Subscribe
Share
Share
Embed
Get a seat at the table and build the design career you want. This podcast is for designers looking to break in, level up, and take control of their careers—whether you're freelancing, climbing the corporate ladder, or just trying to get noticed. Every two weeks, we dive into career fundamentals, design best practices, and the hottest topics in the design community.
I saw it in the wild recently. I I was working on it, and then they gave me a list of feedback from their client, and it was literally part of the list. The logo needs to be bigger. I mean, it's it's a joke. It's a meme.
Nick:But then I was reminded that it's actually a thing and it hasn't happened to me in years. Can you make the logo bigger? But it's it's still real. Anyway, it made me think of that occurrence about what you said with getting the UX right the first time. I think we as designers, we are we are kind of live now.
Nick:This is what I always wanted to say.
Tyler:We are live. And we're officially live.
Nick:We are officially live. Exactly. I mean, this is just an experiment.
Tyler:Hello. Hello. Hello. How are we doing? How has your last week been?
Nick:Last week's been good. Busy in a good way. Lots of lots of projects to work on. How about your good. Your week?
Tyler:Same. Same. A lot of projects on the go, a lot of context switching, which is good sometime sometimes. But it's been it's been a good week.
Nick:Depends how often you have to switch context. I mean, I I noticed within myself, if I do if I do three or four projects on a day or more, that that's too much. So what I'm doing now is now I'm dividing my day into, like, before lunch and after lunch. So before lunch, it's client one. After lunch, it's client two.
Nick:So it's less content switching and folks switching, but it's and it's also calmer. Like, I'm not stressing. Like, oh, I have also to do clients two, three, and four. Now I just know, okay. Client two is after lunch.
Nick:Client three is tomorrow morning. You know? So that's been really helpful. Just use bigger blocks in my schedule rather than many small ones.
Tyler:A good tip. Yeah. I think I max out it to projects, like, simultaneously during the day. Blocking out morning and afternoon is probably I'm gonna take that one up Yeah. If I if I can, if I don't get doesn't
Nick:work all the time. You know? No. Silly things can happen. This week, it got away from me a little bit in the end.
Nick:At the end of the week, I had a few more meetings than usual, also some promises I made for projects, and then I'm like, I well, I've promised these things, but I also have a meeting or two extra. This might be a conflict. You know? So then the the the context switching is is back to the the old way of, you know, more than once on a day. But that's part of freelance design life and perhaps even in in in your, like, in house life as well.
Nick:I I imagine you having stakeholders who send you an email last minute. It's like, hey. Can you do this thing? I need it yesterday.
Tyler:I think less so. I think I don't I don't we don't even use email, to be fair. Like, I don't know. I don't I use email rarely. The the only time we actually use email is if we're booking interviews or sessions with clients.
Tyler:The rest is Slack, which is more active than, I think, than email because they see your little green a little bubble in your Slack. They know you're online. So please, hey. Hey. I I need you for a second.
Nick:I mean, you can you can also set it to the red bubble.
Tyler:Right? Yes. You can. But, I mean, we all have working hours, so it should be on
Nick:Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Of course. Of course.
Nick:Anyway, nice little, you know, kind of off topic talk to begin. But today, like, the main topic is is myths, like UX myths. One thing I really want to mention before we actually start is that it's a two way street. So it's things people believe who are not designers about designers, and also the other way around. So the things we still believe as a community that might not be true anymore or have never been true at all.
Nick:And, also, I think some myths might be busted, some might turn out to be true. And then it's just truth rather than a myth. So that's what I've been thinking in preparation for this this recording. Like, it's most important thing being that it's a two way street. Like, there are things that we tell ourselves that hold us back, I think.
Tyler:That's very true. Well, you can call us the one of my favorite shows was the Mythbusters. So you can call us the design Mythbusters for today's episode.
Nick:Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, man. I remember watching that show.
Nick:Lots of fun. Yeah. Do do you want to kick things off? Do you have something that annoys you or something something you have to explain all the time in mind that might be a good first attempt to to to be busted?
Tyler:I think I think UX is just about making things look pretty is Mhmm. I think is top of mind, which I think in the product designer or designer or whatever variation of the title we use Mhmm. There's a connotation with with with with art or making something look great, which isn't always the case. Ask the question, does everything need to be pretty? Sometimes Oh,
Nick:we're we're we're going deep right away.
Tyler:I think I think we get stuck in, like, the for that one specifically, I think there was a time when Dribbble was the most active things in our lives. Like, oh, I gotta upload my thing to Dribbble, and it's all about this this aesthetic world. But I think LinkQX is having everything in into the picture, not just how it looks, but also how it functions. Does it solve the problem, etcetera?
Nick:Well, that is also because of the word design, you know, in your job title. And that's that's one thing I struggle with if I have to explain what I do somewhere. You know? Like, my my my wife came home recently after work, and she told me, like, well, they asked they asked me what you do at work. You know?
Nick:And I I was, you know, interested and and proud that it's been brought up and and that kind of stuff. But at the same time, I'm like, I hope they I hope they understand. You know? I hope they get it, which is I think this kind of ironic, like, if we are about user experience and things being easy to use and understand, and then me thinking, like, I hope they understand this. I hope they don't think I'm a designer that makes things pretty.
