#15 UX Design titles and roles
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the industry needs to start being somehow regulated. I don't know who's going to take ownership. I don't know how it's going to happen. I don't know what are the steps. I have no clue, but I'm just saying that having more of those conversations, and I think we have a few episodes about it already, about the education and the certification and your skill set and stuff like this. And now we're talking about the titles and it still comes back to the topic

and and the fact that industry is not regulated and that causes all this mess

Hello everyone, welcome on the next episode of Honest UX Talks. We are excited to have you back. In this episode, we are going to talk about UX design titles and roles. The topic that makes everybody confused, ask a lot of questions about who should I be, where should I go, what should I do? Like this topic is a huge mess and confusion on the market. So we decided to pick it up and try to kind of discuss what do we think about all those titles and try to even understand why

our interpretation of those titles. Because as we all know, UX design is not a regulated industry yet. And so that means that there is a lot of mess. There is a lot of new titles, new things, new roles, new interpretations going on in the market. And that makes it all more complex, more confusing, build up on that things over and over again. So I guess bear with us because this is not something we figured out and

There is no workbook that explains it all. There is no specific, I don't know, Wikipedia where you open and it's all written there what does each design title mean. But we will try to just discuss what do we think about all those different titles and how do we interpret those. But before we get started with that topic, Ioana, good morning and how are you doing? How was your last week?

Good morning, good morning everyone. Thank you for tuning in. Hi, I'm Fisa. I'm really happy to hear you again because, yeah, I actually didn't have like the best week. I had, I don't know, I felt really low on energy. I wasn't very motivated. I wasn't very productive. I have a lot of things to do somehow, even though I'm on maternity leave, but I'm still working on different personal projects.

And so, yeah, I didn't feel like I'm as energetic as I normally am. And probably it had something to do with my father getting COVID and being quite sick from it. And so, yeah, it was, I don't know, it wasn't the best week. And some weeks are like this and it's okay.

I don't have many interesting things to say as per how my last week went. And I'm really, I'm excited to actually hear how your week went because I want to see people who are, were actually productive. Maybe you are. People who are productive. Let me look around.

No, I think we're sharing the same, I don't know, like karma or something because my week was also not so productive. And then it's all right, just like you said. But the good thing is I've started this rebranding on Instagram, just like I told you, I think one or two episodes ago. I don't remember if I talked about it already, but yeah, we just started it out. And it's interesting to be back again.

It's interesting. It definitely takes me much more time right now to be online and be present and try to reply everybody and try to post consistently. And even though we have built a pipeline of posts, now it's like with any better product, right? You put it out there, you see the reaction, you see what works, what doesn't work.

So, even though we have planned everything in advance, I now need to adjust because I can see that, okay, some of the topics were too specific, too niche, they don't work. I need to redo even like, I don't know, three topics because they were planned, but I see that, okay, this is not an interesting topic right now or not a

painful topic that I want to cover or people need to read about. So you can kind of get a vibe from the response, how it is going, what makes sense, what doesn't make sense. It's a puzzle game. And yeah, it's definitely an interesting learning journey. For example, it's been exactly one week and maybe two more days after we started posting it.

And I've learned that three topics that we were planning are not actual. So we had to put down like two posts, but instead I would have to sit at night and try to recreate a few more posts. So it's like, again, it's not as simple as you put it, you planned it.

it's on the calendar, you go, right? You still want to learn from it. And it's interesting because you have this analytics and it's cool and it's still a playful process, but it definitely takes some adjustments. And yeah, I think if our weeks were not so exciting and there's nothing much to talk about, let's just get into the topic today so we don't waste our listeners' time and just try to discuss something that is more interesting, I hope.

okay so Iwana I have one big question for you and I think this is a very boring question everybody asks us about it I'm pretty sure they ask you about it too I have a lot of those questions in the dm and um and yeah the first question is what in your opinion is the difference between ux designer and the product designer and I'm talking particularly about the title not

the let's say market definition but really the roles the titles the person in the team that holds the title ux design or product design do you think there is a difference between those two roles is there nuances we need to talk about or is it actually the same thing but just somehow evolved and deinterpreted what's your intake

My opinion is that it's very company specific. So I think that the definition, and it's the same with any design role. So the UX designer can mean one set of responsibilities or a particular job description in one company and a completely different thing, maybe not completely, but a significantly different thing in another company. And I also believe that it also matters not only...

