Photo by Dino Reichmuth on Unsplash
The capacity to learn is a gift; the ability to learn is a skill, the willingness to learn is a choice.
- Brian Herbert
September 2019, my 5-year stint in the university came to an end. Like all graduates in Nigeria, it was time to face reality and figure out life. Months before I left school, I was learning Web development, and it was only natural for me to continue after school. Well, fast forward to November, while waiting for the mandatory one-year service to the nation (NYSC), PHP happily frustrated me. I wasn’t really getting a hang of it, so I decided to try my hands on something else, User Experience/User Interface Design it was. Not just because coding failed me, though I studied Engineering I see myself as more empathic than logical, I’ve always had a flair for design and in fact had been doing graphics design. To kick start this journey into, I got a course on Udemy, “UI/UX design essentials in Figma” by Caleb Kingston. I found this course easy to understand, straight to the point, and covered the basics to UI design using Figma. Armed with my new knowledge, I decided to partake in a 100-day design challenge by Daily UI, of course with a resolve to finish. Yeah, you guessed right. I never finished. I ran out of gas on day 58. Something to be proud of? I don’t know.
At this point, Material Design had almost turned my Bible, I had read some books on design and product development ranging from “Hooked” by Nir Eyal, “UX fundamentals for non-UX professionals” by Edward Stull, “How to Build a Billion-Dollar App” by George Berkowski, etc. I had also listened to a lot of talks on design, with one of my favorites being “The First Secret to Great Design” by Tony Fadell, a former product designer at Apple; coupled with scores of tutorials on YouTube, some of my Fav channels being DesignCourse by Gary Simon and AJ&Smart by Jonathan Courtney. Occasionally I even tune in to watch Adobe Livestreams hosted by Howard Pinksy. In some way, I felt like I had outgrown the daily UI challenge as it was not challenging enough, so I got bored with it. My heart yearned for bigger, more tasking challenges. Owing to this fact, I picked up personal projects to work on and partook in design challenges I found interesting wherever I saw them.
Key Takeaways
- In one way or the other, we as humans think UX. UX in life is as basic as thinking if I have to get to C from A and B, which route takes me faster and more efficiently.
There’s a deep sense of appreciation I now possess when using an app or software since I have a behind the scenes view of the processes involved in product development. To think that for a long while, I never knew a field like UI/UX existed, sort of shows that it is still at its roots in this part of the world. Most often, you are viewed as a graphics designer which I find quite amusing. Also, exposure to design thinking has improved my critical thinking capabilities and even tends to cut across various aspects of my life. I find it fascinating thinking not just from my point of view but from that of the other person. It feels like a superpower. We could all use some form of empathy. - My experience so far has taught me something about learning. It is quite difficult to learn a skill without a structured course content. This might not apply to everyone, but I believe it cuts across most. In learning web development, I had to depend on YouTube videos as were needed and tried to implement what I watched. So, if I wanted a Navbar, I search on YouTube how to create a Navbar in Html & CSS and pick a video I liked. Not only was this time consuming, I believe this method was one of the key frustrations to my learning code and maybe as suggested by a friend, my failure to smile at it. Very creepy stuff, I know. The same non-structured approach I took in learning graphics design, which kind of yielded better results but still left me with a lot of design loopholes. Learning UI/UX came much easier since I used a structured course content, and then built on the foundation with YouTube tutorials and the flow was just great. Also striking a balance between practical and theory helps. Some days I design, some days I read, some days I watch tutorials, some days I seek inspiration. balance is key!
Overall, I’m grateful for how far I’ve come. The goal for me now will be to get better. Certainly, I’m on a never-ending journey. Getting a design job or internship and having to work on real-world projects will come in handy. Until then, We locomote.
Learning is never cumulative; it is a movement of knowing which has no beginning and no end.
- Bruce Lee.