Design during crisis
It is a hard time for anyone in any industry all around the world. Today I want to focus on the design field and how to prepare for the changes that you may face in the next couple of months or even years. In times like this, adaptability and flexibility are keys to survival.
Over the past few years, user experience has played a bigger role in the product development cycle. Specialists from different industries would likely call it the Golden Age of Design — a time when almost every new startup would incorporate user experiences as a core value during the foundational stage. Companies were creating executive positions that were dedicated to supporting and evangelizing delightful user experience as a central part of the business. It’s hard to admit, but the IT industry will suffer a lot and designers will have to adapt to these changes.
During this crisis, when only the essential businesses and employees remain working, many corporations will have to re-prioritize their needs. The vast majority of companies are not as “bright” as in Silicon Valley, and designers still have to defend every user-centered decision while spending time educating management on why good user experience is the key to success.
From a day-to-day perspective, much of the current workflow may also change for you after the crisis. You may see it in different areas, whether that be the research, user interviews, or UI design.
Let’s imagine that some of your co-workers (from engineering, QA, or design) were laid off. You now face a shortage of people. Yet, you must deliver on new features or products as the business needs to develop key components of high value in a short period of time to continue staying afloat.
Simplifying features
At this point, you may start simplifying features. You may feel compelled to reduce some components as you fundamentally lack the human capital to build the feature in the planned time.
In a crisis, time becomes a key resource for the company. Every decision can significantly influence the business, especially if you’re in a small startup.
Let’s take the file upload feature for example. You can upload the file by following two different options: a) select to upload or b) drag and drop. When working under a time crunch to deliver the feature, you might only be able to offer option A, with the drag and drop option only being incorporated in a future release.
Or let’s use another example: the animation is an important part of the interface. If you’re delivering extra features or even working on a redesign of the app, you may need to hold off on incorporating animations or choose to only include the most important ones.
Despite the fact, file upload and animations may seem like simple things to implement, reality shows that you can spend a decent amount of time working on this.
The prioritization curve of the product and development will be shifted towards fixing old bugs, system refactoring or financing reconciliation to keep the system running for existing users. Zoom app can be a great example of this. They freeze feature development to fix security and privacy issues.
Don’t get me wrong. It’s not about decreasing the usability of the app, it’s about having to prioritize what needs to be built next. At this point, you may have a much smaller team than before and the capacity may be reduced to 1–2 features per sprint.
Today, users need new features like never before which is why it’s crucial to release important features to your users as soon as possible without compromising on UX.
Use time properly
At these times, as a designer, you may experience less load than usual. But it’s not time to stop. Regroup, change your priorities and start working towards them. Features and projects that were valuable a couple of months ago may not be valid in today’s reality.
If your team is much smaller now or you are the only designer in the startup, it’s a great time to prepare for future sprints. You have the opportunity to take more time to polish and prepare projects for the developers. It may be a wonderful time for you. You can spend more time on the details of the feature, research, or testing. It is a time to deal with bugs and UI artifacts that you wanted to tackle before but didn’t have time.
Of course, they won’t be pushed to production any time soon but you will have a solid foundation and features that ready to build as soon as your company stabilizes.
Almost everyone is at home, so it’s an amazing time to observe how the behavior of your users is changing. Maybe you will find something that can improve their life immediately. It is also a time to conduct more user interviews as most people have become less busy and might be more willing to respond.
Companies around the world began adjusting their software to the new reality. For instance, “Users Can Now Join Skype Calls Without The Skype Account”, “Zoom is improving safety and privacy ”, “Instagram Launches New Co-Watching Feature” to name a few. Look around, maybe your product has the same opportunities to help bring comfort to people’s lives in these difficult times.
In The End
This unplanned digital transformation will change the way we work, interact or relax. In these hard times, the IT industry should try to bring a sense of calm and confidence. The way you design today can have a huge impact on people more than ever, so use this chance to help people while staying safe.
