Don't Become a UX/UI Designer BEFORE Considering These!

Summary

This video provides an honest look at the realities of being a UX designer in 2023. It highlights eight key challenges, such as the competitive job market, conflicting business and user priorities, the need to constantly learn new skills, and navigating workplace politics. It also addresses misconceptions about the role's creativity and the pressure of tight deadlines. The speaker shares personal insights from years of experience, emphasizing the importance of resilience, adaptability, and balancing stakeholder expectations to succeed in the fast-paced world of UX design.

Takeaways

• 😀 UX design requires significant effort and standing out in the current oversaturated market is challenging.
• 💼 Conflicting values exist in UX design; businesses prioritize revenue over user needs, which can be tough for some designers to accept.
• 📚 Constant learning is essential, as the UX field is evolving and designers must keep up with new skills to remain competitive.
• 📊 Managing stakeholders is a large part of the job, involving lots of meetings, defending ideas, and adapting to feedback.
• 🎨 UX design isn’t always as creative as expected. Most projects are business-driven with standardized design patterns and tight deadlines.
• 🕵️‍♂️ Designers must often handle both user and business needs, which can involve compromises and balancing different expectations.
• 🔥 Hustle culture is prevalent in tech, and while it's not mandatory, those who put in extra effort are more likely to advance quickly.
• 🙅‍♂️ New designers often face frequent rejections of their ideas due to a lack of stakeholder confidence, and building trust takes time.
• ⏰ Deadlines are often tight, with projects needing to be delivered faster than expected, requiring designers to work efficiently under pressure.
• 🏅 Despite the challenges, UX design can be highly rewarding, offering opportunities for career growth, creativity, and impact in various industries.

Q & A

What is the speaker's main purpose in sharing this video?

The speaker aims to share the honest realities of being a UX designer, offering insight into the challenges of the field so that viewers can make informed decisions about pursuing a career in UX design.

Why does the speaker mention the oversupply of UX designers in the market?

The speaker highlights that the oversupply of UX designers, due to the rise of boot camps, makes the market highly competitive. To stand out, new designers must work extra hard to be noticed and desired by potential employers.

What does the speaker mean by 'conflicting values' in UX design?

The speaker refers to the conflict between business goals and user needs. While UX designers focus on creating user-friendly experiences, businesses prioritize revenue and growth. Designers must learn to balance both business outcomes and user needs.

Why does the speaker emphasize the importance of learning new skills?

The speaker stresses that as the UX design industry matures, those who don’t continuously learn new and relevant skills will be replaced. Adapting to technological advancements, like AI, and diversifying skill sets are crucial for long-term success in the field.

What challenges does the speaker mention regarding stakeholder management?

The speaker points out that a significant part of the UX designer’s job involves managing stakeholders, attending meetings, and handling differing opinions. New designers should expect to have their ideas challenged and must be prepared to communicate and defend their work.

In what way is UX design less creative than some people expect?

UX design is less about artistic creativity and more about following standardized design patterns and meeting business-driven project requirements. While there is some creativity involved, particularly in finding ways to improve user conversions, the role often emphasizes efficiency and scalability.

How does hustle culture impact career advancement in UX design?

Hustle culture, where individuals treat work as play and put in extra effort, is prevalent in the tech industry. Those who are more passionate and work beyond the basic job requirements tend to get noticed and advance faster in their careers compared to those who treat it as a 9-to-5 job.

Why do new UX designers often struggle with getting their ideas accepted?

New UX designers frequently face rejection of their ideas due to a lack of stakeholder confidence. Building trust and gaining support for ideas requires experience, logical reasoning, and the ability to communicate and defend design decisions effectively.

What does the speaker mean by 'your deadline for your projects will always be yesterday'?

The speaker refers to the fast-paced nature of the UX design industry, particularly in tech companies that follow a lean startup model. Designers often face tight deadlines and need to deliver work quickly, which can be challenging for those who struggle with perfectionism or slower work styles.

Despite the challenges, why does the speaker still find UX design rewarding?

The speaker finds the UX design field rewarding because of the wide range of opportunities it offers, such as freelancing, building an agency, mentoring, and influencing businesses. Despite the challenges, the speaker believes that hard work and the right mindset lead to significant personal and professional rewards.

Outlines

00:00

🌍 Reflections on a UX Designer's Journey

The speaker reflects on their 14-year journey as a UX designer, sharing highlights like traveling the world, working with brilliant people, building products for millions, and even starring in a Microsoft ad. However, behind these exciting moments, the reality of UX design is quite different. The video aims to share the harsh truths of being a UX designer to help viewers make an informed decision about pursuing this career.

