I want to be a designer when I grow up

When I had just moved to San Francisco, I was instantly intimidated by all the cool phrases my colleagues used. “Damn, these guys must know a lot,” I thought. I had been a designer for a long time but I felt like a noob around the UX experts. If I wanted to succeed, I had to learn the language — communicate like a pro! Then I realized most of them were just in a jargon-measuring contest––they were just as ignorant as me.

If you ever feel lost in the sea of articles from design authorities or design teams, not knowing exactly whose process is the right one or what to make of all those terms they use––know that we’re all figuring out stuff as we go. We just haven’t been able to create a consistent way to talk about our work. The language and process you learn in one company will have to be unlearned when you switch jobs (so you can learn the new, more streamlined one). Have you noticed that when you get interviewed for a design position, one of the requests we always make is that you “describe the design process at your previous company”? That’s because we want to see what can we copy and apply to our own process.

If you work at Company A, your design process is something like:

Define > Jargon > Ideate > Prototype > Jargon > Analyze. When you switch to Company B, you’ll change to:

Understand > Buzzword > Decide > Buzzword > Validate. And if you’re in Company C, the process will certainly be:

Something > Something > Something > Iterate.

We’re in the puberty years of User Experience. On our quest to fit in we’re awkwardly trying different hairdos like flat design, skeuomorphism, and cool gradients. We’re joining different sports like 5-day Sprints, Agile Design, and some prefer the fine–arts activities of Human-Centered Design. We’re experimenting with different drugs like Pixate, Flinto, Framer, and… have you tried Principle? So hot right now. If the current state of UX had a face, it would look something like this:

Don’t get me wrong–I think it’s a great time to be a designer! If you really wanted, you could be the one that sets once-and-for-all the standards on UI animation, pioneer the principles of VR Design, or set the guidelines on UX conversation with an AI.

I’m excited for what awaits us. The importance of design is finally starting to be recognized in the tech world. But if we want to be taken seriously, we have to make a transformation. In this defining moment, we have to take a hard look at ourselves and decide to grow up. I have to admit— I don’t exactly know how, but I know we have to do it together.