A day in the life of a UX designer
A day in the life of a UX designer
Niels Lieven is one of the UX designers of team Fronteers at TRIMM. When he is not doing that, he takes the most beautiful pictures, preferably during long journeys.
Join us in this blog on a journey through his working day at TRIMM.
You always come to TRIMM in your red car .. and then?
"I open up my laptop and check my mail. I am in close contact with the (external) product owner of the project I'm currently working on. We call and e-mail frequently to keep each other up to date. Jira is an important tool that has stories with work that I can do during the day.
After we have a stand up with our team. This is a daily moment in which we discuss what we did yesterday and what we will do today. If there are other important issues which have to be discussed, the stand up is the place to share these."
What does the rest of your morning look like?
"I usually work undisturbed on Jira stories in the morning. Stories are tasks that have been described by the product owner and arise from use cases. These can be tweaks, but also completely new pages or functionalities. I start with sketching on my iPad Pro and working out the digital concepts. I consult a lot with the UI designer, this ensures that he knows from the start of a project what's going on and gives him the possibility to conduct research before he starts designing. When I find the right way of working, I provide clear documentation for the UX designs, the so-called functional requirements. This describes the desired way of working of the website or application.
When the designer has finished his first designs, the developers can start working with the designs and documentation."
Can you elaborate on that process?
"Before projects and the products to be delivered are described in Jira, we always start with a workshop together with the customer. During this workshop we develop personas and draw up use cases. The goal of this session is to determine what needs to be realized. High level use cases arise from these sessions. The product owner then translates the use cases into several Jira stories."
Do you work on several projects at the same time?
"I usually work on two large projects and in between I work on small projects that last no more than a few days. I like that variety, this way no day is the same."
Every team within TRIMM has its own lunch habits, what are yours?
"We go to the supermarket for sandwiches each day, this is always a nice moment. It is nice not to talk about work for a while but about Game of Thrones and food documentaries instead. In addition, we like to play darts during the lunch break."
How does your day continue after lunch?
"Many conference calls are scheduled in the afternoon. That is the moment to show the customer our progress. We work for international customers so this is the most efficient way of communicating. During these calls, I present my work and explain my choices. This sometimes requires assertiveness and a firm attitude to defend your plans. It is very cool to see the customer get enthusiastic about our ideas.
Because a lot of people join these calls, they can take up a lot of time. It can also take a long time for large projects to get a green light. Those are the downsides of the job."
Coffee?
"Well, opinions on coffee do differ. I prefer a glass of water."
How does a UX designer like you deal with testing?
"Naturally we test a lot internally. The testing starts with wireframes in the initial phase of a project to see if it works the way I had in mind. If that is not the case, I return to the drawing board and start again. Testing at an early stage is important, because it reduces the chance that work is done in vain: not only by me, but also by the designers or the developers. At a later stage we also carry out usability tests. These are for testing a click model or a high fidelity template of a website or application. In usability tests we aks end users to execute a number of scenarios. It is nice to see how the customer deals with what I have come up with. They sometimes do other things than I initially expected, which is valuable input for our end product."
Lunch, coffee... that bucket of candy is also nice for the cup-a-soup moment!
"Yes that's a good one, isn't it? However, in the morning I usually go for some fruit that we can get here for free, which is a bit healthier than all that candy."
At the end of the day, colleagues usually go home, but you regularly do something with your team after work, don't you?
"Yes, we often go to the city and combine that with a dinner party, pubquiz or escape room. Once a year our team organizes a craft beer tasting for all TRIMM.
When I look back, lasergaming in the TRIMM building was one of the coolest things we did."
One last question: I wonder how you keep up to date in your profession...
"I attended a few courses using the training budget TRIMM provides. I'm also subscribed to a UX community where I can read interesting content throughout the year, and I sometimes go to a UX congress. In addition, I receive a weekly mail from Codrops about new trends and developments. All this helps to refresh your knowledge, but also to learn new things about your profession."
Interested in an internship, graduation project or (part-time) job at TRIMM? Take a look at our vacancies or send in an open application!