User experience design involves human-centered problem solving to ensure users' needs are met efficiently and pleasantly. It is an interdisciplinary process that includes research, prototyping, testing and iteration. The goal is to understand users, define the problem, and design a simple, elegant solution through a user-centered approach. While advocacy for UX is sometimes needed when working with other fields, the work can be very meaningful when it improves people's experiences.

1. UX Design: An Introduction
Smitha Prasadh
Senior User Experience Designer
UPMC (university of pittsburgh medical center) Technology Development Center
Pittsburgh, PA
Fall 2013: Digital Content Management
University of Hawaii at Manoa
2013 November 25

2. A little about my background,
and how I ended up in UX
a lot of people “end up” in this field after starting in others;
dedicated UX design/research/HCI programs are still
a fairly new phenomenon

3. user experience design
...what is it?

4. user experience design
my asap elevator-pitch explanation:
human-centered problem solving.”
empathy, empathy, empathy!
who are the users / clients / stakeholders?
for a new product/service...
what is the problem users are facing?
for an existing product/service...
is this still meeting the users’ needs adequately?
“

5. user experience design
for a new product/service...
how do I ensure the users’ needs are met, efficiently and in a pleasing way?
for an existing product/service...
how can I update this to more closely meet user needs?
usable / useful / desirable.
you can’t actually design the experience another person will have.
individual lived experiences/baggage, personal lenses, too many subtle variables.
but you can still do quite a bit!
define your scope. understand your target audience—core user group as well as fringe cases. simplify.

6. user experience design
how do I synthesize this information about users and their situations into a tangible solution?
keep it simple, elegant, and down-to-earth. “remove elements until you can’t remove anything else.”
design is not art.
art...
is interpretive.
is an act of exploration.
has no goal.
is about creating for the artist.
design...
is unanimous.
is rooted in observation and iteration.
has a specific goal.
is about creating for the end user. https://medium.com/design-ux/d229af10c167

8. user experience design is all about
the process
exploratory research · synthesis · generative research · persona + scenario development · prototyping · wireframes ·
high–fidelity design · evaluative research + usability testing
RINSE, LATHER, AND REPEAT AS NEEDED.

9. user experience design occurs
before everything else
interface is informed by the ux design process.
designers work with development teams to build out the designs.
the ui design does not come at the end as a “visual afterthought”.

10. user experience design
doesn’t happen in a vacuum
cross-disciplinary teams.
balancing user feedback with business and technical requirements.
teams with a human–centered philosophy are pretty awesome.

11. user experience design
isn’t only about products
service design, content strategy, and other interrelated fields.
understanding how users think and act.
ikea vs. walmart — design of interior spaces, wayfinding, etc.

12. user experience design
is applicable everywhere
ux has applications in and relevance to every field in existence.
wherever there is a directed and purposeful project, ux comes into play.
essentially, a human-centered philosophy put into action.

13. Real world examples:
Sharing my work from Autodesk and UPMC
Autodesk:
2011 oct - 2013 sept
boston, ma
user experience designer
infrastructure collaboration products
UPMC Technology Development Center:
2013 oct - present
pittsburgh, pa
senior user experience designer
convergence
I’m still pretty new
here, so I don’t have
anything I can show
yet! Sorry about that.

16. what about...?
information architecture

17. what about...?
content strategy

18. gee, UX sounds swell! but...
what’s the catch?
there’s still a lot of self-advocating and justifying our existence to others.
we run into occasional trust issues among non-ux people.
in my experience, this is especially true in older organizations where ux is relatively new - “don’t tell me how to do my job,” etc.
SOLUTION: invite them to user research sessions to hear the feedback from users directly.
some degree of compromise is inevitable. it’s easy to get too attached to such creatively driven work.
ux’s philosophical nature + deep investment in work = sometimes taking work too personally. a bad day at work can really sting.

19. but for me so far, user experience design has been...
meaningful, fulfilling, and fun.

20. Thank you for your time! Any questions?
Smitha Prasadh
hola@smithaprasadh.com
smithaprasadh.com

21. References
Design is Not Art - Goran Peuc
https://medium.com/design-ux/d229af10c167
The Spectrum of User Experience - Information Architects, Inc.
http://ia.net/