Nick:You know? So so I, yeah, I really I really connect with the thing you're saying, like, the the the making things pretty. You know, back in the day, I always said in my my bio or about section on portfolio or all these places where you explain yourself, I I mentioned exactly what you just said. Like, well, it's about making things useful. But now to today, and I'm not sure if this is AI influenced or not, but today, I'm thinking, why not both?
Nick:Like, why not make things pretty and useful? Because I think we can, and I also think not enough people do. You know? That's why my my the thing I'm afraid of is that we are using it as an excuse to not be, you know, officially, like, officially strong designer. You know?
Nick:Well, it can be ugly because it's useful. You know? So that might be something where a wrong direction we might be going in. I'm sure you think about this. But
Tyler:I do like both. I think the ideal is fifty fifty just because, like, I'm passionate about, like, the aesthetic part or, like, the design part. But imagine, like, using a product that's beautiful, and then there's a value attached to that. Right? Anything that kind of looks great, same thing with, like, physical products.
Tyler:Anything that looks great and then is also useful just adds that a bit of extra or that differentiator between, like, other products in the market. There's definitely opportunity to use design as a differentiator from, like, other products in the market. So does this look good on my screen? Do I enjoy it? Does it, like, I get to use this this piece of software?
Tyler:And, also, gets my job facilitates getting me
Nick:my job done. I mean, it's it's something you could do. I mean, you could position yourself as someone who makes things stunning, you know, not just look good, but Mhmm. Out of this world fantastically beautiful. I mean, that's something you could do.
Nick:It'd be all about the animations and the micro animations. Not too much, like we discussed, like, two episodes ago about motion, but, I mean, you can do the Apple products landing page style thing. I mean, that could be your your your main thing, and then it's all about designing something beautifully. So I think for this myth that it's okay, basically. I think it's okay to make to it's okay to for people to consider you as someone who makes things look good because it's something you do.
Tyler:Yeah. It is true.
Nick:Yeah. And, I mean, this could be its its own episode, like, because then and now I really have to hold myself back and not say unless, and then start a new rant. You know? But because we have many many more myths to to discuss, let's I I would say let's unless you have something to say still. But from my end, at least, I'm going to put a pin in it and say nothing more about this myth.
Tyler:So Same. I have a I I'm I'm loaded up with follow ups, so I'm gonna put a pin on this one.
Nick:Alright. Alright. Well, you you have lots of follow ups. Go ahead, please.
Tyler:I'll just say one last thing before we move on to the next myth.
Nick:There goes the pin. The pin the pin is out.
Tyler:The pin is out. I'll say there is a sentiment within, like, the design community that, like, we just do design, but we have the capability to to reach beyond just the aesthetic. So within like, whether it's freelance or in house, just like having someone reach out and say, hey. Can you make this pretty? Is a small part of what we do.
Tyler:The other part is the strategic part. Last thing I'd say. Yeah. Well, nothing wrong with that. If you're a freelancer and someone comes to you and they they say, like, well,
Nick:I have this this generated prototype. It looks doesn't look good at all. I need it to look better for me to convince my potential client. Can you do this in a day? No freelancer is going to be like, well, no.
Nick:No. Thank you. You can keep your money. You know? So unless you're fully booked, of course, but, you know, something happened to me this week in that regard.
Nick:And I was like, yeah. Yeah. Sure. Of course. And I'm six hours in already, and it's looking way better.
Nick:And, you know, the invoice is out, so nothing wrong with making things look better. Anyway, what's, what follow-up do you have, your your next myth?
Tyler:Next myth is UX designers work to create a delightful user experience.
Nick:Oh, yeah. Yeah. I think that's related to what we discussed recently about design education. I read a post recently from someone who to me, it felt like his dream just his bubble just bursted. You know?
Nick:It's it's he came out of school, and it's all about, you know, the user and user centric work and that kind of thing. And then he's like all these these job interviews, job openings, and and their requirements, they they don't mention the user at all. But school told me this. Yeah. What's going on?
Nick:So, like, that's something I I can really I really think should be busted is that you work for you know, someone hires you to make money first. Yes. So you have to help them achieve that goal first, and luckily, that's in part that's done by making the user experience better, you know, making it easier for someone to sign up, easier for someone to complete the jobs to be done that makes that make the the products they're part of useful, you know, and that because of it, will stay longer, pay more, upgrade their subscription, or not cancel, that kind of thing. But you should position yourself as someone who's like, hello, person that can hire me. I can help you achieve your business goals.
Nick:You know? You don't have to fly the the the I'm user first banner. You know? It's it's something you can can do on the job that they don't have to understand. So you're you're playing a a double role, basically.
Tyler:Well, because they're they're all linked in a sense. Yes. You're from the business point of view or or the person who hired you, they wanna make money. So can we develop features that push the retention lever, conversion lever, whatever it is, but also avoid those dark patterns. Like, yes, you can create Mhmm.
Tyler:Experience that make people money, but if you if, for example, you hide the deactivate account button and hide it in some kind of subfolder or employ some other dark UX pattern, it also destroys the user experience. So from the user point of view, you lose a bit of trust from that specific brand. So it's it is a balance of both to your point.
