Stop trying to sell the “value” of research / UX / design

Who likes being sold to? The best sales people uncover people’s pain points and constraints and pitch their products to solve problems within those constraints.

When we try to sell UX or Design, we are focusing on our needs. We may even pitch on how the product will be better. But the truth is, this is rarely our manager’s highest priority. Time, cost and predictability are more important to most managers than outcomes.

Rather than fighting against reality, we need to work within it. We need to figure out how to deliver valuable research and designs within very tight time and cost constraints. If we’re asking for 2 hours of someone’s time per week, we will have a lot more success than a vague, and potentially costly, research and design phase.

This Week’s Updates

Enabling the Team

Profit Through People: The Enterprise Model Of Decentralization And Extreme Customer Care by Joost Minnaar
Enterprise has built a strong management framework by decentralizing branches, training in entrepreneurship, tracking customer service (closely), and tying customer satisfaction to compensation.

Watch Your Language: The Hidden Power Of Words In The Workplace by Doug Kirkpatrick
Outdated workplace language reinforces power dynamics. Shifting to human-centered terms fosters collaboration, autonomy, and respect for individuals.

Product Direction

Not Everything Needs To Be An Outcome - Or An OKR by Felipe Castro
Separate work into two buckets: outcomes and due dates. Outcome-based work focuses on clear goals, while due dates manage tasks without measurable outcomes.

Case Study: Are Your Renewals A House Of Cards? by Jim Morris
A product initially thriving in ARR lost 80% in renewals due to misaligned targeting, low engagement, static insights, and flawed pricing. The team pivoted to rebuild value.

Continuous Research

Don't Try To Sell People On The "value" Of Research Or Design by Rory Madden
Who likes being sold to? Real sales people understand the constraints that the buyer is facing and make the solution work for them. We need to do the same.

Are You Considering The Developer’s Mental Model? by Maria Kovalevich
Bridging the gap between tech logic and user expectations is key for intuitive design. Balancing mental models makes products accessible and user-friendly.

Continuous Design

The Wizard Of Oz Method In UX by Sara Paul and Maria Rosala
The Wizard of Oz is a user-research method where a user interacts with a mock interface controlled, to some degree, by a person.

AI Design System Creator: A New Practice In The AI Era With Just One Click by Frank Sun
Using AI to develop your design system can help teams overcome adoption challenges, delivering cohesive and efficient design frameworks that align developers and designers. [sponsored]

Continuous Delivery

Beyond Traditional Testing: Addressing The Challenges Of Non-Deterministic Software by Danilo Poccia
Non-deterministic systems require adaptable testing methods. AI, chaos engineering, and property-based tests make navigating these challenges manageable.

Stop Building The Wrong Tools: How Developer Surveys Transformed Our Focus by James Russo
Developer’s survey data showed a top issue was local dev speed, not a developer platform. Focusing there, the team doubled dev speed and resolved high-priority pain points.

Speaker Announcement:
Daniela Jorge, Chief Design Officer at Capital One

Daniela Jorge, Chief Design Officer at Capital One, will lead a session on “Driving Transformational Business Results: The Role of Design Across the Org.” With a background in driving design’s business value across industries like ecommerce and multisided platforms, Daniela oversees hundreds of designers at Capital One, focused on making banking more ingenious, simple, and human-centered. Drawing from her experiences as Chief Design Officer at PayPal and VP of Design at AT&T, she’ll share insights on amplifying design’s impact within large organizations, embedding design at scale, and fostering collaboration to achieve meaningful business outcomes.

Don’t miss the opportunity to learn from one of the industry’s top design leaders!

FREE COMMUNITY EVENTS 

Check out more upcoming community events 

Video of the Week
Ways of Working: Navigating Growth & Change while Scaling

Jeff Chow, Chief Product & Technology Officer at Miro, joins UXDX founder Rory Madden to discuss the journey of scaling Miro’s product, technology, and design ecosystem. In this engaging fireside, Jeff shares insights from his extensive experience, including his time as CPO and CEO at InVision, and delves into Miro's team-driven approach to innovation. Explore how Miro fosters a collaborative environment, enabling designers and product teams to create user-centered solutions that drive real impact. Watch the full session here👇

The Results of Last Week’s Poll

The question: Do you think scope and code autonomy is realistic in large organisations?

Scope and code autonomy received strong support, with 40.9% believing it is both realistic and essential for large organisations. This perspective reflects a push toward granting teams the freedom to innovate and move quickly, but it also indicates a desire to balance agility with accountability.

In contrast, 23.5% of respondents believe the costs and risks of autonomy outweigh the benefits. To be fair - it is expensive. Getting code autonomy requires duplication of code and then the challenges of handling distributed systems. But, after a certain scale, the trade-offs favour independent teams.

22.1% believe consistency and collaboration are more important than autonomy. The good news for these people is that this is how most organisations work today.

Differing views is great because there is no single right way. Whichever side you fall on, here’s to finding the balance that brings your projects to success!