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Alex Jones

I lead teams at the intersection of strategy and design. Autodidact. Polymath. Barbecue acolyte. I start fires (the good kind).

User Experience

The Forest for the Trees

Every UX professional feels the pain that has driven me down my winding career path, but the next steps aren’t obvious and there is not a clear path to follow. I’m trying to document the opportunities that I see, in the hope that others will drive forward, taking risks in order to have a larger impact.

Admittedly, I miss the days where I spent 10 hours in Photoshop or wrangling code. When I’m finalizing budgets, dealing with internal politics, reviewing contracts or defending a product roadmap, I seriously think about returning to those roles. Those challenges are much more familiar. The role far more comfortable. The results of my effort easier to see.

But my influence would be dissipated. My view of the world narrowed. My ability to deliver a great experience reduced, hampered by the decisions of others.

I would not make the impact that I want.

A Place at the Table for UX

Every so often I’m asked about my career path: “why the switch from coding and design to workflows and wireframes?”, “what prompted the jump from User Experience to Product Management?” or “why the move to the business-side of the house?”

It took me a long time to realize that my reason is simpler than my lengthy replies, outlining a cycle where I gained more control over the experience with each move, only to find that I didn’t have the final say. There was always someone else who would make the call, or could change something that I felt was in the best interest of the user.

Now, my answer boils down to this: I want the best possible experience for our users, and the only way to do that is to be the person who makes the final decision.

Many companies say user experience is critical, but until there are more of us in true, company-wide leadership roles, UX will not have its proper place at the table.

The (Updated) UX Career Path

Mapping the UX Path
Mapping the UX Path

This entry supersedes my earlier post laying out my take on the career possibilities for UX professionals. With this, I aim to shed light on the differences between the options, the responsibilities of the positions and the steps needed to transition from one role to the next.

This post remained a draft for far too long, held there by my hope that I would find time to fill in all of the job responsibilities specific to the PM and UX roles. I lay out four major levels: the Individual Contributor, the Manager, the Senior Manager and the Executive, which I acknowldege is far from exhaustive. There are steps between and within these levels, which aren’t included and there are branches into independent contractor roles as well as design and engineering paths that go unrepresented. Instead of waiting for everything to come together, I’m publishing this as a starting point for us to discuss the possibilities and realities of the industry.

I would love your feedback and look forward to a wide-ranging discussion.

This is just the intro, let’s dive into the details! »

Aol Alto – An Odd UX Decision

Aol’s new Alto Web-based email client is beautiful and does a nice job with the presentation of organized mail. The UI is clean and the service feels modern in a way that most Web-based clients don’t. While I’ve tinkered with it, I haven’t really put it through it’s paces quite yet. That said, I noticed an odd interaction flow that seems like a significant mistake for something that has so obviously had a lot of design attention.

In the video below, you can see the issue – in order to act on one or more messages in the sidebar, you click a label titled “Actions” at the top of the screen, which then slides up and causes an action bar to appear at the bottom of the screen – about as far as possible from your current moue position. I reduced the size of my browser for the video, so the distance is much more pronounced in real world scenarios.

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My gut reaction is that the action bar should drop in from the top, reducing the distance required to move the mouse, and making the relationship explicit. It is also a clearly established pattern to place controls above lists. Following an existing pattern is by no means required, but breaking it is a very explicit decision. I’m curious about the logic behind that decision.

On Convergence and Features

Anything can be forced to converge, but the problem is about trade-offs, and you end up with trade-offs that don’t please anyone. You can converge a toaster and refrigerator, but the end result won’t be pleasing to the user.

Tim Cook

Every single person involved in product management or user experience should read this at the start of each day. It doesn’t matter if you’re working at a giant multinational or for yourself, this applies to every feature decision, large and small.