Perhaps the most vexing problem for designers is design decisions.
Why are you upset? Why is it hard?
There is a saying. A lot of companies are focusing on ux design these days, and that’s a good thing. But most companies end up making user experience design decisions for their products without a design background. This is not a bad thing, but it is a problem, and the problem is that different professional backgrounds bring slightly different dimensions of thinking. How designers can make design decisions, or assist their superiors to make reasonable and effective design decisions, is very critical.
A marketing boss, for example, may be more focused on the bottom line; A technical boss may focus more on technological innovation; A boss from a brand may pay more attention to the brand effect of the product.
Is it reasonable to judge product design purely from the perspective of user experience?
Personally, I think that’s the ideal.
What is the ideal state? Such as:
10 percent discount for train tickets purchased online. Massive free information sites without a single AD. Play online game props are all free. There are no VIP users for music products, so everyone can enjoy the same service for free. The VIP lounge in the airport terminal is open to anyone. Make a very idealistic design draft, and let the developers work on it forever, even if it doesn’t work in the near future. The product design life cycle has no point in time, no resource constraints, no technical reviews, and no cost controls.
Of course, it’s hard to have an ideal. The real state is that the result of a product design is influenced by many factors, such as user expectation, market strategy, brand strategy, business appeal, revenue pressure, technical bottleneck, resource investment cost, time, company value orientation, leadership style, team culture and so on.
So for designers to make effective design decisions, the first step is to understand that this kind of unideal, or imperfect state, is the norm.
Next, from such an imperfect state to find balance, find a breakthrough.
First, understand others.
Discuss a product design points, for example, a very valued clicks and exposure of the product manager in with you to discuss your design will affect his KPI, you don’t have to strong to the user experience first, the user like this logic is king go ahead, but should ponder the question from the Angle of the product manager, think about it, Is there any way to maintain or even improve the quantity of KPIs and at the same time improve the quality of user experience? Admittedly, there can be compromise and frustration when there is no perfect balance. But thinking about a design decision in terms of interchangeability is at least a good start and will earn the respect and trust of your colleagues.
To understand others, the requirement is that designers need to have a certain breadth.
We can not understand how to use JS programming to achieve a dynamic effect, but we should at least know the trend of the dynamic effect of mainstream products now, to know the feasibility of an effect, cost, the requirements of the technology platform and pressure.
We may not understand how much economic benefit a product page should achieve, whether an advertising space should sell 1 million or 1.5 million, but we should understand that the value of this page is divided into two parts, one is for users, the other is for advertisers, and how to choose depends on our understanding of the commercial value of the product. A comprehensive solution from both user and advertiser perspectives.
More details, interaction designers may not know how to draw an icon one stroke at a time, but they need to know whether the meaning of the whole icon in the interface meets the expectations of product design, business and interaction logic.
The breadth of knowledge is an accumulation process, slow and painful, but the sudden explosion of value is amazing.
Second, professional.
A truly powerful designer is one who has the right and credibility to make a design decision regardless of his position and background.
In the whole environment, designers are mostly young people. It is difficult for us to convince many colleagues with life experience and empirical theory, so we rely on professionalism.
Professionalism is reflected in every link.
Take a simple example. You’re an interaction designer, doing a page design. You will have to create a layout based on your business needs and your own professional guidelines. You’ll know where to put each module, what content to put in each module, and how images and text are arranged.
Make sure you stand up to all the questions before you submit your design for review.
This is not to say that your design needs to be perfect, but you need to make sure that every aspect of your design has been thought through.
Cooperative colleagues ask a lot of questions:
Why is the picture on the left? Why 2 images for this position and 3 images for that position? Why is the text paragraph in bold? Why does the rotation have 3 content blocks instead of 4? Why do ads appear at the end of the first screen rather than at the beginning of the second?
You don’t have to answer every question correctly, or there are no right answers to many of these questions. But make sure you’ve thought about it, and that you can articulate your logic and principles for every question.
