EP1. Welcome to the UserFlows Podcast! UX Design & Careers
Howdy and Hello! This is the trailer episode for the UserFlows Podcast. I'm creating this podcast to be a place for us to discuss User Experience Design, getting started as a UX/Product Designer, and how someone would make the transition from their current field to the field of UX design.
Welcome to the UserFlows podcast. I'll be your host Thomas Morrell, I am a father, husband, and designer. Thanks for joining me on this journey. So I want UserFlows to be a place for those interested in UX design to learn more about the field and hopefully help someone find their first job in UX or help someone already working in the field to hone their skills a little bit more. This intro podcast will just be me speaking but over the coming months, I plan on talking to designers who have switched careers from other industries such as Accessibility, Bio-Medical Engineering, Architecture, and more.
I'll talk to designers who went to 4-year universities, designers who have no traditional training at all, or attended one of the ever-popular and growing UX boot camps that have become so popular. We'll talk to designers who are working in the field day in and day out. Some on big, exciting popular apps, and others working on systems we've never heard of.
The idea is to talk to pros, regular people who have made the switch and are excelling in the field. They may not be the big names in the industry, they may not have a book or big project to promote, they'll be the types of people who just want to share what they know to help you get to the next level in your own journey.
The reason I want to talk about this topic, in particular, is because this is exactly what I did. I transitioned from a career in Graphic Design/Visual Design which is fairly closely related. I've seen a number of other designers fail to make the switch or show interest in making the switch, but never quite get there. They may not have been sure where to start, intimidated, or any other list of reasons. So hopefully this podcast will give you some guidance on where to start, what's truly important to know and to learn, and what's going to advance your career the quickest.
What is UX design
For those five of you in the world who may be unfamiliar with the term UX. It’s short for User Experience Design. UX designers work on all your favorite digital products like apps, websites, and even ticketing systems where you buy your train or plane tickets.
The actual definition goes something like this:
“UX design is the process of enhancing human interaction and satisfaction with a product or service.”
In my humble opinion. It is essentially product design, except with a focus on digital or screen-based products. A UX designer will employ skills like empathy, user research, Information Architecture, raA UX designer will employ skills like empathy, user research, Information Architecture, rapid prototyping, data analysis, and usability testing to repeatedly iterate on a product or “enhance human interaction and satisfaction”. I’ll talk more about what UX is and how to build your skills in each of those activities above at another time. We’ll dive into the differences between UX, web design, and other design practices in later blog posts. Today is just me saying “Hello World.”
Why work as a UX designer?
UX designers are very much in demand at the moment as they can bring a lot of value into an organization and are typically responsible for designing the products a company sells or licenses. This can either make the company a lot of money or cost them dearly. Either in launching a product no one wants to use or in launching a product with a bad experience that leads to thousands of calls flooding a call center instead of thousands of dollars flowing into their pockets. So companies have to be very selective about who they let in the door and who they let design their products. This podcast will focus on how to be that person that gets in the door.
Thousands of aspiring designers are flocking to the profession and for good reason. The jobs are aplenty and the pay makes it more than worthwhile. According to this adobe article. Hiring Trends in UX Design. The 6 things you need to know about techs fastest growing field. "Eighty-seven percent of managers said hiring more UX designers is the top priority for their organization: higher than graphic designers (76%) and product managers (74%), and tied with software engineers for the top spot." Not only is it a highly in-demand job, but for the most part, it can be very rewarding. Plus, you can find work almost anywhere even working remotely in many cases.
Now take a recent Salary Guide put out by Cella. A staffing and consulting firm I've personally used in the past to land a job. Mid-range UX/UI designers are making $95,000. $130,000 on the high end. Compare that to what they say graphic designers are making. $61,000 mid and $90,000 high. That's a huge gap. On top of that visual designers are capping out at $100k and web designers at $91,500. If you're interested in seeing more. Download their guide. Those salaries sound pretty good right. From the experience of working near a big city, those salaries go up a lot higher especially at big tech firms and other companies that rely on a top of industry experience. If you're a graphic designer or a web designer, you could see your salary increase by over 40% by putting in a couple of years of hard work to learn the UX process. That's a pretty good incentive.
I guess I should introduce myself before we get started.
My name is Thomas Morrell. I'm a User Experience designer living in the great state of New Jersey. I'm currently a Senior Product Designer for a FinTech company. In the past, I've worked as the Lead Product Designer for one of America’s largest financial institutions.
I am currently a Lead User Experience designer focusing mostly in the fintech space. I’ve recently completed projects for Mobile and SaaS application experiences for companies like Prudential (NYSE: PRU), IDT (NYSE: IDT), and Aon (NYSE: AON). I've worked in digital product development, marketing, branding & art direction for interactive products, print design, and the built environment.
