I wonder how many designers, after reading the title of this post, thought of a perfect meme to describe how that scenario plays out. I mean, even though we all know that working with brilliant developers who can bring your most precious ideas to life is the dream, we also expect that the designer-developer relationship won’t be filled with rainbows and unicorns.
Last summer, when I was thinking of joining DevFacto as a UX consultant, not only did I picture those memes too, I was also unsure if this type of challenge was going to be a good fit for me. Could I picture myself debating which features matter and which ones don’t, every single day? Hmm…
Luckily, soon after coming on board, I got to meet the developers over beers and got a true sense of the personalities on the team. The excitement of collaborating with brilliant minds quickly grew on me and I looked forward to learning within a fun, supportive culture. Now, six months into being a DevFactonian, I can report that I’ve learned a few lessons and busted some myths about the relationships between UX designers and developers. Here are my top 3 discoveries:
1. Developers attach to their work as if it were a baby (just as much as designers do)
Whether in a dev shop, or a design studio, we all protect what we create, foster and put effort into making. So, when someone else modifies our work in any way, it’s difficult to detach oneself but very easy to discount any modification as a nonsensical idea.
Whenever that happens, it helps to remember that we are all in this together and we share the same goal – make the best solution possible. Or, as I like to think about it, create “the perfect baby.” In each project, we all contribute from our own experiences to build a product that combines a fresh, sleek look with exceptional functionality. However, ultimately, we do this not to appease our own egos but to create value for the people who will be using what we’ve built.
2. Sharing your process promotes collaboration
After talking to one of our brilliant devs, I realized that effective collaboration is all about sharing the process. The developers write code, make something come to life, and it either works or it doesn’t. In that way, the mind of a developer is binary. Meanwhile, as designers, it is our job to come up with various ways to create success (usually there are many) and put forward the best one in a mockup or a prototype. However, sometimes we fail to share how we arrived at the presented solution. This makes it hard for a developer to understand why we are making certain suggestions and can lead to a rejection of the idea.
Collaboration comes from having a common understanding of a problem.
Therefore, sharing both my approach and context helps them see where I’m coming from and take my modifications as potential improvements, rather than just self-preference edits.
3. Feelings matter
Even if we try our best to be rational and logical, at times it can be hard to accomplish. As software users, we respond to emotions, we make mistakes and get distracted. We like or dislike things based on how they feel, even if that sentiment makes no sense. That’s just how we’re wired. Even though we’re trained to think differently, it is still easy for us to fall into certain patterns and behaviours quickly.
It’s easy to forget we’re all just human and that does not make us the ideal user.
Empathy has been THE card up my sleeve as a UX designer. I use it both internally with our project teams and externally with our clients. In my work, I’ve learned to play that card as much as possible for the sole purpose of creating products so easy to use, that people will want to use them more.
I do know for certain, that there are still many lessons to be learned and plenty of discoveries to be made about the process of designing user-centric software solutions. But one thing I can attest is that despite the left-brain and right-brain differences between designers and developers, the awareness of the value of good user experience goes well beyond our roles.