A general technique that's helpful in many kinds of UX workshops and design ideation is to first have team members work independently to create diverging ideas and solutions. Then, as a separate step, everybody works together to converge on the final outcome.
Advice on how to balance breadth and depth of skill within the many different subdisciplines of the user experience profession. You can't be great at everything, so how do you choose where to specialize in your UX career?
Will the UX field value people who change careers from another field and want to become user experience professionals? Will the field still value them if they're a bit older, and how do they compete with fresh graduates?
At the virtual UX Conference, Jakob Nielsen was asked "What's the most interesting UX topic at the moment?" Answer: better support for remote lifestyles.
Some designers feel that they know everything about UX, including how to do research, so is there any value in having others contribute, whether dedicated user researchers or external consultants?
Your portfolio must play two roles when you apply for a UX job: first, persuade the hiring manager to bring you in for an interview (or even a first screening call) and then support you during the interview itself.
At the Virtual UX Conference, Jakob Nielsen answered audience questions on how to advance through various career stages: before getting your first job, and being successful as you grow your user experience skills and expertise.
Most online events are boring and people tune out, and yet the Virtual UX Conference was a success with strong audience engagement and high feedback scores. Why?
How to maximize team participation and the value of the outcome when running a UX workshop remotely. Different platforms have different benefits and downsides, so choose depending on your circumstances and needs.
We asked a group of user experience professionals what makes for efficient UX leadership in their experience. Answers differed but included a lot of soft skills.
After each sprint, the team should have a retrospective session to identify what went well or not so well. The sailboat metaphor is a nice way to structure such retrospectives.
When the organization and your coworkers don't understand UX, we have to apply our own methods to communicate more clearly with the target audience for our work.
3 quick game-like activities you can use with participants in a UX workshop to get the team energized and ready to be creative and productive before turning to the real work of the meeting.
Design and development projects are highly multidisciplinary with team members with a variety of skills and vocabulary use, sometimes with conflicting definitions of terms. A kickoff meeting can make sure everybody is on the proverbial same page regarding all the team members' skills and responsibilities.
Anybody who's already a good UI designer and can make great screens, has a big head start to becoming a good UX designer, but more is required to excel in this expanded role.
To maintain focus in a UX workshop, set aside ideas in a "parking lot" if they diverge from the stated agenda. Parked ideas should be discussed later when they won't slow the team's momentum in addressing the meeting's main topic. Here are 3 guidelines for making the most of a parking lot.
UX workshops can drive projects forward and build consensus but are only a valuable use of time when the agenda is defined from the goals you want to achieve. Here's a 3-step process for designing a useful workshop agenda in UX projects.
Use the affinity diagramming method with stakeholders and members to efficiently categorize then prioritize UX ideas, research findings, and any other rich topics. Work together to quickly develop a shared understanding among your team.
