Who am I? How do I identify myself? When asked by a friend from high school, “what do you
do?”, how would I answer? For most of my career, I identified myself as a technical specialist.
Something like, “I help make products easier for customers to use.” I might go on to explain that
I use specialized methods to work with customers so that they can be more productive or more
pleased using products. In essence, I thought of myself as a technical weenie.
In addition, I also identified myself as a kind of user experience high priest. I brought the
good word about user experience to the people in the company who design the products and I
advocated for the users, the customers. I split the world into the Wall Streeters and the Main
Streeters. I took the virtuous point of view of the Main Streeters against the business-first
orientation of the Wall Streeters. The developers were allied with the Wall Streeters in the
company while I was a crusader for the common man; I was morally superior.
That attitude got me more and more isolated from the business goals of my clients. I was good at
finding fault with their designs but not at understanding how the products fit into the company’s
strategy. When some of my recommendations were ignored, it fed my usability paranoia –
designers were out to ignore me. If they didn’t include me in a meeting, it was an indication that
they didn’t care about their customers. When they chose to take a different direction from one I
advocated, it showed that they were Wall Streeters. The virtuous crusader should win all of the
debates.
The picture I have painted here of my younger self is only slightly exaggerated. A colleague
I respected took me aside and told me that I was viewed not as a user advocate but as an
inflexible proponent for myself and that I refused to see product development in the context of
the company’s business. My reaction was to deny my addiction with sainthood. But, eventually,
I began to see the value of building relationships with developers instead of seeing them as the
enemy.
I’m sure none of you bloggers see yourselves as morally superior to your colleagues. How do
you see yourself?
