Lessons in UX: You are probably wrong

I am a very very strong advocate of usability testing of UI designs (note to self – add an extra ‘very’ into that sentence). It helps you validate that users can understand the interface you are presenting them, it gives you insight into the mental model of how users approach the task you are designing, and it lets you see the design from someone else’s perspective. It also helps you fail fast, by making your mistakes in an early, non-production version of the solution you are implementing.

Because, after some years of doing this, I’ve realized that whatever you are designing… you are probably wrong.

User experience designers reading this shouldn’t take this personally. We are, after all, extremely right most of the time – after all, you didn’t get hit by a bus the last time you crossed the street, right? Otherwise you (probably) wouldn’t be reading this. But when it comes to user experience and UI design, we are beholden to a harsh mistress – the end-user. And there’s not just one of them.

Think of the millions of neurons that combine in a single human brain: all of those connections are formed based on biology, chemistry, and primarily… experiences. We are the sum total of our experiences, and our personalities reflect how the electrochemical reactions in our brain formed the self – our self – that exists in response to those experiences.

So when you consider the millions of people with different experiences and perspectives on life… you think you can figure out the optimal design for these people? A design that understands how they would all react to what you have presented? If you think so, well, you’re wrong. You can get close – you can leverage the standards, conventions and cultural symbols that are shared in our country and use certain design patterns that people “get” but… you will not hit the mark the first time. Or maybe the second. Or maybe ever. But that’s fine… Because you will never get it 100% right for every user, all the time.

I consider this idea – that you can’t ever get it 100% right for everyone – as liberating. The best you can hope for is something that is obvious and good enough for the majority of people. It lets me look at design problems in a different way, and explore and play and try different things. This is how you create new solutions… by trying something that has never been done before.

All to try and create something that makes a difference for users – something that is hopefully, after testing and refining, as right as you can get it.

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