So funny. So true.

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I’ll be speaking at the SoCal UX Camp, and at 4pm we’ll be moving the shindig over to 7 Seas in downtown Garden Grove. I’ll buy a drink for the first five people that show me they have downloaded the UX Drinking Game.

7 Seas / Savori
12941 Main St
Garden Grove, CA 92840

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Looks spot on from what I’m seeing. Cheers.

© 2013 From Onward Search.

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I’ll be presenting “From Application To Portfolio: How To Get A Great UX Job” at the SoCal UX Camp Saturday, June 1. Heckling is welcomed and encouraged.

I’ll be the one wearing a Hawaiian shirt and shorts.

The address is:

Cal State Fullerton, Garden Grove Center
12901 Euclid Street
Garden Grove, CA 92840

It’s sold out, but there is a wait list.

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The users want it. The numbers show it. But that feature that proved so useful, it might be get implemented in 2014 — if ever. There might be a lot of reasons: The CTO doesn’t have the right team in place or may dislike the designer that designed the feature, the CEO wants the color red, or product is going after the wrong priorities. All decisions that are at expense of the user (and long term, at the expense of company profitability).

Design in large organizations isn’t for the faint of heart. 

Leisa Reichelt talks about the political or organizational struggles many designers face within their organizations in this great post:

Many times I’ve suggested a design approach only for the in house designer on the team to literally pull the design from their desk drawer or computer and to tell me how they tried to get the organisation to go this way two, three, maybe four or five years ago. They tried and tried, had no success, and filed the design away so they can get on with the work the organisation deemed acceptable or appropriate. It’s kind of depressing, and almost embarrassing when my main role is to advocate for work that was actually done years before I appeared. And sometimes it works.

…

Politics and egos are the main reasons that great design goes awry – either it is never presented (because presenting it is a risk to those egos and would be not wise politically), or it is presented and dismissed, or it is presented and then changed such that egos are not wounded and the politics are in tact, the design integrity is hardly a passing consideration.

 Read on…

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One request I made when I started the new job was to include Product Design in the title, because I believe a) you can’t expressly design User Experience, and b) User Experience is everyone’s responsibility.

There’s another divergence in UX: in-house versus agency. The goal may be the same (usable product or website), but how you get there varies mainly because how you have to communicate product design. I’ve worked on both sides, and my approach to how I get things done is very, very different.

In the agency world, wireframes are deliverables. In the product world, they’re wasted time and money if you can communicate your ideas quicker using a whiteboard, prototype or anything else.

David Cole covers it eloquently in his post:

Increasingly the best designers of our time are not working for agencies, but for in-house teams at startups and tech companies. I think this is an important shift, not just for where the work is done, but how the work is done.

…

Looking back at the ideas espoused by the UX community, I find their relevance to my work winnowing by the year. Many of the practices seem forged in the fires of consultancy. Advocacy is a repeat theme in UX writing, but is borderline irrelevant when working for a product- and design-centric organization. Similarly, when you have internal stakeholders who understand the design process, you don’t need to worry about constantly building consensus. Deliverables like lengthy specs, comprehensive wireframes, and pixel-perfect PSDs are all artifacts from a time when risk-averse clients needed to enforce progress and limit variability. Inside of a product company, these efforts waste time, create politics, and mask responsibility.

Read the post here.

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They let me in. Big mistake.

None of my experiences appear officially on my LinkedIn profile or my resume, because what I do is much more than what I do professionally. But each helps me in the day job more than I could ever admit, because while it’s not relevant to design, it is to the process to creating amazing things and seeing the big picture.

I don’t tell many of my friends about some of them, because it seems overwhelming and I’m a fairly private person, but when I meet other people that have also taken unorthodox paths in life, there’s a certain kinship that is wonderful.

Each experience brought me something different and varied, and each had it’s own unforgetable moments: from a shake machine catching on fire, to photos that seem to capture something other than reality, to driving down the Harbor Freeway and seeing the rightful anger of 1,000 neighborhoods glow in the night.

Each I’ve took pride in and I’ve grown from.

Each has helped me learn from my mistakes.

Each has helped me leave a legacy at places I go, friends I meet, and places I have worked.

You can read the post here and learn more about me.

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From Inigral (they product Facebook applications for Colleges). These numbers are important to watch, because college students become heavy consumers of content and social media in a hurry.

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Twitter is a great resource for User Experience information and engagement with professionals in our field. I also think it’s invaluable as a professional branding tool. One of the groups that has embraced this most are user experience professionals.

