Is content strategy … real? Product strategy? UX strategy? Customer experience? What about content design? Information architecture? Experience architecture? The answer to any of these, depending on my mood, is either yes, no, or who cares. Mostly, and most importantly, it’s “Who cares?”. Arguments about what “does and doesn’t exist” in design land to be…
Tag: product design
Ask Scott: Can we let engineers and other non-experts write copy if we haven’t trained them?
We often have the issue that everyone thinks they can write, and our suggestions [as UX writers] are challenged to the end. We, on the other hand, would never challenge engineering decisions.
Hire Product People Who Already Understand Content
This article originally appeared in Issue 050 of UX Writing Events. For some reason (tequila, mostly) I vented a bit of frustration yesterday afternoon with the way content work is often viewed in product land. This tweet seemed to resonate the most with folks: Imagine how much productivity you could unlock by hiring product leadership who already understand…
Fighting Feature Names
You don’t need Proper Nouns to refer to features consistently.
Design jobs and design roles are not the same thing
Many product teams struggle to collaborate well on projects — making websites, building apps, creating content, authoring documentation, etc. — because they have not distinguished jobs from roles. Too often, teams allow roles to be merely inferred by job title, rather than slowing down to have a conversation about who’s doing what and why. This…
Conceptual debt is killing your design process
Conceptual debt accrues when we take shortcuts in developing the foundational concepts behind our products.
The system is a lie
I’ve always been enamored with product ecosystems. It’s rare that I’ll buy anything without researching what kind of accessories I can get with it. Does it have an official case, pouch, or sleeve? Can you change the tip, the handle, the grip? What can I upgrade? What can I combine it with? LEGO was both…
People Like Free Things (and that’s okay)
I’m sad that Google Reader is going to be shut down. I really like Google Reader. I liked it even more before they stripped some of the social features out to sandbag it for Wave. Judging by my Twitter timeline and blog subscriptions, I’m in the minority. The prevailing sentiment seems to be that being…