Metric

In this episode of Metric: The User Experience Podcast, I chat with friend-of-the-show Tim Broadwater, a UX Master Certificate recipient, about the value of User Experience Certification, or even that of a more traditional route through college.

This covers everything across the diversification of UX roles, leadership and management, and -- of course -- Scream Queens.

A transcript of this show fully marked-up with links and the like can be found at www.metricpodcast.com

Follow Michael on Twitter: @schoeyfield

Support this podcast on Patreon: patreon.com/michaelschofield

Join Rebecca Blakiston -- author of books on on usability testing and writing with clarity; Library Journal mover and shaker -- as she talks shop and makes the case for content strategy, using active and authentic voice, removing unnecessary words, writing meaningful titles/headings, using parallelism, and more.

Rebecca Blakiston (@blakistonr) is the team lead for Web Design & User Experience at the University of Arizona Libraries. She is the author of two books: Usability Testing: a Practical Guide for Librarians, and Writing Effectively in Print and on the Web: a Practical Guide for Librarians. She's also the Chair of the University Libraries Section, Association of College and Research Libraries (ACRL ULS). In 2016, she was named a Library Journal Mover and Shaker.

She's super. We've had beers.

Register: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/writing-for-the-user-experience-with-rebecca-blakiston-a-libux-webinar-tickets-35945982401 

One more over coffee edition of Metric before a string of interviews to round-out the month of April. In this episode: 

• What role does photoshop play in UX?
• Should "design" be part of a user story?
• What are the necessary technical abilities for doing UX?
• What are your thoughts on UX Departments

This episode of Metric is a little special: no guests, no post, just loaded questions and loaded answers. In the actual recording I was thinking about calling it "coffee break," but I over-thought this and now feel like that suggests it's a super short episode. It's not. It's regular length. So, we're going with "over coffee" -- which it was! 

This episode, I tackle three questions about UX Certification, a UX Ph.D who sucks at visual design, and Guerrilla Usability Testing. 

Enjoy. 

Andy Priestner is a global trainer and consultant on user experience, leadership, social media, and LEGO Serious Play. He's the originator and chair of UXLibs, among many things a best-in-show UX conference, as well as the title of the book he edited with Matt Borg.  

In this episode, we were able to wrangle our timezones and chat about the upcoming conference, as well as Futurelib -- an open innovation program exploring the future role of academic libraries within the University of Cambridge through ethnographic studies -- and, really, what prompted Andy to resign.

• 4:00 - About the "team challenge" at UXLibs, plus shout-outs to Ned Potter, Matt Borg, and Donna Lanclos.
• 9:04 - The state of user experience design in these institutions
• 11:55 - What happened with Futurelib
• 18:02 - Andy on leaving his job and going freelance
• 20:48 - The Tracker Project: eye-tracking people in libraries with glasses 

Recently, LITA embarked on a big persona-making project in order to better align their services to the needs of their members, the results of which they just revealed. This provides a solid talking point to introduce conceptual problems with personas and introduce a potentially better-suited approach: jobs to be done. 

• 00:43 - LITA created a bunch of personas
• 2:14 - What does LITA actually want?
• 3:39 - Personas are more noise than signal
• 5:37 - Personas are best as a demographic snapshot
• 6:05 - The User Story
• 7:35 - The Job Story
• 8:04 - Jobs to be Done
• 11:36 - So what jobs do LITA personas need done?
• 14:04 - What should LITA do, then?
• 15:44 - Support Metric: https://patreon.com/libux
• 16:42 - How to enter for our giveaway: a copy of Practical Design Discovery by Dan Brown.

Twitter: @metricpodcast

Facebook: LibUX

Join us on Slack: https://libux.herokuapp.com 

If you thought your grip on web accessibility couldn't get any looser, let's talk about the Accessibility Tree. This is a hostful episode Amanda and Michael. 

This week on Metric we are joined by Trey Gordner and Stephen Batemen from Koios, who are designing services that amplify the discoverability and searchability of libraries with real emphasis on the end-user experience. We chat about startup opportunities in this space, the opportunity and danger of "interface aggregation," the design of their new service Libre (www.readlibre.com), and more. 

These two were super fun to interview. 

• Koios: https://koios.co
  
• Libre: https://readlibre.com
• Trey Gordner is @darthgordner
• Stephen Batemen is @IAmBateman
• Amanda L. Goodman is @godaisies
• Michael Schofield is @schoeyfield
• Metric is @metricpodcast 

Support Metric on Patreon for early access, new pilot podcasts, "swraffle" entries, and more. https://patreon.com/libux 

February's Swag-raffle ("swraffle") for Tesla Amazing Magnetic Notes is still on! Patreon supporters at the $2+ level are automatically entered, but you can also earn an entry by honestly reviewing Metric in your podcatcher of choice and shooting @metricpodcast a screenshot. Thanks!

Metric alum Emily King swings by again to chat about conversational UIs and "interface aggregation" -- front ends other than yours using metadata and API to connect with your site, so that users don't actually have to visit your site directly. 

Please rate and share! These little gestures go a long way. 

You can reach out to Emily at @emilykingatcsn on Twitter, I am @schoeyfield, and Metric is @metricpodcast. 

This week Amanda L. Goodman (@godaisies) gives you a peek into the work  of the LITA Persona Task Force, who are charged with defining and developing personas that are to be used in growing membership in the Library and Information Technology Association.

We — LibUX — are producing our first ever free webinar this Thursday, February 16th, at 1 pm with Metric alum Tim Broadwater, a UI designer and certified UX developer that has worked for Fortune 500 companies, grant-based education initiatives, and higher-ed. It’s called UX Quackery, which will focus on the prevailing dishonest practices that exist in the field of UX, and what we can do to weed-out the quacls. Toootally free and I think it will be really special. Check it out at libux.co/events.