Nick:Yeah. Oh, that's true. I mean, one of the projects as stakeholder, one of the projects I'm working on, I have to be specific, one of the stakeholders had this idea of certain subflow being super important, and so they want it to be easily accessible. Users should know that it exists, and it should be, like, one or two clicks away. Makes perfect sense.
Nick:Right? There's no designer who's gonna say, like, no. No. No. No.
Nick:Let's make it three or four clicks away. But then I mean, that's good. But then I I think he went a step further and said, well, let's prompt the user with everything they do. Like, oh, by the way, we have this thing. We have this thing.
Nick:We have this thing. Like, I think that's going a step too far. And, you know, I've never spoken to him about, you know, user first and all things I've learned in school. But at that point, I still was able to convince him that this is not the right UX, you know, not the right user experience. I think that that would be very annoying for people to see the same pop up every time without being able to click the don't show again checkbox.
Nick:You know? And because of all the theory I've learned in school, and I was able to convince the stakeholder that it's not a good thing to do. So at that moment, I still did the the thing I've learned, you know, be the, like, the the the gatekeeper of a good user experience. Like, keep all the dark patterns at the gate. Mhmm.
Nick:So that's what I mean by playing the double role. Like, yeah, you're and you tell your stakeholders all the way so you can make more money, but you do push back when they take it too far. You know?
Tyler:Yeah. It's on the same lines as if you're doing email marketing, there's a delicate balance of the the unsubscribe rate. So Mhmm. How pushy do you want your your sales emails to be versus the value that they give? If you put it all the way to one edge, you'll you'll throttle your unsubscribe list, and you'll you'll hurt your user base.
Tyler:But if you put it into the right spot, you can still facilitate the business goals while giving value to the users.
Nick:Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah.
Tyler:For
Nick:sure. And the unsubscribe button is always very small. Accessibility is is horrible, but it is there. It is on the
Tyler:page, on the email. So they check all the boxes in terms of requirements. A good one. Yeah. I know unsubscribe is very it doesn't pass the accessibility contrast ratio.
Tyler:That's for sure.
Nick:Yeah. Yeah. No. No. Well, that's an interesting thing as well.
Nick:I'm I'm sure there are a few myths around accessibility. Over here, it's now part of the law. Like, government websites have to follow certain accessibility guidelines. And if not, they can get fines. So that's a good thing.
Nick:Perhaps a bit sad that it had to come to this, like, that they would require a But, again, you know, law is better than nothing. You know? So good thing, I guess.
Tyler:It is a very good thing. I tell you I struggle with one thing when it comes to accessibility as I'm as I work on projects, it's the disabled state, which is has been the bane of my existence. Really? So it's it's making the contrast ratio for a disabled button or row state visible enough for it to be accessible, but also not compete with the active or or default state of of regular buttons, which is trigger than I thought, but it's become a frustration point or a challenge that I had to overcome recently.
Nick:Yeah. Well, I remember back in the day, and this might be horribly outdated, you know, comment section filling up with how dare you type comments, but I think the for example, the the contrast levels do not apply to inactive elements. Right? Or they used to be back in the, yeah, back in the day, I think. I think, you know, doing this doing this kind of live, now I I I am running the risk of saying something that's not true.
Nick:And I think back in the day, it's that used to be the case. Like, this is here are your your requirements in terms of contrast Mhmm. Unless it's inactive. But I'm not sure if that's that's true.
Tyler:I'm tempted to take that advice as goals for my own sanity, but
Nick:Mhmm.
Tyler:I might do my due diligence there.
Nick:Yeah. I mean, that's something to to double check at at some point. Still a very challenging thing because, you know, if you have, you know, white and gray, you know, I assume you use some sort of gray for your your in a, you know, inaccessible or disabled button. I mean, if you have a piece of text in using that gray on a white background, it's harder to read versus using a, you know, large gray rectangle using that color on the same white background just because of the size. So, you know, lots of ifs, and and it depends here again, I would say, because, you know, it depends.
Nick:Like, is is the disabled button, like, does it have an outline only, or is it like a filled button? Like, does it have a fill with white text on on it? Like, I don't know. You know? So there's no I mean, we're talking about a disabled button now.
Nick:But there's no there's no one quick answer to it,
Tyler:I guess. There isn't. Yeah. Especially how you apply your primary color, which I like to use as little like, I like to use the primary color as related to, like, the primary actions. So you'll have your c t one CTA, one let's say, main brand is green, one green button within DUI.
Tyler:That's possible. Active state can be green for a tab element, but the secondary or inactive use some kind of degradation of of gray or black.
Nick:Yeah. I mean, that's that yeah. I mean, the the the this this feels also like we are like, we're zooming in a lot, you know, on on on the button, which is new. It's it's important. But it also shows you how how large, like, making something accessible is, like, for full projects, like, all the different scenarios and combinations of factors.
Nick:Like, it could be I mean, it's a project in and of itself. It definitely is. Something.
Tyler:Yeah. Because it goes outside like, goes outside the color. It's like how you're able to tab across your application just with, like, your keyboard and not using a mouse. Like, does it follow a specific pattern? Can you does the focus treatment have that contrast level so someone can follow where they're going?
Tyler:But I digress. I don't wanna go too deep on this one.
