better to learn UI or UX?
Very simple question. Depends. If you are overall more interested in graphics then go with UI. If you are more interested in people's behavior, go with UX. Nothing else really matters besides that.
Question no 5. When you meet people and they ask ‘what do you do for work’ how do you explain?
Okay, next question. Question for the Ux’ers in my network. When you meet people and they ask ‘what do you do for work’ how do you explain?
Okay, this is actually a pretty easy question. I always say that my job is to make sure that people using the app that I designed are having satisfaction with it as well as people who paid for this app achieve their goal. So yeah, mostly just as a UX designer I make sure that people actually like to use my app and they achieve their goal, they are satisfied as well as the business side.
That's pretty much what I'm saying. Most people actually don't understand basically, but it's often like on those memes posted, like what I think I do, what my family thinks I do, what my friends think I do, what my boss thinks I'm doing. And stuff like. That pretty much sums it up. For most of my time as a UX designer, I'm just posting notes about certain things. Next question.
Question no 6. What is the difference between a UX and UI designer and a web designer?
Next question. What is the difference between a UX and UI designer and a web designer?
Yeah, a lot of people ask this question. Some people don't know or might find it quite difficult to differentiate it and then to understand. It won't be my word, but by Interaction Design foundation definition - UX designer is the human responsible for creating products that provide meaningful and relevant experiences to users.
This involves the design of the entire process of acquiring and integrating the product, including aspects of branding, design, usability, and function. So this was about the UX designer job and about the UI designer. The UI designer is building interfaces, basically, user interface design is building interfaces in software or computerized devices, focusing on looks or style.
Designers aim to create interfaces that users find easy to use and pleasurable. UI design refers to graphical user interfaces and other forms, like voice control interfaces. So yeah, this is about the UI and then UX designer.
With a web designer, things get a little bit trickier. I'm not really sure. But from what I know, web designers are kind of them both, like the one-man army, sort of. But for the last few months, maybe two years even, I haven't really seen a position like a web designer. I think we're going away from it and we are hiring people that are specialists in their own fields right now and not people who are capable of doing everything. Because basically if you are capable of doing everything, then you may not have time to do everything right, or even you can't know everything. So it's best to hire people that are specialists in their own fields.
Question no 7. What are the ways to improve UX?
What are the ways to improve UX? This is the next question. And yeah, user research and user testing. That's it. There's nothing more - do your research and do your testing and you will improve your UX.
Question no 8. What are specializations under user experience design?
What are specializations under user experience design? As I said, I think some time ago we had a web designer, then a UX/UI designer. Then we put those two people on different sites and we separated them. And now we have a UX designer and a UI designer, and they are coming with more and more specializations every year. So right now, from what I know, it's like UX designer, UX researcher, or UX Writer.
You also can have a content strategist, information architect, or any other people that will be responsible for a certain part of your project. Of course, you will meet those people very rarely in one project. Because first of all it requires a budget, and it involves a lot of people. So most companies that can afford that are doing those things in house. So probably Google, Apple, Microsoft, or Netflix, you can find those people doing a project in an app. But when you're working at a software house, it's very rare that you have so different people in one team working on one project. But yeah, it might happen. It's not impossible.
Question no 9. Which UI is better?
Last question. The worst question possible. Which UI is better?
It depends. I don't know, there is no right or wrong answer. I don't know the context. I don't know the documentation. For example, on the right side, I don't know what will happen if the photo won't be so vertical. What will happen if the photo will be smaller? Probably it will just get the final stretch.
Depends. I would need more info to tell you. So if they ask you this question on LinkedIn it's not about knowledge or getting to know your opinion. It's all about engagement and reach. So it depends. And don't answer those questions, it's spam.
Okay, so those are all the questions we have prepared for you today. I hope you enjoyed it. Let me know if you have any questions you always wanted to know but were afraid to ask. I will answer them. Maybe something about design process, design thinking, usability testing, design disciplines, research methods, problem solving skills, UX designer interview questions, or UX design interview questions? Don't be afraid to ask. There are no right or wrong questions.
Remember we post content on YouTube every Friday so keep looking for those and for everything else about the software you are welcome to look for it here at Fronted House. Bye.
