Published on | Prototyping: From UX to Front End — Medium Jack Strachan Photo by Tim Gouw on Unsplash

“Chill out, put your ego in the corner and try and make sense of what is going on” — Bob Baxley.

Bob Baxley, former design manager at Yahoo, Apple and Pinterest told his new hires at Apple that they should not expect to do anything productive in their first year at the company. The design direction, software and culture was so complicated that the new hires were told to focus on taking it all in and learning the etiquette of their surroundings and new processes before expecting to move forward.

This is something that has really stuck with me during my first week of my first professional practice experience. To say we are being eased in is to put it simply… Its interesting to see how things are working out, the other interns and I are really just playing catch up at the moment. Getting set up on the internal network, attending HR presentations and learning more about the certain projects we are going to be involved in.

I say ‘attending’ cautiously.. the presentation was presented in German and I may of understood close to nothing that was said but at least I was present? A problem for another time maybe.

We are joining a project in the ideation stage, the research has already been carried out. Vasts amount of user research and testing to read over in order to make sense of the insights that have been generated. Its fascinating really, the level of resources one company can have to build these journeys and insights from user feedback. Its hard to see how they can still get it wrong, sometimes. I have the feeling of holding this scepticism close to me, constantly reminding myself of the problem we are trying to solve in order to deliver the best experience to a user. Understand, identify, deliver. Summarising user journeys and making key experience notes. I may not share the same language as many of my colleagues but I am looking forward to working in depth with them, to share and to learn. And maybe i’m starting to fall in love with the ‘google-esque’ post lunch table football game.

The shops are shut in Stuttgart on a Sunday, the museums are not.

I found a log book titled “UX Design Snippets” on my desk from a past intern during the week, the lead title on the first page read: UX is not simply UI. The author was making a statement about how user experience design is not simply interfaces, it is more than that. I’m sure it will be useful for a future blog but that simple statement has never been more true. The thinking behind everything here is huge. Not only are we focusing on the user experience of features of products and services but from every angle. From every part of the user journey, even before they have our product in their hands.

This post has kind of been written from monday through to friday, adding small parts every evening so my thoughts may have changed but I didn’t want to edit what I had written previously so bare with me when my thoughts are fluctuating slightly.

The end of the week signalled a milestone for me. My first week of professional practice over and it couldnt have gone better. I’ve settled in well, the other interns and staff have been a delight to work with and are always helping me with my German. I had my first taste of testing a prototype; both by myself and by observing others and this has really gotten us on board with the current project. All that is left is for me to continue building on a good week; both through this professional practice, my language skills and myself.

I ended up walking out of work on friday afternoon with the lead UX designer here at Bosch, there was small talk etc until we got to his car. He fist bumped me, got into his Porsche and raced off. I’m really looking forward to learning from this guy.

Learning design culture: one week on. was originally published in prototypr on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Learning design culture: one week on.

Cool stuff, every week

More Articles