Published on | Prototyping: From UX to Front End — Medium Hayden Slaughter

Each week I answer a question from my mentee on the subject of UX.

Q: What are the “common” questions I’ll be asked in a UX Interview?

There are loads of posts already out there that will tell you what someone got asked in a UX interview or posts from hiring managers outlining what they are looking for. I’ve taken four posts I found from a quick google, pulled out all the questions and put them into 6 categories. Rather than trying to guess which questions you might get asked in an interview you would be better placed to understand the categories they fit in to and what the interviewer is trying to understand from asking about that topic. You can then get to the heart of the question and give a considered and holistic response.

All the questions:

All the questions from these four sources have been split into six categories. Dig into the links to see the authors suggestion for answering a particular question. (numbers listed next to each question relate to the link it came from)

Understanding of UX:

What is UX design? (1)
Why does UX matter? (1)
How would you explain the UX design process? (1)
Is UX design UI design? What’s the difference? (2)
What does the term ‘design-thinking’ mean to you? (2)
What does it mean to be a great UX designer? (2)
How do you define UX/design? (3)

Process and ways of working:

What is your design process? (1)
Describe the design methods that you follow. (1)
Describe your design process and what methods you follow. (2)
Please provide some examples of your experience dealing with user research and usability testing. (2)
What is your approach to making websites and platforms accessible to all user groups, including users with visual, hearing, and motor disabilities? (2)
If tasked to perform a UX evaluation of a product, what would your process look like to accomplish this? (2)
What is your design process? (3)
What Do You Think The Most Important Part Of The UX Design Process Is? (4)

Team and business:

What’s your process for working with other designers, developers, or product managers? (1)
How would you decide which features to add to your product? (1)
When a client says: “I don’t like this design.” What do you do? (2)
Walk me through a design example where you set out to solve a business problem. (2)
What analytics tools and key performance indicators (KPIs) have you used to evaluate your designs? (2)
Sell me on the ROI of investing in UX design. How would it improve my bottom line? (2)
Do you prefer to work alone or with a team? (3)
How do you work with engineers/Product Managers/other designers? (3)
What Do You Do When There’s Not Enough Time To Do Research? (4)

Your experiences:

Tell us about a project that you’re most proud of (1)
Tell us about a UX project that didn’t go as planned. (1)
Describe a recent project you were particularly challenged by and how you approached the problem. (2)
What are some of the biggest challenges you face as a UX designer? (2)
Can you tell me about a project you did this [UX evaluation of a product] for and what the outcome of the evaluation was? (2)
What is the most interesting project you have worked on? (3)
Tell me about an assignment that was too difficult. How did you handle the situation? (3)
What Are Your Favourite Aspects Of Your Current Role? (4)

Wider industry:

What would you say is the next big trend in UX design? (1)
Where do you get inspiration from? (1)
Who in the industry do you follow and read? (1)
What are some of the biggest trends in the UX Design industry right now? (2)
Who are your design heroes? (2)
What are your favorite apps for UX? Explain why. (2)
What are some apps or websites that you love? (3)
Who in the industry do you follow and read? (3)
How Do You Keep Your Knowledge Of UX Design & Techniques Up To Date? (4)

Development:

Why do you want to work at [company x]? (3)
Why should I hire you? (3)
What Would You Say Your Key Skills Are As A UX Designer? (4)
Where Do You See Yourself In Five Years? (4)
What Attracted You To This UX Position? (4)

Six categories:

Understanding of UX
Process and ways of working
Team and business
Your experiences
Wider industry
Development

1. Understanding of UX

This is your base knowledge and where you show that you’ve at least read a book or two about UX. Think of this as a foundation on which all other information is built, its imperative that you have it but its really not that exciting on its own. Its how you use it and what you do with it that makes these fundamentals useful.

A lot of job descriptions focus on this stuff, especially in the junior to mid range market. My view is that its short sited to get so hung up on this area because you want to be recruiting for potential and growth, not just the hard skills they currently have. Demonstrate that you have the skills listed in every UX/UI job ad: agile, research, wireframing, sketching, yawn yawn another buzzword prototyping…… Weave them into your portfolio and build them into the language you use, this will demonstrate your understanding and mastery of the basic techniques. You can then begin to focus on the wider application and much harder skills such as managing stakeholders, getting buy in, extracting and developing ideas, team work and the myriad of other skills that go into getting a useful and usable feature or product into the world.

