Amedea is an experienced user experience designer who firmly believes that the discovery phase is the basis for quality digital products. She has been designing medical applications and back-end systems at the Slovenian start-up MESI for almost 7 years, and for the last year she has been designing complex systems and business applications. She has worked with Zavarovalnica Triglav, Krka, Kaldi, Loftware NiceLabel, Nevron and others. As a very active member of the Slovenian UX community, she organises and manages the Slovenian edition of Global Service Jams and the monthly event SD x UX Drinks.
Hi Amedea. Let's start at the beginning. How did your design career start and how did you end up in UX?
To be honest, I ended up in UX by accident. At the beginning of my Master's degree in Graphic and Interactive Communication at the Faculty of Natural Sciences and Engineering, I started to realise that I didn't really have any work experience in the field, and that it would be great to get some. During my search I came across a weekend workshop called Service Design Jam (later renamed Ljubljana Service Jam). I had no idea what service design was supposed to be, but the organisers were people from GigoDesign Studio, D.labs and Gorenje Design Studio, so I figured I had nothing to lose. I always say that this workshop changed my life, hehe. At the workshop we designed services and for the first time I experienced the process in practice - problem definition, research, brainstorming, concept development, prototyping... and testing the prototype on the street with people I'm seeing for the first time. That's when the light bulb went off for me - yes, this is it, this process makes sense, I'm interested in more... I came to the event twice as a participant, then joined as a co-organiser. At the same time, MESI, where I came as a student, realised that I was much better at moving pixels around on tablets than with marketing materials, so I was able to apply the knowledge I was gaining as part of the Ljubljana Service Jam team to MESI's digital products, while learning, experimenting, and getting the opportunity to design increasingly complex products.
What is your favourite part of the process/your work?
The role of the user experience designer, or UX designer, is in fact a very integrative one. Most often you are the link between different people — users, business stakeholders, programmers, marketing... It's important to understand as many aspects as possible that influence the development and lifecycle of the product you're working on. I like this complexity — of people, of systems. Sometimes I feel like Sherlock, having to unravel difficult puzzles. I like to ask questions. I check if I really understand.
Can you show us 1 or 2 favourite projects you've worked on? Why did you enjoy them?
My first favourite is the survey of different health systems across Europe and the connectivity of data within each system. We found that our product is great for smaller practices, but does not support use in larger systems such as hospitals and large specialist clinics. We have identified 4 main markets across Europe, which are sufficiently different in terms of health systems. First, we carried out a desktop study of the data infrastructure in each country. This served as a basis to identify all the different institutions operating in the healthcare sector. We then conducted 20+ interviews with patients and healthcare staff across all countries to understand what the data workflow looks like. We wanted to know how does the appointment process work? Do all countries have health cards and family doctors like Slovenia? How does a patient get to a specialist examination and later to hospital? What data 'travels' with them and how? How do we pay for health services? All of this has an impact on the experience of the healthcare system in each country. Based on the data collected, we have drawn auser/patient journey map for all the different institutions in each country. We then mapped the journey patient's data takes on top of this foundation. We identified the main changes we need to make to the product to make it work in our main market segments. We had a clear view of where the new sales opportunities were. We made a list of changes that we could implement quickly. Above all, we had a clear vision of what the structure of the data in our databases needed to be, to make it as interoperable as possible with the different systems we had learned about during our research. It was a really complex project, but one that yielded a lot of insights that have served us for years to come.
Figure: Scope of the surveyThe second favourite is the one I'm still working on. We were designing a subscription system for a new 'software-as-a-service' product for a large corporation. We started by identifying all the stakeholders who were involved in the project in one way or another. The introduction of subscriptions is something that touches all departments in the company — from operations, marketing & sales, right through to product & development. After 15+ interviews, we worked with the in-house product team to design the optimal end-user purchase path, and later built on this with a partner purchase path (B2B2B). At the same time, such a system needs to integrate with existing systems in the business — from customer management systems to financial systems. The solution included a partner portal, an end customer portal and a subscription purchase experience on the website. We used rapid prototypes to test our hypotheses about the partner buying experience, upgraded to wireframes and mapped out the implementation phases. With such large projects, implementation takes time, so it's essential to break it down into smaller, complete chunks. One of the additional benefits of this project (besides the sheer complexity of the product we were designing) was working with an excellent in-house UX and product team.
Figure: Visualisation of systems and user journeysWhat do you think we can bring to companies as UX designers?
I notice that designers in companies are still often just put in the role of the one who will 'draw pretty screens'. In reality, we are including and integrating both business and technology requirements into the product, not to mention user requirements. We tend to be the ones with a lot of information. We are the ones who take a strategic approach to design, where there is concrete thought behind every decision. Above all, I think it is important that we ensure that every decision is based on reality — whether it is based on analytics, user interviews, or the constraints imposed on us by technology.
In an interview with a company, I asked whether they also carry out end-user testing. With a look of disbelief, I was asked: 'Why would you ask someone if they like a button?'. I agree that liking a button is a pointless question. But I will always be interested in whether the user notices the button and whether it performs the desired function in the expected way. One small button influences conversion, it enables or disables the user to perform a certain function in the system and thus ensures their (dis)satisfaction, which in turn has a direct impact on business results. Most companies fail to see that a design decision is always also a business decision.
What advice would you give to those who are just starting out in user experience design?
Ugh, loads of stuff 😅. Let's start with 3:
- The first tip is definitely to find a mentor/team/team. User experience design is a huge and complex area and much easier to navigate with the help of others. Attend local and global community events, participate in debates, seek advice.
- Volunteer. Either with design communities, or with friends' websites, societies, etc. The more times you go through the design process, the faster you'll progress. We learn something from every opportunity.
- Don't be afraid of feedback. There is no such thing as bad feedback. A digital product is never perfect. It's never so good that it can't be better. There is no perfection in UX, there is just more and more information to illuminate the next steps.