Previous to being a UX designer I worked for some very cool companies as a graphic designer, art director, and creative director. I later moved to working on branding and environmental graphic design/interiors for luxury hotel and hospitality chains with a company called Zeff Design. At Zeff, I got to work on countless website and interactive projects like digital kiosks and wayfinding systems. Which I believe is where I got the spark to move to User Experience Design.
When my time there came to an end. I was lucky enough to run my own digital design agency Swell Media Group for 5 years or so serving clients like Novartis, Zabar’s, MetLife, and Aon. Swell functioned as a digital partner for a number of companies handling every aspect of digital design for their businesses. Branding, web design, social media, blogging, SEO, and email marketing also more traditional marketing services like tradeshow marketing, printed literature, and more. At this point, I became obsessed with experience design and so I put myself back through school to earn a certificate in UX design/HCI from UC San Diego. The course was offered through the Coursera platform and this allowed me to then dive headlong into UX and product design full time. I haven’t looked back since.
My promise to you?
Let me tell you a story about a company I recently worked at. At this company, we had the different UX disciplines completely siloed from one another. Information architects did their work, business & product owners created requirements, UX designers built wireframes, visual designers made them beautiful and UI Developers coded and released the product to the world. Then UX researchers would look into how the product performed. This was not an ideal setup. It’s not lean and it’s not cost-effective. The company realized this and broke down those silos in possibly the worst fashion possible. The entire research team was laid off. A number of UX designers, UI developers, and visual designers were all let go too. Leaving a group of the more all-around designers to handle all the projects on their own. The thinking was that everyone on the team should be a T-Shaped designer which in itself is not a bad thing. It means they can do a little bit of everything (the horizontal bar of the “T”) and also have really deep knowledge of one particular practice (the vertical part of the “T”). Everyone from thereon forward was expected to be a “Product Designer.”
Designers were expected to run the full product design spectrum. For myself and a few others, this was a natural fit. I had been practicing UX design for a number of years and came from a visual design background. I also quite enjoy the research aspect so I felt right at home as a Product Designer. Others, however, who moved from visual design or front-end engineering were not as comfortable working with business partners to frame problems and grasp requirements. Do the upfront research and launch their own usability studies. A few of us tried to spread the knowledge throughout our group and lend a hand as we could. In the end though. A few people made the transition and flourished and a few others were, unfortunately, let go. The company thinking seemed to be "We don't have the time to train people". This sadly seems to be the thinking in a lot of organizations. So the onus is going to be on you the designer to build up your skills on your own.
So that story is what's leading me to create this podcast. To help those individuals who have the task of making the transition from visual designer or any other field to UX designer and make that transition as seamless for them as possible. So if you are willing. I will try and be your guide, we’ll get into the weeds together. All I can offer is my experience and knowledge. I will strive for complete transparency and honesty when answering any questions you may have. If you ask me a question or to review your portfolio, I will give my unfiltered feedback. Maybe that’s a good or bad thing depending on how you look at it.
What’s in it for me, you ask?
Right, why would a person put his opinions into the ring with a group of possibly the most opinionated people in the world (yeah, I’m talking to you designers). What do I expect to get out of this? Well for one, it’s a creative outlet. As a designer, I don’t write much and I don’t get to design for myself much either. I mainly focus on combining other people's copy with other people's imagery to relay someone else’s intent. With this, however, I can say what I mean and design it any way I choose. As a designer who typically works for corporations, I’m almost a little uncomfortable with that kind of freedom. Secondly, I’m starting this so I can learn how to podcast. Podcasting is obviously exploding. You can create your own television show on youtube or your own radio show for nearly free and people seem to be hungry for this kind of real content made specifically for their niche interest. Why would I not want to learn how to do this? This is the future of communication. There are no more gatekeepers. Literally, everyone now owns the keys to broadcasting. Personally, I spend far too much of my time watching other people's videos, listening to other people's podcasts, and reading other people's words. It was time for me to create my own thing.
Also, as I grow in my design career. I’m faced with the fact that I have to lead, manage and inspire others around me. It’s something I’ve put off for most of my career but is becoming inevitable. In order to better serve them. I want to have my thinking clearly laid out and my process refined so that I can share information with them and you that will guide, help, and instruct as you grow. So that’s the deal, we’re going to grow together. You and me. Let’s do this.
What can I do for you?
So tell me about your journey. I don’t care if it’s been a forty-year journey or forty minutes. How can I help you on that journey? Feel free to ask me a question, I’m happy to give interview guidance, review resumes, portfolios, and the like. Send them on over. DM me through any of the following: Instagram, LinkedIn or email them here.
Links from the show:
Adobe: Hiring Trends in UX Design: The 6 Things You Need to Know About Tech’s Fastest Growing Field
Cella: 2021 Creative, Marketing And Digital Salary Guide
Coursera HCI Course: Interaction Design Specialization
Your Host: https://www.instagram.com/userflows.live/