So it's dependent on the type of company and also on the size of the company. So a UX designer or a product designer in a small company, in a startup, will have to wear different hats and do all sorts of things and be more. Whereas in a bigger company, probably roles are, if the design culture is a bit more mature, design roles are more specific, well-defined, clear responsibilities and so on.

So I think that, yeah, it's really, there's obviously no universal answer. It's very specific to the market, to the company and so on. But for a long time, I felt like all the UX designers I know are changing their titles to product designers. And so that's why I felt like, okay, so product design is probably the new way UX designers choose to call themselves products.

I didn't really understand why that was happening. I thought it was just an industry trend, a career trend. But yeah, so I didn't really, in the beginning, I didn't really give it much thought because I just assumed that it's like a better way of calling ourselves, a more encompassing definition for what UX designers do. But in essence, it's pretty much UX design. But then after a while, since it became a very widespread phenomenon, I started reflecting on it.

And I realized that probably product designers do have a new component added to their role in addition to what a UX designer will do. So I think that UX designers focus more on is this product working, usability, making it understandable for the user and so on, while a product designer will also look at how the product works

I don't know, works on the market, works with the company's objectives, business goals. So they probably have this extra layer of product strategy that UX designers don't necessarily or traditionally have. Although I've seen a lot of UX designers that also have this component to their personality, to their set of skills they're able

to put things into perspective, into the company's perspective, into the market perspective. But yeah, I think product designer has this strategy layer that's an addition to what the UX designer was doing up to this point. I'm curious to hear, I have a lot of more things to say about it, but maybe we'll touch them on the next slide.

the next questions or parts of the conversation. So I'm curious to hear what you think is the difference. - Yeah, it's interesting. It's definitely an interesting topic. It was cool to hear your perception of it. I think I have a little bit different perception. Again, in a nutshell, it's the same. In an essence, it's the same. We designers care about users. We kind of advocate for the users. We understand the company needs, the strategy of the business. We work in conjunction with different stakeholders.

and stuff like this. However, there are nuances and I think it already comes back to your personal experience, right? Or maybe the companies you were working with or collaborating with in some way. And that would be back to what was your experience and what title you would be given at that point. For me, for example, my perception, and again, it's super subjective and I don't think it's correct or incorrect. It's just what I have experienced. And I'm pretty sure people experience different things every time.

So my experience was that UX designer was, because it's like this UX, very abstract, very user research oriented and something very holistic, whatever we call it. We love, you know, to throw out the terms and give you nice words that makes people feel stupid. But the point is UX designer for me always felt like a person who has this more of a research and actually strategy component, at least in my experience.

Whereas the product designer would be the person that is much more integrated into the team and, for example, works in a three-in-a-box kind of setting that works with developers almost hand-in-hand, participates in the stand-ups, helping developers to move forward, maybe unblock them from some issues that might pop up in the development process. And so my personal understanding is

And an experience was that your designer is this person who doesn't necessarily have to go on the developer standups and just try to come up with the solutions for some development issues.

But more of the person who has like this holistic understanding of the product, the vision, the strategy, the research, the business needs, et cetera, et cetera, and come up with some sort of, I guess, even like a roadmap for the product and something more, again, strategic. But that's my experience. And I think I also could be coming back because to the point when I was a freelancer, and as a freelancer, you don't necessarily are integrated into

in the team, right? You, as a freelancer, you don't necessarily talk to the team. You don't do the three in a box kind of meetings. You don't go to the standups with developers. What you do is you do your job, you present it to all the stakeholders. They pick it up from there and they go ahead and do it or solve it or build it. And so for me, that somehow was tied tight to the freelancing role I had for most of my career.

