What user-centred design is not

What user-centred design is not. I’ve written about what user-centred…

I’ve written about what user-centred design is a lot of times. For fun, here are some things that it is not.

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User-centred design is not

…3 people editing the same Figma document.

…having post-its on your desk.

…putting a survey on the homepage.

…a new CMS.

…having a design system.

…having a content designer.

…having a service designer.

…having a UX designer.

…having personas.

…asking colleagues if they can think of any usability issues.

…asking colleagues what they think of the prototype.

…recruiting real users (yay!), but then asking them what they think of the prototype – instead of asking them to complete tasks and observing any usability issues.

…having a mono race, gender, culture or ability design team.

…regarding accessibility as ‘a nice to have’.

…thinking of accessibility as something separate from the default design.

…“checking it works with a few people in another team”

…“meeting WCAG requirements”.

…user acceptance testing.

…changing the colours (unless it’s to increase colour contrast, for better accessibility and usability).

…the subject matter expert being the proxy user.

…printing design principles and sticking them on the wall.

…having a house style guide.

…asking friends and family.

…starting with a solution.

…developing something “perfect” before asking users.

…working alone.

…changing an element of the design because 1 person is momentarily confused but then continues happily.

…predictable.

To be continued. Probably.

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