- There are lots of really big topics
in UX that warrant having a longer video,
having a longer nuanced discussion.
And one of these big topics is a buzzword
that has gotten quite popular over the last few years
which is democratization in UX.
So I'm curious what you all think of this term.
What is it
and how would you even define democratization in this case?
- Yeah, I think that's a great question.
Therese, and certainly one that is coming
up more and more in our field of user experience
and by definition the phrase democratization
means making something much more accessible to everyone.
And I think a lot of the contention, a lot of the
confusion around this concept of democratization
of UX comes stems from just misaligned definitions
or misaligned levels of specificity
on what it actually is that we're
making more accessible to everyone
and who that everyone really is and why.
- Yeah, democratization.
I think you're right Anna.
It does kind of lend itself towards this feeling
of contention when it is talked about.
And I think you're right, it's important to
understand the definition to mitigate that.
I believe making design and making the methods
that we really believe in, our research methods
more accessible is high level a great thing.
It doesn't mean giving away the toolkits
and believing just anybody can do what we do
but helping people become aware of those things
and see firsthand the value in those things.
And maybe yes, giving them some
of the tools themselves when we can't be there
to help them with that type of thinking.
I mean, does lead to benefit when done responsibly.
- I think that's really key because I think
that there is an appropriate amount of fear
in the idea of letting or even advocating
for other people in our organization who are not trained
in our craft to potentially think that they can do our craft
and it not be to the degree that we want it to be done.
And so I think the contention
around this idea comes from fear, right?
And I think if you look beyond that at the greater good
there are certainly a lot of occasions where that may occur
where someone may overstep, think they can then do UX
and then in that idea minimizing what our contribution is
- The fear's warranted I think in some situations.
- Totally.
- Let's not hide from that.
But you're right Sara
I think when there's excitement and openness
like that's a big thing we can use to our advantage
and it's like, I kind of think
of the analogy like even if we have a first aid kid at home
we don't think we're doctors, right?
It doesn't stop us from going
to doctors for medical conditions, but we can arm ourselves
with general knowledge to take care of ourselves better
and apply healthy thinking to our own lives.
- Absolutely Kate, I think I like to think
of this as there's exposure to research and design
versus experience in research and design.
So say we, I recall a time actually where
a product team I was working on
we had conducted some multi-day usability testing
of our shopping cart and checkout flow.
On day two or three
of this kind of week long usability testing
I had someone from outside of the user experience team
ask if they could lead the next session.
And even though that person had been observing all week,
it really does take a strong UX professional to say
you know, I respect your interest, but given our
investment in this research like we're going to make sure
that someone who's trained in this part
of our craft make sure that they're leading that.
But maybe that's something that we add to our list
of priorities to kind of help train and upskill others
on certain methods like qualitative testing
for those moments when maybe there isn't quite
enough UX capacity to help each
and every product team through a certain method.
- Yeah, this conversation's really fascinating
to me because it seems
like what is considered democratized is pretty important.
Like what is it exactly we're democratizing?
Is it a task that we're democratizing or is it data?
Is it knowledge and accessibility to what we've learned?
- Where's the line, right?
To go back to the first aid kit
the first aid kit has bandaids,
not stitches and sutures, right?
So there is a line, and like Anna mentioned
I think qualitative testing is a great example.
That's a method that with training and education
people can start to do some for themselves.
- I think even, you know, if you
if you start thinking about democratizing user experience
in your own organization
you have to scope that appropriately.
And democratization isn't going to be something that all
of a sudden solves all of your user experience
you know resourcing challenges where maybe you can't get all
of the research done that you want to
or you don't have enough individuals
to lead the design process.
Even if you start to think
about what that democratization can look like
and responsibly training other people,
providing templates so that good sound research can happen,
there's likely still gonna be many times where
those individuals trying to kind of self-serve say
this is really complex
I need the help of a trained user experience professional.
So I think the scope
of the democratization is really important.
- Yeah on that topic, it sounds
like there's a really good case
for democratization when you do have resource challenges.
So my next question is
should everyone care about democratization?
Like what if you don't have resource challenges
is there still a value to doing it?
- My immediate response is, yes
there's always value to having people participate
and have knowledge of your work.
If anything, it just gains you more respect.
And so I think even if you're not facing resource issues,
the idea of making our expertise and different types
of responsibilities and methods accessible now
I don't think that means
that we assign everyone something to do
but at least accessible that people can come
to the table and participate should be on everyone's radar.
- One way I think that plays out is
and this gets back to your question
about what are we democratizing, is thinking about tools
like research repositories, democratization of knowledge.
When is that a bad thing?
