Journal

The rise of the user experience design sector

Update: this event has now finished, but you can access the discussion at the link in the following paragraph. Thanks to everyone who took part.

On Friday, August 6th, I’ll be joining other panelists to discuss careers in user experience as part of The Guardian’s Careers live Q&A sessions.

This is a subject I’ve written about here in the past – in How to get a job at a web design agency – and it’s an enduring interest of mine, as a mentor with the IA Institute and as I watch this field evolve and mature.

One of the first comments on the site, from Dominic Francis, sums up the challenges that some can feel moving into user experience:

‘You dont have much of a portfolio, you’re not creative enough, you don’t have enough consultancy skills’

It’s a refrain I expect to hear quite a bit. I’ve got my own ideas on this – and will share these as part of Friday’s session – but whether you are an experienced user experience designer or someone just setting out, why not join me on Friday. It should be an interesting discussion.

Further reading:

• The Guardian’s Martin Belam on What is Information Architecture (and by extension, user experience)
• Whitney Hess on 10 Most Common Misconceptions About User Experience Design
• Matthew Solle on creating persuasive portfolios To portfolio or not to portfolio, that is the question
• Cameron Moll’s advice on revealing you approach to problem solving: What managers look for in designer/developer portfolios