{"product":{"product_id":"1592537561","title":"Universal Methods of Design: 100 Ways to Research Complex Problems, Develop Innovative Ideas, and Design Effective Solutions","price":"39.38","image_url":"https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/51rxdWnnNdL._SL500_.jpg","url":"https://www.amazon.com/dp/1592537561"},"comments":[{"body":"It's not an inneficient way to learn. Not only it is the most efficient way to learn *about your product*, it is *the only way*. It isn't even merely a design tool, it's a design **phase**.\r\n\r\nWe hang here because brainstorming, research for similar products, benchmarking and peer evaluation are all very important tools in the designer's toolkit - **for the concept development and research phases**. When push comes to shove, you can have all that and still end up with a crap product because you spent years designing a system and never cared to playtest it.\r\n\r\nThe same thing can happen the other way around. If you playtest recklessly and iterate nonstop, without knowing the best tools to collect, filter, evaluate and apply feedback, you may end up with a frankenstein's monster of a system.\r\n\r\nThe phases of design are interdependent. Saying any of them is \"time consuming\" and \"not efficient\" places them on a scale, like there is something more optimal to be done when in actuality there isn't. If it's taking too much time and not being efficient you're probably doing it wrong and [have a lot of study to do.](https://www.amazon.com/Universal-Methods-Design-Innovative-Effective/dp/1592537561/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8\u0026amp;qid=1513348998\u0026amp;sr=8-3\u0026amp;keywords=universal+design+principles)","subreddit_name":"RPGdesign","author":"DXimenes"},{"body":"Couple other thoughts from a practicing UX/Anthro person:\r\n\r\n- You need to locate yourself where the action is: San Francisco, Portland, NYC, Boston, Chicago, etc. Trying to (re)start a career in a smaller city is going to be difficult.\r\n\r\n- If possible, try and work the manufacturer side before going to agencies. The difficult truth of UX testing is that most clients see it as a \"nice to have.\" Testing budgets tend to be the first thing that gets cut when budgets are tight. The plus side of being hired into a corporation is that the UX department are often more stable than at smaller agencies.\r\n\r\n- As others have suggestions, interning and co-oping are great ways to start. If you are still in school, start hanging out in the IT/CS departments and seeing if there are any student projects or research labs that could use some help.\r\n\r\n- Grab syllabi for reading lists. Also, track down a copy of \"Universal Methods of Design\" - http://www.amazon.com/Universal-Methods-Design-Innovative-Effective/dp/1592537561 - which will help you begin to understand the language that the industry uses. And look into \"Contextual Inquiry\" which is a modified form of Ethnographic research that many companies use.","subreddit_name":"Anthropology","author":"mattBernius"}]}