There is no secret (UX) ingredient
Think UX is easy after a few Figma tutorials? Think again — this one’s a reality check wrapped in a Kung Fu Panda punch
Yes, yes, yes, it’s really tough when we realize “it’s not like we thought it was”. Through my mentorship sessions, I meet lots of different people. What have I been noticing lately? Nobody tells you the whole truth about where you’re headed.
More and more people are jumping into the world of design, attracted by promises of high salaries and a fast career in UX/UI. Some have experience as graphic designers, others don’t. But no worries. The Internet is here for you.
What I’m thinking is, the Internet “slightly” misleads people who are looking for their path and wondering what to focus on. “Do these 5 things and success is guaranteed…”, “This is the only course you need and you’ll know everything about…” and on and on. People get tempted and are left with the impression that… maybe it’s really not that hard.
Over the years, I’ve done design before the Internet appeared, then during the boom when everyone had to have a website, then came the time when Flash sites were wow, after that apps, products…
During those years, I really liked skeuomorphism. There are many articles about why and how flat design appeared and took hold, the advantages from a UX perspective, etc. We won’t talk about that today. But back when design was skeuomorphic and there was no AI to draw it for you, being a designer didn’t seem so easy. Shadows, layers, highlights, and who knows what else. It definitely required skills.
Back then, to be on Dribbble, you needed an invitation and a recommendation. I remember my excitement when I got an invitation and could “be one of the chosen ones” too. Now it’s not like that, and some of us call places like that eye candy and design porn.
Maybe people are getting led on right now after watching a few Figma videos, taking a quick course, and learning how to draw rounded rectangles. Someone tells them the “good” values for border radius and they’re good to go. But you know, even if you just drag the corner to round it off by eye, that’s okay too. Plus, when you look at it, your screen is like the latest app from one of the multi-million dollar companies.
Everything’s great. We put the certificate on LinkedIn and start our first job.
It’s really cool being a designer. Your company gives you a brand new MacBook Pro (which maybe you’re using for the first time), you put on a few “designer” stickers, and you’re good to go.
Crashing into Reality
Oops. It wasn’t that easy. Someone told us not to be fooled by posts with a few flashy general tips that say if you don’t follow them you’re a loser, but who listens?
For me personally, these “quick truths” that everyone knows actually work differently though. They make me think and act.
The truth is, all the things we’ve heard and “are clear to us” (like, “Yeah, I know this, I don’t need a hint!”), are really true, but with one caveat. It’s not easy to apply them. You just read them, say to yourself “well yeah, that’s how it is,” but you don’t do anything. That doesn’t cut it.
Back to our heroes
But let’s get back to our designers, who after 1–2 months of clicking around in Figma, decide they can’t do this anymore (well, there are also more persistent people who don’t give up easily, they go through another “burnout” or two and a salary increase, they tolerate it for 2–3 years, but the moment comes when they say — Enough!). “We won’t put up with this “nasty manager who’s breathing down my neck and only knows how to give tasks”, “clients who ask for stupid things”, “bosses who don’t know what a design process is”, “a company where the maturity is bad”.
But turns out it wasn’t that easy in Figma either. Turns out there were a million things, you needed semantic variables too, and you had to name them differently, there was something like code syntax, but then who are the programmers to tell me how to name things and why they want them one way for Java and another way for the website. What if they’re different things and what if different teams are working? And there was something called Swift. Right? I’m the designer, I tell them how the design should be, and they “just” code it. And that dev lead who’s a hundred years old, he’s going to teach me what the modern things in design are. They should just stick to their VS Code and not give me advice.
Can’t do this anymore. Things need to change.
This UI thing wasn’t that easy, that Figma course I took that supposedly was everything I needed didn’t tell me I’d have to learn so many more things.
It’s not easy. But hey, AI is going to make interfaces anyway and take the UI designers’ jobs.
So, decision made. I was a UI designer, now I’ll be UX. I spent so much time clicking around in Figma, I have experience. I won’t be one of those little bees hovering over the screen and moving pixels.
Now I’ll be a UX designer. Or… actually, let’s go with product designer, sounds cooler.
Goodbye Figma
What’s so complicated about it anyway. Meetings in the wonderful office with snacks and Perrier water. (When Madonna was in Europe, she drank Perrier as well). You listen, you nod. Then you talk to people and don’t even write down what they tell you. I’m a modern designer. I just turn on my work iPhone to record and then give the audio to NoteGPT to pull out the most important stuff for me. You sketch out some quick diagrams on paper. Ah, that’s something else. I won’t ruin my eyes staring at where things moved by 1px, like before in Figma.
I want to be a UX designer. It’s not that complicated over there.
I scribble something on paper, give it to the UI designers, and tell them what to do. Then my job is to sit in meetings, look at the finished prototypes, give my expert opinion, and create even more work for them.
Decision made. This is it.
Hellooo! I have news for you. And it’s just 4 words — IT’S NOT THAT EASY!
P.S. Any resemblance to real people and events is purely coincidental. P.P.S. Artificial intelligence was not used in writing this article.
If you don’t feel like reading (Like, who has the time? If I read everything all the time…), here’s what you can take away:
- Don’t believe the “5 things that guarantee you…”.There’s no shortcut to success. Hard work, focus, and perseverance.There is no secret (UX) ingredient.
And for those who aren’t satisfied with the minimum, I recommend reading “The Psychology of Money: Timeless lessons on wealth, greed, and happiness” by Morgan Housel, and you’ll understand what he means when he says:
“It’s never as good as it looks. It’s never as fun as you imagine.”
What about you? What techniques do you use to uncover the real problem behind initial requests? Share in the comments! 💬👇
There is no secret (UX) Ingredient was originally published in UX Planet on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.