Nick:Well, no. I I have maybe a, you know, in between question. How would you consider yourself an accessibility expert?
Tyler:Far from it, probably. Yeah. Far from
Nick:it. Same here.
Tyler:I have my plug ins that help me, do my my checks for me. So Figma has a bunch of, like, plug ins like Stark, for example, where you're able to kinda select specific elements. It tells you what grade of accessibility or contrast level your text is versus, like, a background. You're able to, like, emulate different visual impairments. So I have the tools.
Tyler:Nice. So the tool's the expert.
Nick:I am not. I'm using I'm using the tool. I mean, that's enough, right, for most cases. You know, I I do the same thing. I don't have the plug ins, but when I am unsure, I would use a plugin to just to double check.
Nick:But I, you know, I think, like, if you look at accessibility fundamentals, it's color contrast, it's size, but also being able to navigate your website without a mouse. Like, can you use tab space and enter just to to go through the page, find the element you need, and then use it, and stuff like titles and alternative texts for links and images so that it works with screen readers. And to make that happen, you need to have the the header structure set up properly, like the h one until h. Like, that's how far as base level I would take it for a project.
Tyler:Mhmm.
Nick:And then being able to navigate without a mouse usually isn't part of the initial scope, you know, because it is a bit more work.
Tyler:Yeah. That's a fundamental, like, structure. There may be some refactoring involved in in making sure that as you build, it's structured in a specific way. Yeah. But, like, seeing as though, like, you're a you're a design engineer, there are some packages you could install that does the check for you.
Tyler:So Yeah. As part of, like, the merge process, like, if you wanna merge your branch, it does a access you can, like, launch an accessibility checker, and it'll identify the components that failed and why they fail and with suggestions on how to fix it, which could be useful.
Nick:It could be. Yeah. For sure. That's that's something I'll I'll check out, you know, in in one of my my my off moments, you know, between meetings or something. Because I I've maybe this this would will bring it back into the the topic of of this this episode that there I'm sure there are one or two myths around accessibility, for example, and this is from the outside looking in.
Nick:I've heard so many times from stakeholders that when you try to convince them about accessibility work, they they always say, well, I haven't heard any complaints. That's a dangerous one. Yeah. So we're not gonna do anything about it. You know?
Nick:I mean, then you can have all your your nice talk about, you know, making something accessible brings in more people as more money for you, blah blah blah. But it's super hard to convince someone to increase the priority on something because that's the main thing. Like, we haven't heard any complaints, but we have heard complaints about this other thing. So let's do the other thing first. But there's always the other thing.
Nick:So how do you well, let let's go to that question later. Maybe that's the maybe that's the myth for now. Like, I haven't heard any complaints.
Tyler:Yeah. And so you do which should be posted? That's a tough one because, like, on the topic of accessibility, has happened numerous times where it's a nope. We don't really need to do it now until a client requires Yeah. Your software to be accessible, and then it's all hands on deck because we need then it becomes a business problem rather than
Nick:a Yeah.
Tyler:Kick the can down the road kind of deal.
Nick:Yeah. Oh, one thing that that did help, I think, if I remember correctly, is we made a recording of someone with a very severe visual impairment. We asked her if she could create an account on her mobile phone on the platform we we were working on, and she was really, like, really, like, close to the to the camera. Like oh, sorry. To to her phone, and we were trying to film it.
Nick:And we asked her to think out loud, like, tell me what you what you're doing, what you think you have to click, and what do you see, what don't you see. And it was a horrible video. Like, it was so it was hard to watch to see your struggle, try and make an account. I think that's that's that's the one thing that could work, you know, and then show it
Tyler:to your stakeholders. That'll that'll go over. That's a horrible video to watch, but a solid video for proof that you need to work on those specific things. That's a good move.
Nick:Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So so, I mean, that that that's probably a topic, like, for for for an episode. Like, you know, handling stakeholders, how to convince people of the things they don't want to be convinced of, and how to move things up the road map.
Nick:Any any other myths? Anything on
Tyler:our list? I got here okay. This is a good one. This is your suggestion, actually.
Nick:UX designer unscripted, by the way. I don't I didn't I didn't ask Tyler to to give me the assist here.
Tyler:UX designers get everything right the first time because we know UX. Spicy.
Nick:Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah.
Nick:For sure. Can you just quote, do the UX, unquote? You know, that's I I I saw it in the wild recently. And that that mock up I just mentioned, I I I was working on it, and then they gave me a list of feedback from their client, and it was literally part of the list. The logo needs to be bigger.
Tyler:I mean, it's it's
Nick:a joke. It's a meme. But then I was reminded that it's actually a thing, and it hasn't happened to me in in years. Can you make the logo bigger? But it's it's still real.
Nick:Anyway, it made me think of that occurrence about what you said with getting the UX right the first time. I think we as designers, we are good at making guesses Mhmm. At the first you know, as the first version, you know, based on design theory and our knowledge and experience. You know? We should try this thing first because it's worked in one or two projects prior to this.
Nick:You know? But we don't know anything from the start. Getting user understanding is something that takes a while. You know, it takes a few iterations, a few releases of your product. So I think the our aim gets more narrow, more focused, which e with each talk we have with the user, with each, you know, email feedback we get.