I have a list of people that I respect and follow to retweet their content. The list I have is literally called Stuff I Follow. It’s not all UX types — some of them are personal friends — but it helps me keep up to date on what’s going on.

Yes, I play favorites. Yes, this may promote people I like. But it’s my list.

Here are some of my favorites, in no particular order:

• Ha Phan — Designer extraordinare out of San Diego working at a cool startup called Porch, Ha’s commentary on user experience and engineering has a sharp and pointed wit few can match.
• Jon Fox — Jon’s the Director of User Experience at a new startup down in Los Angeles and has a lot of great thoughts on startup UX. We’ve traded a lot of ideas on dealing with product management. We’ve also traded war stories, and is a curator of The Big Idea List.
• Coburn Hawk — He’s the Director of User Experience at Magento, and another curator of The Big Idea List. We’ve drank, talked, traded war stories also. His passion project, The Middle Man.
• Winnie Lim — Winnie is the amazing designer behind Simple Honey, a travel personalization website. She’s the best example of introverted designer that uses social media to communicate. She also has some amazing stories with meeting founder types in San Francisco two weeks after touching down. The best days of her work are really ahead of her.
• Jake Hercules — Sometimes we have to see the field through the eyes who’s new and excited by it, and Jake’s that person for me. An Usability Researcher at Citrix, super sharp and does a great job merging theory with real world challenges.
• Lynn Teo — Lynn’s the CXO over at McCann Erickson, and one of the best public speakers on UX I have ever seen. An Carnegie Mellon alum, every single one of her comments about Experience Design is insightful and informed. She also sees Twitter is a great engagement channel and a way to create tangible relationships.
• Timothy Whalin — Timothy is a great guy out of Denver that retweets a lot of awesome information about user experience and visual design (some of which I retweet). He also engages with users, which is a sign of a true Twitter enthusiast.
• Leah Reich — Leah’s is an ethnographer, and it shows with her live tweet observations of fellow commuters on BART — one of the best uses I’ve seen of Twitter. Her engagement on Twitter is solid.
• Kristen Johansen — She’s the Director of Product over at the gold standard for online training, lynda.com. Very straightforward, insightful commentary on the art of design.
• Paul Sherman — Paul’s the former leader of the Usability Professionals Association and a consultant out of one of the flyover states. Smart guy. Great at super technical solutions.
• Jonathan Lupo — Very smart, and he’s done something with his agency Empathy Lab few have done: sold it to a much larger company. Really worth following his feed.
• Ian Fenn — He’s a really, really sharp guy, and is really opinionated. I also like Ian because he engages instead of just broadcasts, a true example of someone who understands how Twitter should be used.
• Ian Smile — A great curator and editorializer of UX content, Ian brings a sharp wit and a keen eye for what’s good in the field. His tweet, “Why has “no portfolio” become a bragging right in UX? I hear it too often to not ask” was classic.
• Jared Spool — Whenever I want to know how bad flight delays are on United, I read his tweets. Really informative stuff about user research, and we’ve had some great conversations about organizational theory. Really funny avatar.
• Jonathan Korman –– Never mind his hair (I think he has the longest hair in UX), or his vocabulary, he has one of the smartest and most eclectic feeds in UX.
• Startup L. Jackson — He’s not really a person, but an impersonation that relates it’s stories to the startup world. Always wise, seldom boring, and always worth following.
• Laura Klein — Sharp wit, very knowledgeable, uses profanity when appropriate, and currently reading her Lean UX book. Worth following both her feed and her blog, Users Know.
• Dorian Taylor and Lynn Polischuik (2,800 followers) — I listed them together because they are usually engaging with each other, and both of them reside in Vancouver, so it’s useful to keep track of the scene up there. Very smart conversations, plus a lot of Lynne’s dog pictures.
• Jason Shen — He’s a San Francisco startup guy, and writes a kick ass blog about kicking ass. All an absolute must read, truly motivational.
• Dustin Curtis — A mostly personal feed with the occasional interesting quote (CNN is the TMZ of news) makes it a worthwhile read.

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Yup, it must be April 1.

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How to choose a 486. Scary.

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Great read, for you data wonks. Data has to have meaning:

The problem with data is that the way it is used today, it lacks empathy and emotion. Data is used like a blunt instrument, a scythe trying to cut and tailor a cashmere sweater. Some folks do a better job of making data interesting — like the fine folks at Foursquare. They use cutesy phrases to remind me of my coffee addiction and occasionally point out that Jared Kim and I are besties when it comes to eating ramen noodles or visiting Hakkasan, but they don’t really tell the whole story and they need to do more.

