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Business — Content design — Human-centred approaches — Technology

The complex task of simplicity — Paul Taylor

Sainsbury's Basics food packaging - washing powder, flower, canned tomatoes

It is human nature to add things, making them more complex. This feels like you’re doing something, but actually you’re probably making the situation worse.

We see this in web design. People like adding pages to their websites because it feels productive. But actually, the most effective websites are the ones with fewer, simpler pages.

The same can be true for any design, including the way we structure our work.

We often anchor around the wrong thing. That’s why some big institutions have no chance — they are hit by random plans and transformations rather than anchoring around purpose and iteration.

Linknote — — 85 words

Human-centred approaches — User experience

Types of design focus — Ben Holliday

Useful definitions outlining the differences between user-centred design, person-centred design and human-centred design.

If user-centred design is more functional in terms of understanding and meeting needs. Person-centred design is more holistic. This means that it’s more focussed on emotional needs and goals. Human-centred design is then about thinking beyond individual needs and more towards the collective needs of a system, place, or community.

See also: When individual experience isn’t enough — what shared spaces teach us about the challenge and opportunity for user experience

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Economics — Service design

In storytelling and service design, easy is boring — Daniele Catalanotto — Enigma

Illustration of a rollercoaster

Why it may not always be right to design as smooth a journey as possible.

This idea seems counter-intuitive at first, but makes perfect sense on further reflection.

…people who had an issue with a service that was later resolved gave a better rating to it than people who didn’t have any.

It reminds me of a story (which I now cannot find) about someone who annually camped out for nights on end to get tickets for a particular event. One year, this person’s dedication was rewarded with free tickets. This gift offended the person. They derived their utility from the effort they were putting in (or perhaps in showing that effort to other people). The value was in the struggle.

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Social science — Society

Why being kind could help you live longer — Lauren Turner — BBC News

Illustration of hands holding hearts

It has long been known that being kind to others makes you feel good and can improve your mental health. Now it seems there is a growing body of evidence suggesting that it can increase your life expectancy.

“Living with people who treat you, at best, with disregard or a lack of concern, and at worst with open hostility, is bad for you. It shortens your life, quite literally,” [Daniel Fessler] says.

“Conversely, both receiving kindness from others, and providing kindness, both of those things are the antithesis of this toxic stress situation. And they’re good for you.”

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User experience

Repeat after me: Preference testing is not A/B testing — David Travis — Userfocus

Person holding up two photographs

Reasons why you shouldn’t simply ask users to choose which design they prefer.

It turns out people aren’t good at answering this kind of question. People don’t know why, or they don’t care enough to answer, or they may not want to tell you. When asked for an opinion, most people will form one on the spot. Such opinions aren’t carefully considered or deeply held. It’s not that UX researchers don’t care what people like: it’s just risky making important design decisions based on fickle opinions.

User experience isn’t about discovering what people think they want. It’s about finding out what they need.

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Human-centred approaches

“The signs were completely radical”: Margaret Calvert looks back on her illustrious career — Matt Alagiah — It's Nice That

Illustration of Margaret Calvert

A wonderful interview with Margaret Calvert, who worked with Jock Kinnear on my favourite design — the system of UK road signs.

If you look on Wikipedia, it says we were “responsible for some of the road signs”. We weren’t – we were responsible for thinking out an entire system as well as designing how it was to be, the arrangement of the information and the pictograms that followed. It wasn’t just “some road signs” – that is such an understatement!

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Human-centred approaches — Web

The term “responsive web design” has failed — Frances Berriman

Those words (originally from a slide by Alex Russell) may seem rather provocative. But it is a fair reminder that design isn’t just about how it looks.

In this case, most people (including, at times, myself) have fallen foul of the trap described here. That of thinking that setting a few breakpoints for smaller screens is enough to be responsive.

It reminded me of Jakob Nielsen’s 2012 article in which he advocated building a complete separate mobile site. This was a controversial viewpoint at a time when responsive design was becoming seriously trendy.

But seven years on, can we truly say the mobile web is a great experience?