Disclaimer: Don’t I wish I own a time machine for the convenience of traveling back to the past and/or catch a glimpse of what the future might actually hold? I’ve been typing this out at 12:47 AM because it has been very top of mind as of late. I think it’s time I said my thanks since graduating.
It has been exactly 4 months since I graduated General Assembly, and I wanted to take the time to reflect on key learnings and express gratitude to people I’ve met and shaped my experience ever since.
What is General Assembly? It’s a kind of educational institution offering courses and classes in technology, business, design, and data at 14 campuses around the globe. I enrolled in their User Experience Design Immersive flex programme, designed for anyone looking to transition into the world of user experience design, either as a designer, researcher, or information architect.
I wasn’t sure if I was ready to become a designer like that, which is funny because being one was never in my list of ever-changing ambitions since I was young. So, making a transition (of sorts) to become a designer was daunting. Because I can’t draw. At all. Or at least that’s what I thought I had to be good at until I started to learn about being a human-centered designer. When I accidentally created an internal ticketing system as a rookie hire three jobs ago because… UX. Huh.
Now, looking for opportunities to rotate to my next role, I couldn’t have been more wrong about my nervousness. I’m grateful to have started my career in market research and credit the leap I took to push me outside my comfort zone to find an area I really love.
Six key learnings I’m taking away:
- Relationships & allies matter: What brought me joy was connecting with others, especially inside my team. Honestly, there’s no right journey to approach work and life. Through conversations, I found previous teachers, graphic designers, architects, marketeers, etc who bring their unique perspectives to the work we do. With every new person I met, there were more opportunities to seek constructive feedback and build trust to have conversations centered around growth. Ideally, I think it would’ve also been nice to have a moment with others I didn’t have an opportunity to bond with. Who knows what I’m missing?
- Confidence takes time: I put too much pressure on myself to be perfect, speak at every meeting or have this constant need to contribute to something. Something I realised through daily “self-talks” with my mirror, I learned that confidence takes time. I wasn’t the only one who put pressure on myself, and thankfully had supportive individuals share their experiences of finding their voice during their own group meetings. Showing love: A special shoutout to Pink Floyd for always being there to keep my head straight and calm me down before any major presentations.
- Exposing your research: Clients often say they know their users. They make assumptions on who they are, how they use their products — online or offline — and what their problems are. As a designer… that designs experiences, it’s our job to do the research and show them how it really is. It’s a magic weapon. It’s essential to show clients what real people think. Show them what their needs and problems are. And then design something that addresses those needs and problems. Because this is what UX is all about: building something that adds value to people’s lives. And you can’t do that without talking to them.
- Don’t get married to your ideas: In a fast-paced and highly iterative world, it was useful to know why I had to get some distance from my ideas, because things change. Quickly. If you’re married to your idea, you start defending your design even if testing proved otherwise. So, clearly, it’s not about what you think is the best, but what is best for the project. It’s also wise to treat your idea as an assumption i.e., “I think this problem could be solved doing X” instead of “doing X will solve the problem. Validate this assumption by testing it. If the assumption was wrong then that’s fine! Everything is adjustable. Just keep validating.
- Users need to be at the center of it all: When it comes to building breathtaking products, there needs to be a deep understanding of consumer unmet needs. Starting my career in market research, I built a strong foundation to approach qual and quant research methodology focused on revealing the customer voice and perspective. This taught me how to drive product discussions forward by connecting the dots with data points and insights collected.
- Learning doesn’t stop ever: Entering a culture that fostered learning and growing enabled me to celebrate the little wins with myself. I also found this innate passion to learn new skills and technology monthly — I’ve built virtual whiteboard spaces, presentation templates, Figma wireframes, etc.
Thank you to: Suzette Josephine, Yu Jie Ong, Mabel Teo, Jean Goh for keeping me sane when it wasn’t always sunshine and rainbows, for organising practice presentations at midnight, for sharing dank memes, for the inside jokes, for “toasting” to the good, bad and ugly, for being each other’s biggest fan, and the rest of class UXDIF 1 for sharing this journey with me through team projects or just exchanging a smile in class.