05:00

💼 The Challenge of Breaking into UX

The UX industry is becoming oversaturated with graduates from boot camps, making the job market noisy and competitive. Landing a first UX role requires a lot of hard work and standing out in a crowded field. If one isn't prepared to go the extra mile and put in significant effort, finding success in UX design will be challenging.

⚖️ Balancing Business and User Needs

Businesses prioritize growth and revenue over user needs. While UX designers focus on user experiences, it's crucial to understand that business outcomes often take precedence. Designers need to balance both user and business goals, and compromising on what's best for users will be a frequent part of the job.

🧠 Adapting to New Skills and AI

As the UX industry evolves, designers must continuously learn new skills. Those who don't may be replaced by others or even AI tools. UX designers, especially those focusing on UI, will need to interact more with customers, run workshops, and develop strategies to stay relevant. The speaker plugs a course on mastering user research and strategy to help designers grow in these areas.

🏛️ Navigating Stakeholder Politics

A significant part of a UX designer's role is managing stakeholders. Designers must be ready to communicate their ideas effectively and defend their work against frequent challenges. Navigating these politics is crucial, as stakeholders often hold decision-making power, and designers need to understand when to push back and when to go with the flow.

🎨 Limited Creativity in UX Design

UX design is not as creatively free as one might expect. Processes have become standardized, and projects are often driven by strict business requirements and deadlines. While there is still room for creativity, it's more about finding innovative ways to improve user flows or increase conversions rather than producing visually artistic designs.

🚀 Hustle Culture in the Tech Industry

The tech industry values individuals who go above and beyond. While treating a UX job as a regular 9-to-5 isn't necessarily bad, those who invest extra effort and passion are more likely to advance in their careers. Designers looking for quick wins or easy money might struggle in an environment where hustle is often appreciated and rewarded.

💡 Dealing with Rejection and Building Stakeholder Confidence

Many new UX designers face the disappointment of having their ideas rejected. Building confidence with stakeholders takes time, experience, and logical thinking. For those unwilling to develop a thicker skin or learn how to gain stakeholder trust, succeeding in this field will be challenging.

⏳ Deadline Pressure in UX Design

UX designers often work under intense time pressure, with deadlines that seem to always have been set for yesterday. In fast-paced tech companies, designers need to move quickly to meet expectations. For those who struggle with perfectionism or slower work pace, adapting to this high-pressure environment can be tough.

🏆 The Rewards of Hard Work in UX Design

Despite the challenges, the UX design field offers many rewards for those who can navigate it successfully. The speaker shares personal experiences of freelancing, building a multi-million dollar agency, and mentoring others. They encourage viewers to adopt the right mindset, work hard, and persist through difficulties to enjoy the benefits of a UX design career.

Keywords

💡UX Designer

A UX (User Experience) Designer focuses on creating products that provide meaningful and relevant experiences to users. In the video, the speaker discusses both the rewarding and challenging aspects of being a UX designer, emphasizing that while it can seem glamorous, it requires hard work, adaptability, and continuous learning to thrive in this field.

💡Bootcamps

Bootcamps are intensive, short-term training programs designed to quickly teach specific skills, such as UX design. In the video, the speaker critiques how many bootcamps are 'pumping out' UX designers with questionable teaching standards, leading to an oversaturated market. This creates a competitive environment where designers must work harder to stand out.

💡Business Growth vs User Needs

This concept refers to the tension between creating user-centered designs and meeting the financial goals of a business. The video highlights that while UX designers are tasked with improving the user experience, the ultimate priority for most businesses is revenue growth, meaning that user needs often take a back seat to business objectives.

💡Upskilling

Upskilling is the process of learning new skills to stay relevant in a profession. In the video, the speaker warns UX designers that the industry is constantly evolving, and those who don't continuously improve their skills, such as mastering AI or customer interaction, risk being replaced by more adaptable designers.

💡Stakeholders

Stakeholders are individuals or groups with a vested interest in a project's outcome. In the video, the speaker stresses the importance of UX designers learning to manage stakeholders, including communicating ideas and expectations effectively, as much of the job involves navigating politics and bureaucracy in meetings.

💡Creativity

Creativity in UX design is about finding innovative ways to solve user and business problems. The speaker notes that while UX design is not as artistically creative as it may seem, there are still opportunities to be creative in areas such as optimizing user flows or improving conversion rates, despite the constraints of standardized design patterns.

