If your metrics are money, it's called good hearts law. Good hearts law says that if a metric becomes a goal, it becomes worthless. So what you do is if you say the goal is to make money, people will say, well, why don't I just shortcut the whole thing and make money directly? This is how you get massive crime like the world economic collapse in 2008. That was a response to a criminal act of American bankers. We have to overturn the dominant paradigm. Designers design. How can we kind of get business people on board with the vision of creating great products? You can't.
Alan Cooper teaches us what it means to be a good ancestor. He enlightens us to why it’s so hard to build good software. He reveals how money trumps good UX and ethics far too often. He explains why UX is not about finding the best location for a hamburger menu, but about solving the big problems that exist for the user and the business. He also inspires us to consider (and potentially redirect) the footprints we’re leaving now, for the generations to come.
- Should designers code? (4:40)
- Specialization vs. generalization (7:41)
- How do designers get business on board with building great products? (13:19)
- How do you be a good ancestor? (25:30)
- Ancestry Thinking (41:06)
- What does the future of UX look like to you? (44:01)
- What advice do you have for aspiring UX designers? (53:13)
- What do you want your legacy to be? (57:16)
Check out the detailed show notes including the transcript and Eli Jorgensen’s astonishing superhero artwork at userdefenders.com/053-2
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