Nick:But I think, you know, expecting a designer to get it right the first time and and it to be perfect and and flawless, exactly what the user wants Mhmm. I think that's a wrong expectation that will only bring disappointment and and
Tyler:stress to anyone involved. Also, on on the same lines as if you're shipping too late, like, you shouldn't have the perfect solution immediately. That means you you you you try to polish it for too long. Plus, like, UX is not a siloed department. It's everyone contributes to it.
Tyler:So you should get to, like, a thing first and then share it with your stakeholders or your teammates, and then they can help poke holes and see things that you didn't
Nick:Yep.
Tyler:You didn't see. Yep. Like, that happens to me on a daily basis. Like, I have I have my dev ready hand off a Figma file and then have a engineer go inside, poke around, ask questions like, oh, I forgot about that. I forgot about this.
Nick:Mhmm.
Tyler:So it's, like, it's true collaboration. And in the day, like, UX designer does not hold the keys of all things UX. Sometimes we miss things, and, like, our collaborators help us out with that as well.
Nick:Yeah. I mean, that's I mean, that's exactly it. And do you feel any stress or insecurities there? Like, when you when they tell you, like, hey. You forgot this thing?
Tyler:Yes. But does like, I you have to remind yourself, yeah. You're not perfect, and you don't yes. You're the UX designer, but, like, part of what we do is is we don't ship things because the designer says, yes. It's okay.
Tyler:We have to have multiple checks. That's that's how the development process works. Like, yes, I get like, oh, I forgot. I should have done that, but good. We have our teammates that are that are engaged in the UX concept, so it's an appreciated concept.
Nick:Yeah. Well, you know, interesting thing is that it you know, I I I have that feeling a little bit sometimes, you know, where I feel responsible. And then, you know, for for another project, we updated a flow, used flow in quite a big way. And from the data, the results were inconclusive. Like, was, you know, on some days, it was a bit better.
Nick:Some days, it wasn't better. So it's, you know, conclusion more or less the same. I didn't feel good about it. You know? I was like, we made all these things better or so I thought.
Nick:And, you know, I wonder what they're going to say. But then, you know, later, was like, oh, wait a minute. You know, we compromised. We had meetings with the developers, with the founders, with the marketing people. We they all had something to say.
Nick:And then as a group, we came to the conclusion to, you know, deviate from the original path and go a little bit to the left or to the right, So it's not my fault. And at the same time, it also wouldn't have been my solo win if it was way better. You know, I think that's helpful to battle the insecurity and the impostor syndrome. Yeah. That's a
Tyler:good way to think about it. It's not it's you don't have to shoulder the blame that way because they can feel that way sometimes when because of where, like, design sits as part of, like, the development process, like, any mistake that we do can't be corrected after it's launched. So, like, part of our job is, like, risk mitigation, so making sure that we flesh out all the edge cases, use cases, and make sure that it's good. So when we hand it over to engineering or we put it to code and then we launch it in the wild, there's no undo as per it's a whole feature that we've launched. Yeah.
Tyler:So it feels more risky than it than it than it's like doing a quick update if you're an engineer.
Nick:Yeah. Well, that's true. That's true. And I feel like there are lots of little myths being busted, like, right in your answer about getting it right the first time. You have to get it right first time and all these things, you know, a few more, which I think is very healthy for all of us to hear.
Nick:Like, you know, you can change things later in version two. It's fine to undo something, which makes me think that there's also, perhaps because of education, where you learn design thinking where the first two steps are really about, like, understanding and researching, which you can go back to for step one and step two. Actually, it is it it's never ending, basically.
Tyler:Well, it's also part of how we learn, like, in school. Like, if you fail a test, you fail a test. You don't it's it's that, like, we do a thing. We get graded. It's either pass or fail.
Tyler:But part of what we do is it's okay if it fails. We it's a it's a learning opportunity. We'll see. True. There's a there's a part two of that test, a part three or part four that comes in iterations.
Tyler:Yeah.
Nick:I I let it go to part four sometimes in school where I would have to redo a test a couple of times. And then I told my teacher, like, hey. I got a nine out of 10 score. And I was very proud, and the teacher said to me, like, well, that's about time. So that's my that's my spirit crush there.
Nick:Anyway, doesn't matter too much. Yeah. So we have a few things. We we have the I think the getting things right the first time and and blaming yourself and and feeling responsible is, like, there are a few big big myths there that we need to bust. Like, I think designers can be, including myself, I do this all the time, I think we can we have a tendency to take too much from the pie at once.
Nick:I mean, we are just designers, and I I don't say that in a in a mean way, but I think that's that's good to accept it and be fine with it. Like, you're part of a team. You are not the team.
Tyler:That's yep. That's a great point and a great perspective. It's a Yeah. Take less. Like, yes, you wanna you wanna contribute, but it doesn't all rest on your shoulders.
Nick:Yeah. Is that some sort of saying where you say something like do big by thinking small or something related to it? Like, I think that's a good motto to have. Like, do a few things very well instead of trying to do everything.
Tyler:Yep. Fair. And in practice, that's applicable too. If you ever done landing page optimization, you don't do all the changes at once. You do Mhmm.