💡Hustle Culture

Hustle culture refers to the mindset of working long hours and going above and beyond to achieve success. The speaker discusses how this culture is prevalent in the tech industry, and while it's not mandatory to adopt this approach, those who do often advance more quickly in their careers. However, balancing work-life boundaries can be challenging for those who want to excel in UX design.

💡Stakeholder Confidence

Stakeholder confidence refers to the trust and belief that stakeholders have in a designer’s ideas and solutions. The video points out that building this confidence takes time and experience, and new UX designers often find their ideas dismissed early in their careers, requiring them to develop thicker skin and communication skills.

💡Lean Process

The lean process is an approach to product development that emphasizes speed and efficiency, often at the cost of extended planning or perfection. In the video, the speaker explains that UX designers in tech companies often face short deadlines due to this process, which prioritizes getting products to market quickly for testing and iteration.

💡Perfectionism

Perfectionism is the tendency to want to achieve flawlessness in work. In the context of UX design, the video warns that perfectionists may struggle with the industry's fast-paced environment, where deadlines are tight, and projects are often rushed to market before being fully refined.

Highlights

The UX design field offers global travel, collaboration with talented people, and the opportunity to work on impactful products.

Landing a first job in UX design is challenging due to the oversupply of designers and the need to stand out in a crowded market.

Businesses prioritize growth and revenue over user needs, requiring UX designers to balance business objectives with user experience.

Staying relevant in UX design requires continuous learning, including new skills like research and interacting with customers.

Managing stakeholders is a key part of the job, requiring designers to defend their work and communicate ideas effectively.

Creativity in UX design is often constrained by standardization, strict requirements, and business-driven projects.

Hustle culture is prevalent in tech, and those who treat work as play tend to advance faster, though it's not mandatory to adopt this mindset.

New ideas in UX design are often shut down, and building confidence with stakeholders takes time and experience.

Deadlines in UX projects are typically very short, making it necessary to work fast and manage perfectionist tendencies.

The UX industry is evolving with AI, requiring designers to adapt and learn how to work with AI technologies.

Soft skills, such as managing stakeholder expectations, are equally important as technical skills in UX design.

The balance between business needs and user needs is a constant challenge, and designers must navigate this dynamic carefully.

Upskilling in both UX and UI design is becoming crucial, as the industry continues to raise the bar for competency.

The tech industry's lean process emphasizes speed, meaning designers must work under high-pressure environments to deliver quickly.

Despite the challenges, the UX design field can be highly rewarding with the right mindset, hard work, and adaptability.

Transcripts

I have been a ux designer for over 14

years and I've loved every moment of it

it's given me the opportunity to travel

the world

meet some incredibly smart and talented

people build products used by millions

of people generate millions of dollars

as a former US agency owner and even

have the opportunity to do pull-ups

topless in a Microsoft ad why not

but behind all the fun and glamorous

moments the reality of being a ux

designer is very different

[Music]