But I think that I don't want to interrupt you. I just want to make an important point here. I think that what you described for me pretty much sounds like the product manager role. So this is what adds to my confusion because product managers are,

the ones who pretty much are the owner of the feature functionality of particular products so they have to keep everything to deliver everything end to end and work with designers on one hand on the other hand work with developers work with the business stakeholders and so on so yeah this adds to my confusion I think it's

I've always worked with product managers who were doing just what you described. And I think maybe, I don't know, maybe product designer also encompasses product management responsibilities that were traditionally deemed as the product manager's responsibility, but also

product managers don't necessarily get their heads dirty with design. I mean, they may be involved in research. They may have a very close relationship with the UX designer and able to and enable them to come up with the best solution. But at the same time, yeah, I don't know. It's just so maybe we should have the

Product manager versus product designer versus UX designer. Moreover, in my previous company, or actually in this company, I think we also have this role. And I was also confused because...

all that definition, the differentiation was just super new to me. I'm new to corporate world in general. And so we also have this role product owner. So when you have a product manager, project manager, product owner, what else there out there? I'm pretty sure there is, there is also business analyst and all of that. And yeah, like how do you,

For me as a UX designer, freelancer, I was actually doing all those roles. I was wearing all those hats. I would manage the project, manage the product, do the analysis for the product. So being kind of a business analyst or some sort, not necessarily like in a professional way, but

but in the freelancing way, hacky way. But also, you know, the design, the advocating, the finding solutions and stuff like this. The interesting insight from our conversation is that maybe it's not just the design industry that is pretty confused, but also the whole IT industry that might be confused. Also, what I've heard from my colleagues, business analysts, they also say like, oh, you know, we sometimes also don't understand this P-A, P-O, B-M, B-A, whatever.

What else? Like we also have confusion in terms of what do we do? What are the responsibilities there? So it just feels like a trend on the IT market in general, not necessarily just design related.

And yeah, it's because it's a new industry. The IT is around for like, how long? 20, 30 years? And only the last 10 years it expanded or accelerated so, so quickly, so fast that it just didn't get a chance to adjust and really regulate all those new things, new terms, new notions and roles. So I guess it's something that we could have expected. All right. So I guess the

the bottom line from this particular topic or you know difference between UX design and product design that we like I think let's agree on the fact that it's kind of the same maybe right now we have a feeling that product design is sort of like a new UX design but it might be having the specific differences depending on the company you're working on especially if you're working in a more UX mature company

It will be better defined there. And maybe your role will be more regulated, described, I guess, even on the contract level. But it all really comes down to where you work, what's the market there, what's the company maturity level, and how is it written, particularly in relation to your company.

It's interesting because I think that probably Facebook is one of the companies that deeply popularized the product designer role. And I think that from their definition, the product designer, just as a bottom line to our first question, the product designer is a combination between visual design,

interaction design and product strategy. So it's like the product designer needs to be able to deliver end to end. So deliver on a visual level, of course on an interaction level, because that's where UX design pretty much sits.

And then also on a product strategy, make sure that the product and functionality makes sense in the broader scope of the company and the market. And so, yeah, if we were to go to the culprit of this new title that's so popular, probably Facebook would be them. And this is what they define the role. Yeah, that's a great add-on. I think it definitely helps to sort a little bit of the history mess. Yeah.

that happened um okay let's then try to discuss a little bit more of the terms in this episode so i also wanted to hear your opinion on all those other terms that circulate around and would also be you know different depending on where you apply and how do you um

What are you supposed to do in the company you're working at, you were supposed to work at? So what about those other terms such as, or differences between UX designer, UX researcher, UI designer, customer experience designer, interaction designer, webmaster, web designer, marketing designer? What is this whole mess? Where is it coming from? Is it the same thing? Is there a difference?

Let's discuss all those terms and mess on the market. Anything you want to pick up and start from in particular?

I think I want to start with what's causing this. I think that we all know, we're all experiencing the symptoms or the consequences of all this mess, because I think we're pretty much confused all the time as to what a particular job posting, job description entails and what will I be doing? Should I apply to this role? Is it right for me? Am I that confused?

Am I a UX researcher or how would my set of skills be framed with this company? So I think that we're all dealing with the consequences of this mess, but I'm also really interested in understanding what's causing this mess. And I think that...

that sits at the foundation of the problem is the fact that companies, just like you said, the IT industry is not yet mature. It hasn't been around for so long as, I don't know, medicine or law or any other architecture or other technology

professions. So I think that it's because this causes the entire industry to not enter this level of maturity where things are clear and defined and in place and so on. But yeah, the problem is that companies

companies don't understand what they need or many companies don't really understand what they're looking for. I think it's not the case for design mature companies where things are very clear so we know we need a UX writer, we need him to do this, this and that. We have a very clear segmentation of roles and responsibilities throughout our design team and that's great and that's a company that I