…

[Foursquare] knows that I check-in with a handful of people, whose relationship to me can be inferred from the social graph. Add to the mix the fact that I have left tips and taken photos at that spot. Now, compare it to all other coffee shops I have checked into and how they rank against this one location. Add all of them up, and you end up with a rudimentary conclusion: I don’t go to this coffee shop simply because it’s an interchangeable part of my daily routine, or because it’s on my way to work. I visit it because it is my happy place, my one cup (or dozen) of zen. And a company like Foursquare could use that fact to package even more compelling experiences for me.

…

The symbiotic relationship between data and storytelling is going to be one of the more prevalent themes for the next the few years, starting perhaps inside some apps and in the news media. I was reminded of the future filled with data narratives when I saw this visualization – Out of Sight, Out of Mind, by Pitch Interactive. It takes data about drone attacks and makes them visual and easy to understand, and in doing so, elicits a strong reaction.

But it merely scratches the surface — presenting a slight improvement on an infographic that might have appeared in the pages of a magazine. In a future where we have tablets and phones, packed with sensors, the data-driven narratives could take on an entirely different and emotional hue.

How are you using data?

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Less clutter. Closer to Mobile First.

Thoughts?

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I’ve been kicking the tires of a new collaboration platform, Hunie. It’s a place where designers can posts their designs and get feedback from other designers who are experts in the field (you know, not those self proclaimed experts).

Designs are easily annotated, and it provides even non-designers and great platform to comment and collaborate. 

You should sign up. Now.

Congratulations to Damian Madray on the launch.

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Do we want to live in a world that’s always on? Walk into any bar in places like San Francisco, Seattle or Los Angeles, and there are hordes of people that are splitting their attention span their “Jesus” phones and conversations.

Even now, do you really have anyone’s undivided attention?

And then’s there’s Google Glass. Mark Hurst writes about how this is even worse with the new device:

The key experiential question of Google Glass isn’t what it’s like to wear them, it’s what it’s like to be around someone else who’s wearing them. I’ll give an easy example. Your one-on-one conversation with someone wearing Google Glass is likely to be annoying, because you’ll suspect that you don’t have their undivided attention. And you can’t comfortably ask them to take the glasses off (especially when, inevitably, the device is integrated into prescription lenses).

But wait, there’s more!

Finally – here’s where the problems really start – you don’t know if they’re taking a video of you.

The user wears them unintentionally becomes part of the world’s biggest webcam network. 

Now pretend you don’t know a single person who wears Google Glass… and take a walk outside. Anywhere you go in public – any store, any sidewalk, any bus or subway – you’re liable to be recorded: audio and video. Fifty people on the bus might be Glassless, but if a single person wearing Glass gets on, you – and all 49 other passengers – could be recorded. Not just for a temporary throwaway video buffer, like a security camera, but recorded, stored permanently, and shared to the world.

…

Google Glass is like one camera car for each of the thousands, possibly millions, of people who will wear the device – every single day, everywhere they go – on sidewalks, into restaurants, up elevators, around your office, into your home. From now on, starting today, anywhere you go within range of a Google Glass device, everything you do could be recorded and uploaded to Google’s cloud, and stored there for the rest of your life. You won’t know if you’re being recorded or not; and even if you do, you’ll have no way to stop it.

Isn’t that a slight privacy violation? Where’s the checkbox I can click?

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It’s satire and reality at the same time.

“It’s weirdly self-centered and creepy to be broadcasting my whereabouts to the whole world, and then be rewarded for it with some worthless piece of clipart,” said Tampa, FL college student Theresa Gibson. “I don’t want to know where other people are, I don’t want them to know where I am, and I definitely don’t want it all to be tracked by a website that pits us against each other to see who can share our locations the most. Frankly, it doesn’t make any sense why that would ever appeal to anyone.”

And…

“Nobody needs to get my immediate take on everything I see online,” said Atlanta printing consultant Deirdre Levinson, questioning the merits of any site that, without knowing her level of intelligence or expertise in a particular topic, would deem her worthy enough to engage in a discussion. “And they’re sorely mistaken if they believe I could actually add something of value to the conversation. At best I’m just going to parrot back some loose approximation of what I’ve heard before, which will just prove that I never should have weighed in in the first place.”

And…

“Don’t always ask me to send everything I’ve read to everyone I know. And by the same token, I don’t need to know if they’ve read the same thing. That information means nothing to either of us,” said Glendale, AZ shopkeeper Dan Allenby, who could not think of a single instance where it would be helpful to sign into another website through his Facebook account. “If I wanted to tell someone about something, I’ll just tell them individually. Or better yet, they’ll stumble across it on their own.”