Tyler:Or else you don't know what what contributed to it failing or or succeeding. You do one. First, you change the title. Did it go well? Then change another component and then in the
Nick:I mean, I I think that's if you're looking for a job, you you feel like you have to throw around the big numbers for your case study just to to, you know, grab some attention. So maybe that's another myth to to talk about, like, case study, big numbers. I think that it's more realistic to do lots of work to get, like, one or 2% increase. Instead of, like, 30. I did 40.
Nick:It's 80% better. Well, that's I think some people will look will be cautious about believing that.
Tyler:Yes. You gotta be those numbers have to be realistic. You're you're tempted to kinda boost them a bit just because you wanna kinda stand out, But you can do that with the title. It doesn't have to be. We we 300 x our our Yeah.
Tyler:Our usage, our engagement rate, our our adoption rate. Make it like small wins are still wins.
Nick:Yeah. I mean, we could really brag about our our newsletter, you know, when we announced new episodes. Did you Talk about it. Did you know it has a 100 open rate?
Tyler:We are just smashing our way. We are the best. We are the best.
Nick:Yeah. Our single subscriber opens it all the time.
Tyler:If that isn't a call to action to subscribe to our newsletter Yeah. I don't know what would be.
Nick:Well, become our second subscriber. You know, we I mean, we have subscribers on the different platforms, but we also have the, like, the episode announcement email, which is on the website, you know, designtablepodcast.com, and then you go to an episode or an article. And then really at the bottom, we have that get notified of new episodes link. So one person signed up for it, and that person opens it all the time. So that's good.
Tyler:Good. Yeah. I do I I don't know if that becomes a vanity metric, that a 100%. I'm gonna I'm gonna feel really bad when it when it dips below a 100.
Nick:Yeah. Well, that's that's a a running joke within the newsletter community, you know, because I I don't do newsletter work at the moment, but I used to do quite a bit of newsletter design work. And that's what they all said. Like, well, you know, your your open rate is, like, between 5060%. That's nice of your mom and your friends to open your newsletter the whole time.
Nick:But, you know, once your newsletter grows, the open rate naturally dips. You know? And you should be happy with between 3040%. So that's an an oh, really type joke that they all make over there.
Tyler:That might be an interesting metric to add to a dashboard. Did your mom open your newsletter?
Nick:Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, in instead of just five coding our projects, why not meme code our projects?
Nick:Like, why not make anything fun? Like the fake Stripe notification app. Not sure if you've seen that one.
Tyler:Yes. I have. I have.
Nick:Yeah. Yeah. I I I they they bust ed a design agency, you know, founder person on Twitter recently. When you zoomed in on his photos of his his MR arm bragging, you could see that his the payments came in at exactly the same time of day each time. People people are like, that can't be right.
Nick:And then he started I think he started blocking lots of people. I'm I'm not sure about about that last part. Yeah. Busted. It's a different kind of myth being busted.
Tyler:That's embarrassing. Yeah. Yeah. Don't believe all that you see out in the wild.
Nick:Yeah. Well, that yeah. That that's a good one too. Also makes me think about how you put down, like, percentages because you have there's difference between a a percentage increase and a percentage point increase. Mhmm.
Tyler:Yeah. Exactly. And also a dollar increase. Like, what sounds better? A a thousand dollar increase in MRR or a a 200% increase in MRR?
Tyler:It depends how you wanna which sounds better to you. Well, that's a very interesting thing because you are the ROI designer. Right? That's your your thing online. Right?
Tyler:So I'm
Nick:sure you have some that's your brand. And it's very interesting thing to to follow, which, you know, just to promote some more. I said, I really think you should follow Tyler on on LinkedIn and and Twitter and all these places. Anyway, I'm wondering what you think about it. Like, what's better?
Nick:Like, the the act the dollars or the percentage?
Tyler:It depends on what sound it's both in the audience, but also depends on what sounds bigger to be to be to be in that way.
Nick:I think when Typical designer you with all your ideas. It depends. Man, man.
Tyler:It always depends. Well, in that example, let's say let's say you're you're doing five k MRR, and you you increase your MR to add another five k on top. So you're doing 10 k per month. Yeah. Double.
Tyler:It double. In that case, would you say would would be more palatable? I added extra five k MRR or an extra 200 what's the math there? Is that 200%
Nick:Mhmm. Increase? If you go from five to 10 k, you you add a 100%. 100%. Yeah.
Nick:Added. Well, I would say that I assume that the person you are telling this is aware of the old MRR. Mhmm. You know, they know it it's it used to be five, and I feel five is a big enough number to make doubling it sound very impressive. Yeah.
Tyler:And then say you're making $50 a month, and then you make another 50. Would you rather put the percentage in that case or the the $50 MRR?
Nick:Then I would tell the number, the 50, because I mean, I know the the doubling sounds more braggy, and I I probably brag about doubling the MRR if it was social media and I was looking for likes. Mhmm. But if I would have a serious conversation with my clients, I would tell them the number.
Tyler:Yes. Of course. Perception wise, she wanted to be braggy, which isn't like, it's a bit excessive. $50 is a terrible example.
Nick:It's a v and I
Tyler:don't know if that if that deserves a share or a post or a conversation Well with your stakeholder.
Nick:You know what? What what I think is yeah. Well, you say it's a terrible example, or maybe. I don't know. But what I think is a problem for for many you know, for all of us, basically, is to be afraid to say the wrong thing, and then we say, like, well, it depends.