I think all design, any designer should work in for, uh, um, for some time in their career to understand how mature the teams work and how distinct roles collaborate together in a design team. But that's the case for just a couple of companies, big companies, most companies, uh,

are just not really clear as to what they need from a designer. So they don't really understand what their need is. And I think this is where our responsibility comes in because we need to help them even in an interview. So we apply for a job, but we want to treat it like a design problem and understand if

they're asking the right questions, they understand their needs for what they are and not for what they seem to be. And so, yeah, I think that this is what's partly a cause for the problem is the fact that companies don't know what they need and they just recircle, reuse these titles that they see thrown around in other companies. And so, yeah, it keeps on adding to the mess.

So, yeah, this is an interesting part. What's causing this? But then we can also go and discuss all the different types of roles, all the titles out there, which I don't know how to make... Where to start from? Yeah, where to start from. So, yeah, I'm going to hand it over to you now. I'm curious to hear what part of the problem makes you more interested. Okay, so you have...

perfectly covered the first part. So what do we think causes the mess on the market? I agree with you on that note. I would probably just want to make all those terms. I actually wrote them down in front of me right now in the notes. I'll just go and read them out and try to explain what I think about all of them. And if you want, you can also...

share your perspective if you don't think that some of those roles or those titles make sense for you. So basically, I think I would probably start by saying that originally, and at least in the beginning of my career, and it was around 10 years ago, it was most of the times on the market, I would hear the term web designer or something like that, something web normally. So I think the first decade or

of millennial, was really all about web design. There was this, in 1999, there was this dot-com bubble, right? Then there was a lot of new websites coming up and many, I guess, the first real designers were like raised and became, the first real UX designers kind of started being active in exactly 20 years ago.

And back then it was all about web design. So because we have this new world of browsers and new website pages, and I think even some people, for example, when I was in school, we actually did first websites that were built very simply with HTML and CSS. So that was just a very new world. And everything there was all about the web, right? So I think the normal title was Web Designer Express.

except of the normal Nelson group. And some people, really specific niche people, were thinking about usability and nuances and use of the websites and stuff like this. But back then, I think most of the times, normal designer would work on just the layout, the colors, the typography. It would be just a designer that would build a website that looks good and has the content on it, right?

Then somehow, I think slowly, slowly, slowly towards 2010-ish, I don't know, I'm sorry, I didn't do the proper research, I didn't do the whole timeline, but it's just my perception. So around 2010-ish, then we started seeing a little bit more talks about

I think that's when the UX term started being more popular. I don't know what caused it and who introduced this term that it became so big, but I think that back then it was about usability. So how usable is this website if I go there, if I find information I'm looking for, if layout is clear, if the eligibility is there and all of those sort of ease of use aspects of the web design, let's say.

And then it started expanding more and then let's say new parts of the new roles or new responsibilities were introduced because there was a race of understanding that, okay, the life is really changing. You know, web pages are not just computer anymore, but also mobile. And

you know, with the iPhone, I think, introduction, we started talking about, you know, new trends that people are becoming. People are using internet more and more and more and more. And if you look into how much time is spent on the phone right now in 2021, it's insane. I think half of the day was spent using the phone. So I think like around 10-ish years ago, people started understanding the whole, you

importance of this new world with mobile apps in the app store, with more and more web and mobile internet and stuff like that, people started understanding that this is a new future, new reality and new trends and everybody started becoming the York designer. And I think around that same time, I also became curious about the title York design and just turned my head around it and started transitioning towards that.

But right after that, I think this whole last decade from 2012, I don't know exactly, I'm talking subjective here, but I think around 2012-ish or something, the UX design became really strong. But then there were still titles like Interaction Designer, Information Architecture, the first wave of new terms.

And right after that, I think five years ago, 2015-ish or so, we started seeing more and more and more and more craziness going on in the market. So we started having all those customer experience, service designer, user researcher, user writer, UX writer, and what else? Marketing designer and stuff like this. So this is something new and it's still not super regulated or explained or not even... I think there are a lot of people who don't even know

how they would call themselves because their role in the company would be specific or niche that would encompass different roles and different departments even. And,

that made some people who were confused as to what are their roles inventing new roles. For example, this marketing designer, it's something, it's like the person who is responsible for marketing materials, including web design, including web pages and materials online that people could find about some companies. So it's all about marketing side, but also it includes usability and graphic design and still thinking about web and legibility and stuff.