2. Process and ways of working

Building on your foundations is the processes you use to deploy these skills and understanding. The interviewer is trying to get insight into how your mind works and how you have developed your skills into actionable tools to deploy at the right time. This isn’t about having a right or wrong process, its about showing your maturity as a designer and how you can pick and chose the right tool for the right job. If you only have a hammer then everything will look like a nail, thats no good for a business in the real world.

Know your portfolio inside out and backwards, be able to talk about the skills you have used and why. Know which areas will be of most interest to the company and the people. This is where your research of the organisation and people will come into its own, combined with your portfolio and knowledge of your own skills you can pre-empt what the interviewer wants to know and hand it to them on a plate.

3. Team and business

This is your opportunity to show you have done your homework. You should know the company inside out, find out everything you can about who they are, what they do, how they work, who works there and anything else you can get your eyes on. This is vital information so that you can make sure what you talk about is relevant to them and that its the right company for you.

The company:

Know in detail what the company do
What products or services they offer
Who their competition are
How long they’ve operated in the space
Who they collaborate and work with
How they work
The makeup of their team
How many employees they have
Whats the structure of their organisation

The people:

Where do they hang out online
What type of people are they
Do they use social media, what do they talk about or interact with
Are they advocates or speakers in any particular areas
Where did they previously work
What do they enjoy about their jobs
Who has previously worked there

As well as researching the company and making sure your answers appeal to their situation, you also need to demonstrate your business knowledge and understanding. Show how you handle stakeholders in an organisation like theirs, how you deal with concerns or issues and how you make sure that there is input from the relevant people. Talk about the times you faced problems similar to theirs and how you overcame them. Ultimately they want to know that they will be in a safe pair of hands and that you are the right person to steady the ship when the rough times inevitably come. They want to know that you don’t just operate in theoretical or ideals but that you have hands on experience and know how to handle a situation when problems, changes and challenges come your way. Not just manage the situation but take control of it and ensure a positive outcome.

4. Your experiences

Its now time to show the application of your base skills, processes, teamwork and business understanding. Real life situations where you did what you say you can do. Again know your portfolio inside out and back to front combine it with your knowledge of their organisation, the way they are structured and the types of problems they face. Pull out the parts that are particularly prevalent to them, empathise with their situation and demonstrate how you can be the one to help with the problems they face.

It’s not just about making everything look rosey, you should also show self reflection, your ability to learn from situations or mistakes and how you adapt and grow from experiences. Good interviewers know that its not often, if ever, a project runs smoothly from start to finish and they want to see the nitty gritty of the problems you encountered and solved. They will likely have their own problems and will want to know you are well versed in dealing with them.

5. Wider industry

This is your chance to talk about what gets you excited and inspires what you do. If you love UX and the career you have chosen then this should just be a great time to geek out and talk about what you love. Its also a chance to talk about some of the stuff you really like in UX at the moment, to show you have an opinion about current trends and advances. Make sure to temper those opinions with the fact there are many constraints and challenges the teams making these products would have faced that you will never know.

6. Development

From a company perspective they want to know that you are a keen learner and not going to stagnate in a role. UX is a relatively new field and is constantly moving, changing and evolving as a discipline. Thats without the constant advancements in technology and ways in which we interact with technology. Talk about how you learn and the fact you take pride in continuously developing your skills, show them they don’t have to hold your hand every step of the way and that you will take the initiative to grow and become even more useful to their business.

I’d encourage you to have your own interview guide by which you judge whether the company is the right fit for you as well as you being the right fit for them. Know what your own career development and progression looks like and where you imagine this to take you. Is this a good stepping stone for what you want to achieve, does it open doors and enable you? If you don’t know where you want to go then how will you know if this is the right path to take you there? Knowing all the right answers to all the right questions will be of no use if the company and you aren’t well aligned and going to be useful to one another.

UX interviews are not a set of right or wrong questions that you can revise for. They are a conversation with two parties working out whether this is the right person to enter into a relationship with. Its not about reciting the answers to questions or telling the interviewer what you think they want to hear. Its about incorporating these practices into your day to day work, making sure that you live and breath good processes and ways of working. That you believe in them and they’re valuable to you, your team, the user and the business. If you have that built into your DNA as a UX designer then these aren’t interview questions. Instead it becomes a discussion about your passion and purpose and this is just a platform to tell others about what you believe and explain how you work. It just so happens that it will lead to getting a great job at the end of this discussion.

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Smashing those UX interview questions

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