Nick:And then you give a then you give a fake answer. What I'm trying to do now is when you ask me, like, the 50 goes to a 100, like, what would you say? I would try and answer the question anyway while running the risk of saying something stupid. But I think staying away from the well, it depends makes it more authentic and makes you appear like someone with an opinion. And I think some people that are looking for designers value someone with, you know, critical thinking and an opinion.
Nick:So I'm not sure if I said something dumb about your example, but, yeah, if I would brag, I would say double. That's my answer.
Tyler:It's fair. The film in the audience. Back to that. Depends on the audience.
Nick:Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, maybe that's the biggest biggest myth of all, the it depends myth. Like, saying it is bad or the other way around, maybe we say it too often.
Nick:Like, what do you think?
Tyler:I think it depends is a answer just because it's not like, everything is conditional. There's so many, like, pieces of the pie or or pieces of the puzzle that you have to kind of put into play, so it just always depends. I don't think there's ever a case where, okay, this situation requires this specific without any deviation solution. Yeah. I don't I think I think it always depends.
Nick:I think there's That's the reality. Right? It's Yeah. If there was a one size fits all solution, AI would have replaced us long ago. Exactly.
Nick:Or replace us sooner. Depends how you look
Tyler:at this. Because it's yeah. When will AI replace us? It depends.
Nick:Yeah. It won't. It will if I well, if I have to believe social media, it will forever be in six months. No. It has been in six yeah.
Nick:It's it has been in six months since 2023.
Tyler:Yeah. It's never changing. It's not gonna replace us. It's it's the thing that we use, not like, imagine, would you rather okay. Here's what I've been thinking about for a while.
Tyler:Would you rather here's the myth. Would you rather replace fire half of your company and use AI or give everyone in your company AI to be more efficient, which one would you take?
Nick:I would take the second one. Like, I Of course. I'd say that's more of a a growth mindset instead of let's save and reduce type mindset.
Tyler:Exactly. So in that in that case, I think we're I think the fear is is not warranted. I think we're fine. The companies that adopt and what's the what's the right word? I would say, like, 10 x your employees by leveraging AI is probably the best way to go instead of cutting and replacing.
Nick:Yeah. That's what they all say. X to leverage. Like, that's a real leverage is a real AI word. It is.
Nick:No. Well, I mean, that's that's very interesting. Like, the, you know, the whole AI talk. I I spoke to someone this morning, and he said that AI will take out, like, the middle part of of the spectrum, and we are now standing, like, before that gap. And some people will jump over the gap and become, let's say, AI efficient, proficient, or or AI native, and then everyone who's not going to make that jump will fall behind.
Nick:Because if you stay where you are now, you will the people who are jumping over will become quicker and better and can do more things, and that will make them super cheap or the ones who do more, super expensive. Because he also said that the big AI companies are losing money currently, like billions each year. Like, it's just not profitable. So you can either wait until, like, the tech becomes cheaper, or you have to raise prices. And if you raise prices, you make someone more expensive, and then they have to raise prices as well just to pay for the AI help.
Nick:You know? So there's a lot of, you know, crazy stuff going on in that regard, I think. That is, you know, you can better jump and learn the tools rather than be you know, stick your head in the sand and be like, well, no. No. No.
Nick:It's not good.
Tyler:Yeah. We've we've gone through periods of time where there was evolution, and I think it's get those periods are getting shorter and shorter. And the people who waited until it was fully adopted were left behind. But if you stay not saying you have to be ahead of the curve, but, like, just be aware. Start testing things here and there.
Tyler:And just so that, like, when the next jump comes, you're not left behind to that median point you're saying.
Nick:True. True. Yeah. I've never great example of it is that I tried the cloth code and Figma MCP this week or last week just for me to be able to form an opinion, you know, for firsthand, like real project, real client, real request to do something where I was like, well, let's try, see how it does. And it didn't perform that well.
Nick:So one option would have been to complain about it online and, you shout from the rooftops like, we're safe. We're safe. It sucks. You know? But I didn't feel that was very productive to do, so what I did instead was to look at, like, why doesn't it work?
Nick:And it turns out you have to align the code base in your Figma file. Like, they have to align perfectly. Like, you have to speak the same language in both in both places. So you either need a developer with design knowledge or designer with developer knowledge. And then if you are if you have people in both sides, they need to need to be able to talk and communicate with each other as well.
Nick:So it's very error prone, and you have to be very smart to keep it aligned all the time. And that requires a lot of skill, human skill. So it's going to be useful, but it doesn't mean you can just sit back, relax, and one shot your prompt. You know, it doesn't work that way in a serious code base. You have to learn, and it will make you better.
Nick:But you have to, you know, again, jump that gap and have the mindset to to do it.
Tyler:And if you do, then I think you will print money. Solid advice from the resident Yeah. Design engineer.
Nick:Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I yeah.
Nick:You you know what? What's interesting, I'm not sure if the if you have the same thing, but all these things happen to me during the week, and then I'm like, oh, I have to tell Tyler during the recording. But then the episode will get very messy because all all of the random rants that I have
Tyler:We just have to make a another random rant episode.