and rarely do people actually talk about

it so this video is not to discourage

you to becoming a ux designer but

instead share the honest truths about

what it's like being a ux designer in

the real world

so you can make a better decision on

whether or not this is the right field

for you so let's dive into eight reasons

why you shouldn't become a ux designer

in 2023

now the first reason is that it's going

to take a lot of work you have to make a

lot of noise to stand out nowadays boot

camps and their questionable curriculums

and teaching styles are pumping ux

designers out like Japan's fastest Mochi

makers

that means the market is slowly being

over supplied and getting quite noisy

what this means for you is that you have

to put in extra work to stand out to

break through the noise be memorable and

be desired by potential Employers in

other words Landing your first job is

going to be hard and you are going to be

stretched so if working hard isn't on

your agenda then definitely think twice

the second reason is around conflicting

values the reality is that businesses

care about growth not users don't let

the title fool you yes we do design for

the user hence our title product and

user experience designer but if you ask

any veteran in the field they will tell

you a business outcome will always Trump

overt users needs and sadly a lot of

designers struggle with this one if you

can't accept the fact that businesses

have an agenda which is to generate lots

of Revenue pay back their debts and

their investors you will burn out in

this industry this is fine

things are going to be okay you have to

learn how to balance both business and

user needs and compromising on what you

think is best for the user will be a

daily activity

now the third reason is around getting

uncomfortable you'll have to learn new

skills you might not want to as a us

design industry continues to mature

designers that don't continue to learn

new relevant skills will soon be

replaced by someone who does or someone

who knows how to prompt an AI

effectively if you're a UI designer

that's used to working behind the

computer you are going to have to push

yourself and start talking to customers

run workshops and interact with people

more frequently now a quick plug if you

do want to master user research and

strategy and have always wanted to build

confidence in talking to customers

performing real analytical secondary

research and translating them into

practical strategies I have the perfect

course for you it's called the Practical

user research and strategy mask class

where you and I work through step by

step the entire process of how to

actually manage stakeholders form

strategies and perform primary and

secondary research there is a link in

the description to learn more about it

so check that out now on the flip side

if you or ux designer that really

struggles with the UI design side of

things you are going to have to learn

how to polish up your UI design skills

the Baseline for our industry is rising

so if upskilling isn't something you

enjoy doing it's going to be tough

the next reason is politics and

bureaucracy half of your job will be

managing stakeholders that's a fact yes

on top of research UI design managing

Design Systems and running workshops you

will be spending a big portion of your

time sitting in meetings and managing

stakeholder expectations when you are

new to the industry it's just assumed

that you just don't have that much

experience and most of the decision

makers you work with they will challenge

your ideas so if you thought designing

one version of your solution was enough

[Music]

The Joke is on You in the world of ux

design you need to learn how to

communicate your ideas educate your

stakeholders effectively and really be

ready to defend your work now my tip for

you is to know your place understand

that there is a time when you need to

push back but there is also a time to go

with the flow so if managing

stakeholders isn't something you enjoy

doing and you just dread it maybe think

twice

[Music]

the next reason is it's not as creative

as you might have thought ux design is

unlike art the processes for ux and UI

design have matured over the years and

the focus has been to make them more

efficient scalable and usable that means

a lot of design patterns are

standardized best practices have already

started forming projects are generally

constrained by strict requirements such

as tight deadlines and finally nearly

all projects are business driven all

these reasons are why most ux projects

don't allow for too much room for

creativity even though you see a lot of

these beautiful images on dribble and

behance but it is important to note that

there are other forms of creativity

required in these projects such as

creative ways to convert more visitors

into customers and tactics to reduce the

amount of people dropping off in the

sign up flow it's just not the

traditional form of creativity that you

might have thought of

[Music]

then we have hustle culture is

appreciated but not mandatory now the

tech industry is filled with extremely

passionate individuals that treat work

as play this includes both designers and

software Engineers these are the

individuals that get noticed and are

always favored by the business now I can

speak firsthand about this because that

was me when I was still engaged in

full-time roles I am not saying treating

work as a nine-to-five job is a bad

thing I'm just saying if you have goals

of advancing in your career making more

money it does make it harder for you to

advance if others are putting in more

time and effort than you so if you are

looking for a quick win or to make a

quick Buck this industry will chew you

up

thank you

then we have your ideas will be shut

down lots of new product and ux

designers struggle with this one they

entered the industry excited filled with

ideas but very quickly they notice every

single ideas of theirs are shut down I

call this a lack of stakeholder

confidence building confidence with

stakeholders takes time it takes

experience and logical and rational

thinking so if you don't plan on

building thicker skin learning how to

build confidence with stakeholders it's

going to be very hard for you

[Music]

now the last reason is that your

deadline for your projects will always

be yesterday oh you thought you had four

weeks to design an input field

jokes on you in our industry the US

design industry it's an inside joke that

the deadline for all projects was

yesterday simply because tech companies

they just work incredibly fast unless

you're at a large Enterprise if you

haven't read the book Lean Startup you

definitely should because most tech

companies adopt a lean process when

shipping digital products nowadays the

nature of this lean process specifically

favors speed to Market meaning the

faster you can get something out to

customers the quicker they can really

start testing and get results this means

that you will be working with short

deadlines and if you suffer from

perfectionism or just a slow work Pace

it won't be the business's fault but

your responsibility to work faster under

higher pressure environments to meet

their expectations now the list of

brutal realities goes on and on but if

if you can navigate yourself around

these areas and break through the noise

the product in ux design industry has so

much to offer and I can personally once

again speak firsthand about this from

influencing freelancing building my own

multi-million dollar agency teaching

mentoring advising Adventure capitalist

firms I've done it all and hands down if

I had to do it all over again I wouldn't

do it any other way once again it's

tough but I think with some hard work

the right mindset and attitude the

rewards are pretty damn good now if you

like this video make sure to gently

smash that like button subscribe for the

Die Hard fans and if you want to

continue learning make sure to check out

this video and I will see you in another

video very soon now the last point I'm

getting real hungry ah

now lastly your debt