Choose job stories over user stories
What's inside: Experience economy, design leadership, aesthetic-usability effect, AI + ideation, universal color, design strategy, and more.
Newsletter • October 13, 2023 • 5 min read
Hey folks,
Here are the top 10 things I found worth sharing and your UX tip of the week.
UX tip of the week
Consider replacing user stories with job stories.
The problem with user stories:
They typically contain characteristics or demographics that don’t help to explore why they might behavior with a certain feature.
They assume the action proposed is the best action the user should take to solve a problem.
They ignore or leave out important context and motivation for taking an action.
The benefits of job stories:
Designed to be independent of solutions to facilitate better understanding of customer wants and needs.
Provide the background for a solution rather than define the feature direction.
Ensure that the solution focuses on the best action the user should take to solve the problem.
The typical job story structure is:
“When [trying to do something], I want to [motivation] so that [outcome].”
Attach research findings that illuminate the problem in context for best results.
Top 10 things worth sharing this week
We operate within an economy driven by experiences, and it’s the experiences products provide us that create differentiation and market staying power. Learn more: The Experience Economy and The Power of Moments.
Design was mentioned as 1 of the 5 jobs that potentially won’t get eliminated by AI based on the supplied evidence. Agree or disagree?
Explore how designers can turn into design leaders from Jared Spool. Dig into these for more insightful stories: Emotion By Design and Creative Confidence.
For the job hunters: Pavel Samsonov shared their CARDIO framework for interviews. Adam Glynn-Finnegan spoke about what separates great designers from good ones: “I think it’s really important to be pragmatic and flexible.”
“Once you have AI engines that write, design, or do things, the threshold for what counts as creativity gets more clearly illuminated.” Michael Bierut on design before and after the computer and why AI might not be so bad after all.
Have you seen Beasts of England’s type library? Pick up a fine-crafted font or two (like I just did).
Greg Laklouf breaks down service vs. business vs. strategic design: “Service Designers unlock user value, Business Designers seize market opportunities, and Strategic Designers ignite design-led strategic outcomes. Together, they form a symphony of value multiplication, harmonizing the art and science of Design Strategy.”
Consider these recommendations of how to work with universal color in a sustainable manner to avoid being affected by trends, culture, or symbolism.
The aesthetic-usability effect means users believe beautiful-looking products will be easier to use. To overcome this, make an intentional roadmap plan to balance look/feel and usability/a11y improvements.
On Ideation and AI: “Design thinking fulfills a key purpose beyond idea generation. The reliance on design thinking facilitates open discussion and builds consensus across functional teams to move forward and evolve those ideas. AI on its own can’t do that.”
Thanks for reading!
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Sincerely,
Gerren