Trust me, your judgment will become more accurate over time.
On the other hand, if there are any questions, your answer should be: “Sorry, I haven’t thought of that question” or “Ah… I don’t know, “and your professionalism will be questioned and compromised.
The appeal of professionalism is straightforward.
You get it right, you get it right, or you make it feel right for the first time. Do it right the second time. Two experiences have convinced most people to trust you.
On the other hand, if you misjudge or come across as unprofessional the first time around, it’s hard to recover your professional influence.
For example, designers have their own design principles, design culture, macro thinking, micro innovation and detail control when making products. Designers can do a lot of things to expand their professional appeal. But every designer should start from the first step to do a good job, every detail of a product design, to show the professional designer everywhere.
Third, professional.
You are a valuable person who can provide value to the product design team. You are a team player who can be trusted with your team.
One of my basic requirements for graduates is that there should not be a typo anywhere in the design. This is an example of a professional detail requirement.
We designers, naturally romantic, uninhibited personality, is a very beautiful thing. These advantages can lead to some irrationality. Most professional designers today don’t have these problems, but I’d like to list a few things that designers should be aware of in particular:
During the meeting, positive feedback should be given, and the minutes of the design side should be output actively, and the executable items should be listed. Be outgoing in work situations, even if you’re an introvert. The reasonableness of an argument, tit for tat when tit for tat, compromise when compromise. Don’t bury yourself in work, learn to present and express yourself. The process should be reflected in the design process, not just one result, sometimes a result does not represent your whole thought process. To summarize, to precipitate, can not finish a design project immediately into another. Always remember that most tasks at work are rational and logical, and most people are not, so you should have a way of dealing with things and people in accordance with your personality and habits. Sometimes it’s a rush. Accept mediocrity sometimes.
Fourth, have courage.
Designers often cannot make blind decisions because they have not yet understood the dimensions of the entire product, such as form, business model, and goals. If the decision is made purely based on user experience at this point, it may not be a good result.
But when a designer has a degree of preparation, it takes courage to make decisions.
Of course, if you make a decision and it doesn’t turn out right, you’ll be affected. So you need to be careful.
But when the result is right, the positive value is very high.
To have the courage to make a decision, do not rely on a single passion, but on the usual understanding of the business, the accumulation of experience, the prediction of the outcome, plus a little luck.
Number five, have a little style.
Breadth of knowledge, professionalism, professionalism, passion and courage. In the end you just need a little style.
This is a designer thing.
We don’t need to dress up like business people every day. There are lots of interesting ways we can work.
Having the strength to show the style as the basis will be a bonus for the construction of a designer’s charm and influence.
There will be many of these style points, some examples:
Break the ice in serious, heated discussions with jokes. A big fight with someone doesn’t make them angry. Can present ideas with very interesting PPT. Even when angry, he can keep smiling and discuss patiently. Able to express ideas quickly with diagrams on the whiteboard. Reasonable range of earrings, tattoos, alternative hairstyles, cool clothes. Understand the truth that “wise men show weakness, fools show themselves stronger”.
These will become a possible label for you, and with your basic abilities, your overall acceptance and memory points will be good.
Finally, back to the question of the title, how do you make design decisions?
With the accumulation of the above five points, as long as you do not be silly, do not temper, reason, have their own satisfactory design draft, to achieve a everyone OK you also satisfied with the design decision will be difficult? 🙂
Here, read Yuhara kei:
His growth experience is fascinating: “Recommended Reading! The Way of Design and Growth of Youyuan Kei”
His work experience is worth reference: Design Director Youyuanqing: My Work Experience in Huawei
His way of reading is worth learning: Huawei Design Director You Yuanqing: How to read a Design Book
Original address: You Yuanqing designer: @edC You Yuanqing
This article is originally translated by youset.com, please respect the copyright and translator’s achievements, please attach the youset.com link to transfer, violators will be corrected. Thank you for your cooperation.
[Yushi.com original article submission email: [email protected]]
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