Read on…

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I’m going to be presenting with Jon Fox in Orange County at Kareo with Jon Fox:

From Application to Interview: How to get a Great UX Job

Patrick Neeman presents: The process of getting a great user experience job isn’t as hard as you would think. This workshop covers all aspects of the interview process, from presenting a great resume and portfolio, what to expect during an in person interview.

Mobile as a UX Driver

Jon Fox presents: Showcasing how the user experience movement of simple design, quick data consumption and connectivity is driven by the rise in mobile devices, small screen applications and on-the-go mobility.

Click here to register.

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Now I’m moved.

So I was catching up on Twitter and blog reading, and I came along this post. Kyle Neath has always kind of cracked me up — that photo on Twitter — but the blog post about how the internet can level the playing field is great. To paraphrase, he didn’t know the value of his early work, and found solace through a Ruby on Rails community.

It took me until early 2009 for me to realize the real value of this network. I was miserable at my job and I sent a long-winded email to court3nay inquiring about working with ENTP. ENTP was a half-product, half-consulting agency at this point comprised almost solely of caboosers. All of whom had never met me or ever heard my voice. About 30 seconds later I got a response:

Hey Kyle,

That’s pretty fuckin awesome, if you’ll pardon my french.

We’re just heading out to breakfast, I mean, an important company meeting, but I’ll get back to you today.

Courtenay & Rick

And then a follow up:

OK, I’ve talked it over with everyone (unanimous— “kyle? awesome!”)
I think you’ll fit into our team perfectly.

No in person interview. No phone calls. No technical test. They were confident enough in my pixels to give me what equated to my dream job at that point in my life.

Really fucking crazy.

This industry we work in is magical. For the first time in human history, it’s possible to be represented (almost) solely through the merits of your work. Build something magical, push it up to GitHub under a pseudonym, and you could become one of the most sought after programmers in the world.

Do great work. Reach out. Pixels don’t care. Exactly.

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Rogers has been responsive at doing this investigation. Here’s the recap.

• Double Plus: I recieved a call from the office of the president, promptly. They want to solve this. I got a very responsive person that seemed to understand the situation.
• Plus: They acknowledged I emailed several vice presidents in the company.
• Plus: I sent them a list of articles and support posts about phantom roaming charges. There apparently is a bug for older iOS devices (version iOS 4 and 5) where if the phone is set to auto download music and applications, data roaming will be activated. Neither Apple nor mobile companies that I know of have acknowledged this bug.
• Minus: I was offered the “if you buy the $100 package retroactively, we’ll forgive the rest of the bill” solution. I explained to the  representative, “That’s great, but that’s an admission of guilt and not a real solution.” These are electronic systems that have no physical cost for this roaming issue other than increasing profits.

I get it — not everyday are they going to get someone on the other end the designs iPhone applications, has travelled internationally, is comfortable with social media and can navigate email systems. But their customer service runs the risk every day when they mistreat customers. This is all bad press, and probably will cost them customers.

They would get a lot better press if they said, “We’ll forgive this,” and would probably get a renewed contract that’s worth over $2,000 over the next year. Otherwise, there’s a good chance they’ll lose a customer over this. Sean Van Tyne, a friend of mine, talks about how good service breeds loyal customers.

A great service design culture really starts from the top. Loyalty comes from the promises companies make to their customers. Period.

Here’s a few recommendations:

• Users should be able to remove automatic billing from their account. I get it, you want to get them on the phone. Comcast is a master of this, especially when you want to cancel the account, but their service representatives turn it into a sale. This, however, a) pisses off users and b) probably contributes to the customer service costs. I’m embarrassed as a member of the User Experience field that any UX Designer would allow Black Hat UX to happen.
• Connect the technical support and customer service systems. I shouldn’t have to be transferred every time another department needed to speak with me. There’s nothing more aggravating than, “I don’t know the answer to this, I need to transfer you.” Again, added costs for answering simple questions.
• Properly train your representatives on the devices your customers use. 30 percent of your customers use iPhones. If they don’t understand that the iPhone setting for data roaming are three screens down, or think the phones have magic powers, you have alienated 30 percent of your customer base. This isn’t a fragmented Android market — it’s a device that is a single hardware platform and very, very predictable.
• Look at issues, and resolve them by looking at the ROI. The amount of time spent on this issue by all parties involved will cost much more than the $619. As a former product manager, sometimes cutting your loses is best for the business.

More updates tomorrow. Stay tuned.

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