5 Things UX Designers Shouldn’t Be Afraid Of

Fear has been the most obvious and consistent roadblock in my professional career. I believe that fear is often a major obstacle for designers, UX professionals, and in reality, professionals of any kind. On a more positive note, I have always been able to grow and learn from the moments when I have faced my fears and found the courage to take on the challenges set before me. Here are five things that I used to be afraid of but no longer am, and as a result, it has made me a better designer and UX professional.

Public Speaking

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I used to hate presenting my work and speaking in front of people when I was in school. I quickly learned however that leading meetings and speaking to large groups of people is an important part of the growth of a UX designer. Being able to comfortably communicate with others and share your ideas is a big part of creating successful experiences. Running workshops, and presenting my work is something I do on nearly a daily basis. I still get a little nervous before leading a meeting but I am thankful that I have been able to overcome my stage fright for the most part.

Coding

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It seems as if the “designers should/shouldn’t code” debate will never end and I don’t want to contribute to the debate with this article. I will say that one of my biggest professional regrets and the reason why I didn’t get into UX earlier in my career is that I was afraid of coding and I was generally intimidated by technology. While anthropology and history played a large role in my upbringing, technology was not a huge part of my childhood so it was something that always felt unfamiliar to me. I remember turning down a web design job interview just because I didn’t know how to code! I was excited when I learned that I didn’t HAVE to know how to code to break into web design. I have since learned the basics of coding and found a passion for technology. I am thankful that my knowledge and experience with technology and code have led to me having better relationships with the engineers I work with. So for the record (I guess I will add to the debate) even though I believe that UXers should know the basics of coding, I don’t think it’s required to break into UX, and more importantly, don’t be afraid of coding like I was.

Not Knowing All the Answers

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This is true especially if you are a junior designer, but even if I understood this, I was always so afraid of looking or feeling stupid if I didn’t know an answer to a question. Ironically, the more I have learned and the more experience I have gained, the more I haven’t been afraid to say I don’t know” or “I will have to find out and get back to you”. I now believe the people that you want to work with will respect the honesty and humility that comes with I don’t know, especially if you follow up that response with a high level of dedication and effort to getting the information needed to answer a question.

Keeping up with Design Tools

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Similar to coding, I was always the designer that was intimated by the other people in the class that knew how to use Photoshop or some other software tool better than I knew how to use it. Fortunately, our industry has seen an influx of a new set of design tools that are highly accessible and easy to learn for up and coming designers. The increased accessibility to design tools should teach new designers that a designer’s process, thinking, and mindset are far more important than the tools in the toolbelt. The processes I have grown, the workshops and UX exercises I have learned, and the mindsets I have developed have been key to my career growth and have been the most important reason why I have become comfortable using design software.

Failure

Image Courtesy of Unsplash (Ian Kim)

This is the most obvious and important fear to overcome all of the previous fears I have mentioned are rooted in this one. Being afraid of making mistakes, being afraid of failure has easily been the one thing that has slowed me down the most. Ironically, I believe UX design celebrates failure and mistakes or UX design is at least a more forgiving design discipline than some other design fields. Fail fast and iterate has become one of my mantras as I have learned that in reality that the sooner I can test and fail the ideas, prototypes, and hypotheses I come up with, the sooner I can learn and grow from those failures, and more importantly, the sooner I can pass on what I have learned to my stakeholders, colleagues, and clients. Of course, there are different degrees of mistakes and you don’t want to be reckless, but the sooner you understand that the most growth and learning comes from failure the sooner you will grow in your UX career.

I would be lying to you if I wrote that I still don’t struggle with fearing these five things. It might not be easy for you to overcome your fear of a few or all of these things but if you do you will create a clearer and much stronger pathway to becoming a better and more confident UX designer.