Rounak Bose
User Experience Designer, NetBramha Studios
Kolkata, India
3 parts designer, 1 part tech-geek, 2 parts writer, 1 part truth-seeker, 2 parts space enthusiast and 1 part realist. Too many parts? Naah!
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A UX primer for lone-app developers
The experience that a User has with every part and aspect of a product or service is by far the determining factor as to whether the User would continue to be involved with that product. Most developers and designers forget these absolutely core principles of each design process and leave their users either dissatisfied, or frustrated, or worse - wondering why the app exists at all.
This lightning talk is essentially a primer for all app developers (more so, if they are lone-developers) to make sure that the experiences they craft don’t fall prey to the “immediate-uninstall” of apps post-installation and first-time use. And some of the most common mistakes that the developers make in terms of usability are tackled in this talk. Some of them are:
* Disconnecting with the User
* Designing for the Developer, and not the User
* Overwhelming (or, underwhelming) the User
* Confusing the User with Complexity
Creating an easy and pleasant experience is one of the primary goals that every designer has in mind. Helping Users to achieve their solutions is, more often than not, the main motive of every developer. But for every single person involved in the process of app-development, it is necessary that their thought process works in a way that satiates the Users on both fronts. The experience and usability part of it, and the visual appeal are almost equally responsible for the success of an app. And it all boils down to not making Users think too much.
Through my studies in Visual Design, as well as in Experience Design, I have come up with a set of guidelines that will help all developers and designers by giving them a gentle nudge in the right direction, towards making more meaningful and pleasant experiences, all the while not forcing the User to put in much thought.
All developers will benefit from the talk in the way that is most significant to them - to craft excellent usable and useful experiences that will stay on the Users’ phones, thus implying a long-term place for these apps in their lives.
A design-centric approach to development
Developers don’t design, right? Product Managers don’t design, right? Interviewers, focus group moderators, sales in-charges don’t design, right?
Wrong - this is where most of us fail to understand the true implications of what “design” actually entails.
Design is not fancy gradients and layouts - that is just art. Design is understanding what to do, and taking decisions - coming up with how to do it, it is a never-ending process. Good design lies hidden, and that is what needs to be unearthed for everyone, so as to understand its true potential.
The development of a product or a service is the first stage in its lifecycle, that often overlaps into subsequent stages. So it is extremely crucial that a design-centric approach be adopted to make sure that everything created is - right from the start - being done in the best interests of all people who could possibly be affected by the process. It is extremely important to notice that I didn’t use the term “users”. I would love to introduce the uninitiated, to the term “DMU” or “Decision Making Unit” that every developer and designer and marketer and product manager needs to know of.
Basically, the DMU has 5 main roles -
* The Initiator
* The Decider - almost always, also the Buyer
* The Influencer
* The User
* The Gatekeeper
Consequently it is vital to design not only for the “user” that we speak of so casually. Because as it turns out, if the experience of any of the above roles is sub par, the chances of survival for the product decreases manifold.
Moving forward, it is quintessential to make design the driver, for the freight-train, that is each existing problem that needs solving. And to that end I will be covering 5 main topics that every person, closely associated with a product/service needs to understand thoroughly. They are -
1. Phases of design for any product/service
2. Methods of design for each phase
3. All that will go right through this approach
4. What could go wrong if this is neglected
And lastly, I will follow-up with an analysis of -
5. What actually went wrong when I failed to apply this system to my work, and how the damage could have averted.
This talk is aimed to help everyone understand how design has the potential to guide your workflow from NDA’s to deployment, and even after. Through my work and research in Experience Design, I can show you how crafting something as simple as a Concept feature Lattice, at the beginning of every project and performing procedures like Kano Analysis will help you gain design direction and steer you away from dangerous traps - a common one being, developing to solve a problem we create on-spot to “just make something”, rather than designing for finding solutions to existing problems.
And all this for one common goal - to develop, to build, to solve - with a design-centric approach.
droidcon Italy Sessionize Event
droidcon India 2019 in Chennai Sessionize Event
Rounak Bose
User Experience Designer, NetBramha Studios
Kolkata, India
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