Nick:Yeah. One of my favorite episodes to record comes out just before did we do that last time or time before? I don't recall. We did it last time.
Tyler:So Last time. In Yeah. Four weeks.
Nick:You know, you're saying four weeks now was very interesting, but this one comes out weeks after.
Tyler:Exact this one comes out after that one, in five weeks. Yeah. No. In six weeks.
Nick:Yeah. Six weeks. So so and, yeah, when you say four weeks, it's actually minus two, you know, when people hear this. Yes. True.
Nick:Yeah. True. It's hard
Tyler:to keep track of the math there.
Nick:Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, look at us being all confused. You know, it's, I wonder if there's an AI for that .com should be a thing.
Nick:Maybe it is. Maybe there is.
Tyler:Or just use Claude and then create your own tool Yeah. And then sell it for lots and lots of money.
Nick:Yeah. Anyway Any any more myths on your list on your list?
Tyler:What do I have here? Yes. And maybe the last one here. UX designers need to have a traditional art background. Art background.
Nick:Well, it would help, but it's not required. So busted, I would say. Like, it's not a requirement. I'm really hammering down on the word that it's required.
Tyler:Yeah. I'm with you. I I think I've seen so many cases of designers from different backgrounds, traditional and not. I don't think it really I don't think it really matters.
Nick:If you have an art background, the bias is that you are going to be a Johnny Ive type designer. It's really all about thin fonts and black and white and minimalism and that kind of stuff. And nothing wrong with that. I I like that style. To be honest, I try and use it myself when it's appropriate for a project, but it it will I think it will create a a specific type of designer, you know, the artist type.
Tyler:Our our initial myth, which is do the actual designers have to make things pretty?
Nick:Yeah. Yeah. True. It comes
Tyler:full circle.
Nick:True. Yeah. Yeah. Well, that that's that's a good point. Yeah.
Nick:Yeah. I would I would recommend it to to learn more about art and all the, you know, classic design stuff like Gestalt and psychology, color theory, and that kind of thing. And it feels like that's something you would learn in an art education. Let's say it's optional, not against, but also not a requirement. Yep.
Nick:Yes. Optional.
Tyler:It is beneficial in some cases, but not mandatory.
Nick:Yeah. True. Alright. That's everything on on my list and I think on your list as well. So we have quite a good list.
Nick:We should summarize this not now, but, like, in a in in the description or in a social media post before we launch this. Hey. By the way, we're going to handle all these myths. What do you think? Have a listen.
Tyler:You know? True. It could be a good designtable.com podcast.com post.
Nick:Yeah. I think so. We should write another one of those just to make the websites worth a read as well instead of just being a list of episodes. Alright. What's on the table for the next episode?
Tyler:Yeah. I think we're gonna be spilling a lot of sauce next episode. We're gonna dive into conversion tricks that we've learned over the last decade or so. Yeah. All the tricks that we've kind of picked up along the way.
Nick:Yep. Yep. Will there be some some dirty tricks there as well, like gray area, dark pattern type tricks, or are you a white hat designer?
Tyler:I know the dirty tricks. Do I use them? No. Mhmm. Though I know I know when you can use them and when you can't, but I don't I generally don't.
Tyler:But there are some tricks you can use. There's a gray area there. Not black hat, but gray hat.
Nick:Gray hat. Yeah. Sassy while wearing a a black hat at the moment. But then the question is, will you share those dirty tricks, Or are you not all about, you know, not being a a bad influence on people?
Tyler:I think it's good it's a good idea to share them just to know the difference between what's a white hat and black hat technique. Right. So you're aware that if you've picked up something, whether it's ethical or not, I think it's good to know both sides and why it's good why when to use the good one and why it's not okay to use the their dirty little ones.
Nick:Right. Right. Right. Yeah. It's good to be able to recognize them when, like like I said earlier, when a stakeholder is about to suggest one, it's your radar and your alarm is is going off like, hey.
Nick:Wait a minute. There's one. Do something about it. Exactly. Alright.
Nick:Well, that that's that's, I think, a wonderful teaser. If you wanna know all the dirty tricks from the book and how to use them slash not use them, you have to tune in next week.
Tyler:A bunch. Get two weeks. Bunch.
Nick:Yeah. Also, you know, in the meantime, like, also we already mentioned thedesigntablepodcast.com. You know, you can read articles, subscribe to be notified about episodes, but we're also going to do at some point a q and a type episode. You know? So you can reach us on social media, comment on the video, and then leave reviews where you can post questions on all the big platforms.
Nick:So I'd really like to invite listeners and viewers to to do so. And then we will, you know, feature your question in a future episode, which I think is going to be a really cool episode with a quick fire q and a type episode.
Tyler:Exactly. We'll watch them for social media. We'll do some posts. We'll we'll send a we'll send a poll to our our 100% subscriber rate and our newsletter. Unanimous voting.
Tyler:Exactly. We'll collect all the questions, and then we'll answer them.
Nick:Yeah. Nice. Well, that's it for today then. See you next time.
Tyler:That was a great episode. So if you like this content and wanna hear more, please like and subscribe.
Nick:Yeah. And if you want to see more, please go to designtablepodcast.com, Spotify, Apple Music, all the
Tyler:big
Nick:players, and more.