UX people get asked the value of their work all of the time. They don’t have a good answer. 1
There are two reasons for this. 1) They don’t, in fact, provide value; and B) The people who hire them and ask that question don’t really care and don’t really want any “UX”. 2
When much of what passes for interaction design is really just visual design tweaking, what quantifiable value does it provide? Not much. 3
There are far, far more “UX designers” employed today than there were 20 years ago, and yet most of the newly created software I use today suffers from the same 20-year-old errors. 4
The interaction failures of contemporary software include some of the most basic, elemental, and egregiously unnecessary violations of good interaction design principles that were called out and vanquished years ago. 5
What the hell kind of discipline allows that to happen? 6
Hmmmm, maybe a discipline that has no discipline. Maybe a discipline that values its empathy more than it’s actual hard work. Maybe a discipline that likes drawing pretty pictures instead of cracking difficult problems of user understanding. 7
Or, maybe it’s a discipline that has Stockholm Syndrome. Maybe a discipline that accepts being marginalized by product companies that don’t understand or value user centered design. 8
So those companies gradually marginalize the contributions of interaction design (companies like, say, Sonos, Autodesk, and Apple), and then ask questions like, “What is the ROI of UX?” 9
Knowing the ROI of a discipline is a manager’s job, yet they ask that question of the practitioners. They aren’t seeking enlightenment. They are building a case against the discipline. 10
And the practitioners take the bait every time. 11
The value of interaction design is massive and awesome! You can see the value of IxD from a half mile away. IxD makes product managers look like heroes. Apple built their reputation on it. Thousands of companies have bested their competition with it. 12
If your boss is asking you to quantify the value of your work, you need to understand that your work has no value. Not at that company. Not with that boss. 13
So when your boss asks you “What is the value of your work?” you have only two valid courses of action: A) Accept that you and your situation are a valueless combination; or 2) Go somewhere that your work is valued. 14
Go somewhere that does not ask the value of your work, but somewhere that VALUES YOUR WORK! 15
If you cannot find a company that values your work, you are experiencing what it was like back in the 1970s, when the software revolution began. When the entrepreneurial revolution began. 16
Back in the 70s, the company that invented the microcomputer refused to believe that it was a computer! The company that invented personal computing refused to believe that people wanted computers. 17
Massive companies grew from the startups that KNEW those big companies were wrong. They KNEW the value of their thinking, their viewpoints, their innovations. 18
The question isn’t “How can I convince my boss of the value of UX?” The question is “How can I convince MYSELF of the value of MY OWN work?” What *IS* the value of your work? Does your work have value? If it’s not obvious, it doesn’t have any. 19
