“Without an anchor, we can be drifted to any shore.”
I attended a UX conference a while ago and a wonderful designer gave a talk on how to manage complexity within solutions without completely sabotaging the UX.
On a basic level:
- Avoid quick fixes
- Avoid multiple design approaches
- Finish the feature; don’t just drop the effort after the first version (iterate people!)
- Know when you need to do a redesign; features do outgrow designs initially applied
- Have a vision and try to stick to it; don’t get distracted by trying to please everyone
And a nice motto: every time we add something we are probably decreasing UX and usability in some way.
Whilst the talk was mainly focused on UX, the main thing I took away from it was the importance of trying not to make reckless, reactive decisions. Big picture thinking over short-term ‘wins’.
Why do we do quick fixes? Why would we have a blend of design approaches? Because we aren’t seeing the big picture. We aren’t thinking about the long-term or even mid-term health of our product or solution. We don’t iterate because we are rushing to get to the next thing, so we have half-baked features everywhere. We jump around thinking we are grabbing opportunities and are working ‘agile’, when we are actually degrading product quality, UX and vision.
One forgivable reason for this is when people leave; one design lead introduces one design approach and then they leave, then the new design lead takes a different approach. One product owner has a ‘if it ain’t broke don’t fix it’ mentality, then a new one starts with a ‘everything can always be improved- nothing is ever good enough!’ mentality. This is less than ideal, although it is somewhat forgivable. Sadly however, all of this jumping around also happens with a steady team: I have witnessed it.
We have to stop confusing working agile with working chaotically and not taking the time to think things through. We have to fight the urge to react to everything. Imagine your neighbour has one loud party and you move out of your apartment, 10 people say they love your hair long and one person says they prefer it short- so you run to the hairdressers, you start one hype-diet only to switch to the next one a month later. This approach to life doesn’t work and it doesn’t bring long-term results.
We have to commit to something and we have to monitor and adapt appropriately- at the right time, for the right reasons, and ideally based on the right data. We have to understand what we want to find out, why and when- and then think about what we want to do with the learnings we make.
Reactive decision making falls outside of any logical structure which supports mid-long term ROI; to work agile doesn’t mean we go where the wind takes us- as this thinking could take us over a cliff.
Now, of course there are times when quick decisions are needed- but only in emergencies. You have a blocker bug which compromises user data; you do a quick fix to stop it immediately because you really, really have to. There is however no emergency situation I can think of which would warrant releasing an MVP of a feature and then not validating it to inform a 2nd iteration. Sure, you don’t need to do it immediately- it’s OK to move onto something else and give the MVP some time to gather data on the market, but the reality is that a lot of product companies do stuff, don’t have a validation loop in place (with a reasonable time frame), and just churn out features with no accountability.
I think there are many reasons why we make fickle, reactive product decisions, but to name just a few: we often have a poor, misinformed understanding of what it means to be ‘agile’, value is often measured by volume (not impact) and we are impatient — everything around us encourages impatience and we much prefer to chase immediate reward than to take time and make effort to get much more out of something in the long-term.
If anything in this story resonates with you and you happen to agree with me, then perhaps I can also offer some advice to help fight the urge to make reactive decisions:
- Mission statements, strategic visions, company goals: these things are important. We need guiding lights. If we don’t have them we end up in situation where we do everything, but nothing is actually achieved
- Keep an eye on people turnover. New people bring in fresh ideas and that’s awesome, but there’s no harm in actively trying to retain some stability.
- Next time you feel pressure to make a quick decision: ask yourself ‘is this an emergency?’ If not then you can take a breath and think of the best approach. Your product and team will thank you for it.
