Did you also spend years at university learning systems thinking, only to end up drawing UIs?

Now is the time to change.

I went to a decent university and studied design methodology. It was a great program well-structured to ensure we all understood systems thinking, design thinking, service design, user research, interaction design, and even some hands-on programming.

Guess what 90% of my peers work with today?

They are UX designers. There is nothing wrong with that; it’s a great career.

But I’ve had a recurring thought lately:

In my world, facilitating the problem-solving process is design methodology. This is what designers know. This is what we’ve studied and earned our degrees in.

So, why are 90% of designers working at the very end of the problem-solving process, drawing the interface between a computer and a human?

Yes, the industry has had a high demand for people to create usable interfaces, as that is often part of the solution to a problem. However, that demand is rapidly decreasing. Things have changed. There are fewer opportunities out there - especially for junior designers.

It is becoming easier to put together usable interfaces. I certainly don’t think we should consume 90% of people trained in design methodology to do it. Maybe 10% is enough - someone to conduct actual user testing and tie everything together.

So, what about the rest of us?

“Ahhh! Where are you going with this? Should I go back to uni?”

No no no! - here comes the good part.

AI is here, and it brings a golden opportunity for designers to step away from interfaces and see the full system, a business, a service a product. We can finally work with what we always should have been doing: facilitating the process of problem-solving.

I believe this applies to both junior and senior designers. To be well-prepared for this shift, sharpening your facilitation skills and your service-design-toolbox is perhaps more important than learning how to prompt UIs.

At least, that is my wish for the industrial paradigm shift we are currently in the middle of.

Maybe we can all help explain this to those who still see designers merely as people who draw interfaces?

keep shipping,

Gunnar

Yeah - it’s still free :)