For the last 8 years I have been blogging and speaking to convince companies why user experience matters. They now get it.
For the last year, we have seen exponential growth in our space. Even though my company, EffectiveUI, was the first, we are certainly no longer the only firm saying that designing for user need is critical for success. However, we are entering a time where those words are becoming commoditized. Just because a company understands how to talk about the value of what we do does not mean they understand the practice, the “how”.
I have made a conscious decision last year to focus my energy on defining the DNA of a successfully launched software product. I asked the EffectiveUI team, “end-to-end, what does it take to define and build something that meets business, user, and technical objectives?” I studied not only the strategy, research and design practices, but also the development methodologies that are most successful.
It would be egotistical (or, should I say even more egotistical) for me to say the world should come to only us if they want to get things done in the right way. The entire team at EffectiveUi has recognized that our customers have a desire to use us to get the important projects our quickly, but also need to bring user experience in-house. This is a macro-trend right now; companies are scouring for UX talent while attempting to create their own UX culture.
To that end, we created an arm of EffectiveUI focused on education and training. For our customers, we have developed a flexible curriculum to help them adopt the world’s best practices. For the community, we have partnered with Galvanize’s gSchool to train the next generation of practitioners.
The gSchool philosophy is cleverly unique. They understand that intensive, skills-based learning is the future and, if their first offering is any indication, they have hit the nail on the head. Our program, geared for training “Experience Architects“, will train designers on how to work through all aspects of leading a user-experience focused design initiative.
I’m looking forward to helping our lead instructors teach the “how” in the coming year and watching the first class go on to build amazing products…
http://www.gschool.it/experiencearchitect/
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