I don't think it is, making that knowledge available
to people so that they can act on it
in situations where we can't be there first person.
Cause really we're in situations most of the time
as UXers where there's never gonna be enough
of us to go around, right?
And so we might have teams that will come
to us when it's feasible, reasonable
and I think it's always valuable
but involve us in their processes.
But if we can't be there due
to whatever kind of constraints organizationally we face
we can still do what we can to provide
that knowledge and those resources to people
so that they can act with that in mind.
- To play devil's advocate, I'm interested though,
is knowledge for other people ever a bad thing?
Well what if it's used against you?
So what if you're advocating for something
and you've made this research repository available
and someone is using that knowledge
to counter your expertise
and and your executive decision?
And I think I'm genuinely curious.
- I think that's, oh, go ahead Kate.
- I always think democratization isn't the answer
and it has to be accompanied
by other due diligence and responsibility to educate people
on the resources, the tools, the data, the knowledge
whatever it is that you're sharing.
And so a situation where a research repository
or any other kind of toolkit is made available
is not the end of the steps, right?
We also have to make sure
that we do what we can to educate people
on how to use that information.
We're doing the same tactics, like helping folks engage
with research so that they understand it
and so that they can use it responsibly.
- I think of it as kind of demystification a little bit
versus overprotection or gatekeeping
of the user experience craft.
I think in some ways too, democratization,
healthy democratization does require some level
of UX maturity within an organization as well.
We can't bring in lots of tools
and templates and processes and standards for analysis
and synthesis into an organization who maybe
has never done any user experience work before.
- So this gives me kind of two more questions
that just popped in my head.
Very thought provoking.
First is what democratization is, right?
We've got the democratization of tasks,
the democratization of information
but I'm also curious what it's not because I think, Anna
we were talking earlier about how democratization
is sometimes misconstrued to be one thing versus another.
So, or you know, otherwise that certain activities are seen
as democratization when in fact it's not.
It's just business as usual.
So I'd love your thoughts on that topic.
What is democratization not?
- Yeah, I don't think that democratization necessarily means
that untrained individuals are all of a sudden initiating
and leading user experience research
or user experience design.
I think that really there is structure involved
and so democratization isn't just kind of a free
for all for everyone to, you know, go start talking to users
or asking them if a user like, do you like a design?
Well, would you use it, right?
We all know that this isn't sound research
these aren't the types
of things that we're really getting from user research.
So democratization is not just kind of opening our craft up
or opening up what we do to any and everyone.
It's making it much more open so
that others can participate meaningfully in the process
and get the value from the work that we do.
And maybe that means they're helping a little bit
along the way.
- Democratization isn't a free for all, it's not
an open invitation, it's not a watering down of our very
real experience and craft that we provide
and the value that we provide, but it's an invitation
to apply a user-centered mindset
to the decisions that you make.
And we can play a role in helping people understand how
to do that, not do all of the things that we do,
but put on that mindset and apply it.
- I think having a goal
for your democratization efforts is really important.
I think trying to do it just
for the sake of doing it certainly won't get you anywhere.
And I think also potentially having misaligned goals,
I think efficiency is a really kind of great idea or goal.
I think that having more respect
and buy-in into then what we present is a really good goal.
So I think being really clear
about what you're trying to achieve can help lead efforts
and also not let kind of you diverge too far
from this concept.
- Absolutely, this is giving me some pause
and I think it's drawing me
to this one final somewhat hot topic question, which is
how do you know when you're gatekeeping
versus how do you know when you're cheapening the craft?
Which it seems like these are the two extremes maybe
of democratization, which is that if you do it right
then you are able to preserve the craft
but also if you do it poorly, it might be seen as like,
oh we're just not letting others grow the field.
So I'd love your thoughts
on how do you balance these two things?
- I think the beautiful thing about this being a spectrum
is that if you're too far on either end
you're probably not in the right place, right?
So if you feel like you're completely gate keeping
you probably are and you're probably
too far on that end of the spectrum.
If it feels like a circus and free for all
and everyone is out doing their own UX methods and research
and that nothing's lined, then you're a little too far over.
And I think if you feel like you're
you're in this gray space
then you're actually probably in the right place.
- And I think too that it's not, you know,
watering down our craft or it's not assuming to say that
it's really easy and anyone can do it.
That's certainly not what this is about, but it is
about making sure that more people can start
to see the value, hear the feedback our users have,
see what they struggle with, with their own eyes
so that we can all make better informed decisions
about how to improve the experience together.
- Yeah, and I certainly see the value
in this conversation as well.
So thank you for joining me today.
It's been a lot of fun, a lot to think about.
- Thanks Therese.