{"id":5164,"date":"2016-10-07T11:37:00","date_gmt":"2016-10-07T09:37:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/careerfoundry.inbearbeitung.de\/en\/blog\/uncategorized\/how-do-ux-designers-work-within-a-team\/"},"modified":"2021-08-03T13:08:03","modified_gmt":"2021-08-03T11:08:03","slug":"how-do-ux-designers-work-within-a-team","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/careerfoundry.inbearbeitung.de\/en\/blog\/ux-design\/how-do-ux-designers-work-within-a-team\/","title":{"rendered":"How Do UX Designers Work Within a Team?"},"content":{"rendered":"

It\u2019s what every good company strives for: teamwork. Warwick Business School<\/a> have found that the evolutionary roots of teamwork stretch all the way back to chimpanzees. Professional teamwork was first researched in the 1920s by Professor Elton Mayo who concluded that people who were made to feel involved or more important did better in the workplace.<\/p>\n

UX design is no different. The work of a UX designer touches many different departments and you need to collaborate effectively with all of them to ensure the product is a success. Unfortunately, like good communication, teamwork is often one of the essentials that gets forgotten when people are busy or working remotely.<\/p>\n

In this article we look at how a UX designer can leverage teamwork to create mutually beneficial working relationships, inspirational products, and the best possible user experience.<\/p>\n

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First impressions<\/h2>\n

Interactions with the rest of the team can be tricky as a new UX designer for various reasons. As a relatively new field, people might not really be sure what UX is, and as such they might not know what you are there to do. Brown bag lunches are a great way of letting people know what your job entails (we’ve created\u00a0an overview on what a UX designer does<\/a>).<\/p>\n

Talk through the benefits of well thought out UX design, the processes you use, and provide some slides with some examples of work you\u2019ve done previously. You could use your portfolio<\/a> if it is your first UX position.<\/p>\n

The 4mat system<\/a> where you explain, as simply as possible, the why, what, how and what if is a great way of structuring your slides so that you cater for many different learning styles.<\/p>\n

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Senior management<\/h2>\n

The good news is that senior management are taking UX seriously otherwise they wouldn\u2019t have employed you. However, like with the rest of the team, they might not be entirely sure what UX entails.<\/p>\n

A common issue is senior management being keen on the visual aspects (i.e. \u2018making things pretty\u2019) but be less aware of the benefits of thorough user research<\/a> and usability testing<\/a>.<\/p>\n

One way to get them on your side is with quantitative data, so start gathering a great set of UX metrics<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

All senior people want to know that you are going to help them reach targets and make money. Explain to them how great user research can help them to make informed business decisions. If you don\u2019t have any metrics for the product already, start off with some figures from other sources.<\/p>\n

I recommend having a look at the article 13 Impressive Statistics on User Experience<\/a> for some ideas. For example, espn.com<\/a> revenues increased by a massive 35% after they incorporated user feedback into their homepage redesign and 88% of online consumers are less likely to return to a site after a bad experience.<\/p>\n

It is also important to build up your own set of figures for the product so that the return on UX investment can be measured, and you can show that there is an effective UX strategy in place.<\/p>\n

Google\u2019s HEART framework<\/a> is a great way of measuring the quality of user experience. It incorporates Happiness, Engagement, Adoption, Retention and Task Success. They recommend picking two of the areas to focus on and then building metrics around them.<\/p>\n

\u2018Adoption\u2019 includes new subscriptions created and purchases made and \u2018retention\u2019 which includes renewal rates and repeat purchases are usually metrics that senior execs want to see. You can always check what would be most useful for them to see based on the business priorities, and start building a collection of data points to benchmark monthly or quarterly so improvements can be tracked.<\/p>\n

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Web developers and product team<\/h2>\n

A UX designer\u2019s main interactions on a day-to-day basis will be with developers and the product team.<\/p>\n

Different teams work in different ways so it best to ask for a run down of all processes when you first start and then see where your UX design skills can be added to the mix. Some ideal places to add UX input are:<\/p>\n

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  1. Conducting competitor and other industry research<\/strong> to see what other products are already on the market and where the opportunities and threats are.<\/li>\n
  2. Initial user research<\/strong> in the form of surveys, focus groups, etc to check assumptions.<\/li>\n
  3. User testing<\/strong> based on early prototypes to check the product is on the right track.<\/li>\n
  4. Most development teams nowadays work to some sort of Agile<\/a> methodology. If this is the case, attend sprint planning and sprint review meetings<\/strong> as the voice of the user. Other team members may have different priorities, e.g. getting the project finished quicker so be prepared with business cases about why a certain feature is best for the user.<\/li>\n
  5. Usability testing<\/strong> to check that the product is usable and intuitive.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    Be sure to meet with people face-to-face as much as possible, either at morning stand ups or informally in the office to discuss user needs or to go through wireframes.<\/p>\n

    It can be really nerve-wracking as a new UXer to show off wireframes in formal meetings, so until you feel more confident, it is a good idea to sit amongst the development team so you can grab them, as the technical experts, for quick ad hoc advice. It\u2019s also good to be near the developers so you can answer any questions they have while building features.<\/p>\n

    Finally remember: it takes time and effort before new processes become the norm. Sometimes it can seem to developers in particular like time wasting or adding unnecessary steps, as many of them are used to starting to build products or features without UX processes in place.<\/p>\n

    Be patient, keep gently reinforcing the benefits of solid user research (e.g. them not having to do work again) and be friendly even when frustrated- however hard it can be.<\/p>\n

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    Marketing<\/h2>\n

    You might not be living in each other\u2019s\u2019 pockets as much as with other teams, but it is likely you will interact with the marketing team too. They are a really useful team to have on your side, as there are plenty of crossovers between UX and marketing.<\/p>\n

    Both professions are interested in research and understanding human behaviour, building loyalty, and improving the overall experience – the better the UX, the easier the product will be to market to its audience.<\/p>\n

    Some potential areas for collaboration include:<\/p>\n