And so I think that today, the current state of 2021 is the fact it is so messy just because we, again, the market is growing like never before. And many roles in some different companies would be different and there will be niche roles, niche responsibilities, right?

varying different heads and that would make some people want to have specific names because it's not necessarily UX, not necessarily UX research, not necessarily UI, right? They would be specific to their role and more of those companies would come up and just like, you know, like mushrooms, those different companies grow, roles change, change their shapes and that causes people trying out new terms and new titles.

And that's where we are right now. So if you're just getting started with design, please don't get confused. Just accept the fact that it's a very new industry that many people are still figuring out what are the titles? What are the most common titles? What are the niche titles? What are the specifics? What are the even certifications to become a marketing designer, become a UX designer? How do I get there, right? It's a mess.

But I'm happy that we're having this conversation, that maybe it would shed some light on why this mess is happening. At least I hope so.

Yeah, we totally I'm hoping we're not contributing to the mess because for us, it feels messy as well. But yeah, I think that these conversations need to have to happen more and more because otherwise we we won't be able to just like you like to say, regulate or pretty much clarify.

What these titles stand for, what they mean, what do I, what do I need, who do I need to hire or what title do I need to hire for when I have this specific set of needs in my company? And so conversations like this need to happen. Otherwise people will just, uh,

independently in isolation, create new titles or new job descriptions that won't make any sense. And so the problem will only grow. And so this conversation is really important as much as we can contribute to the clarification. And yeah, I think that another part that we could, we as an industry, this time I'm talking, we could maybe discuss more or bring more clarification as to what types of

deliverables or activities stand for each role. So for example, if you are a UX designer, then you will be working with customer journey maps. If you are a UX researcher, then you will be spending more time in the discovery phase of the design process and you will be doing interviews and research guides and surveys and moderate, or maybe you will be doing usability testing. But yeah, what I'm, what I'm saying is that, uh,

We probably should be talking more concretely as an industry as to what each role entails in terms of where it spends time on, what types of problems or needs it's going to solve, what value it brings, and ultimately what deliverables will come out. So I think that this is what's also contributing to the mess or the lack of clarity that we have right now. The fact that...

I don't see even job descriptions. They're often pretty broad or, yeah, very, I don't know, maybe overly detailed or too little detail to them. So it's really hard to understand what you actually, because probably, yeah, it all comes down to the fact that

companies don't understand what they need. And so, yeah, it's a chicken and egg type of problem. True, true. I actually think that what we are discussing today in a nutshell, it's not even like how do we understand different roles, but it's really all about, and we are getting to this, I guess, bottom line of this conversation. The industry needs to start being somehow regulated. I don't know who's going to take ownership. I don't know how it's going to happen. I don't know what are the steps. I have no clue, but I'm just saying that

as we start having more of those conversations. And I think we have a few episodes about it already, about the education and the certification and your skill set and stuff like this. And now we're talking about the titles and it still comes back to the topic

and the fact that industry is not regulated and that causes all this mess. And also I remember that I've participated in the autumn courses of NNG. Basically they run those seasonal courses

and NNG is this very famous, let's call it organization that was one of the first ones who started talking about UX and have a lot of studies around it. So the Nielsen, he was talking, his introduction talk was actually called UX titles and why we don't want and don't need to create more titles. And he basically, you know, there was a lot of like, there was thousands of people participating, everybody was listening to him and he was just

you know, as an intro topic. It was not just, hello, how are you guys doing? But it was really the topic, the intro topic was about titles. So I guess we are on the same page with Neil Nelson.

Anyways, so let's probably try to get into wrap up of this episode. But I also want to ask a really quick question before we jump into our traditional takeaways section. So I wanted to ask, is there any specific title that you have seen somewhere in job titles? I remember you mentioned that in the last months, you've got a lot of recruiters reaching you out and asking that they're looking for designers. So I wonder if...

Somehow you have seen an interesting title that you've never seen before. And is there any new ridiculous thing that you might have seen online and want to share with us? I think it's a super fun and interesting question, and it could become very powerful to illustrating the mess we're in. But unfortunately, yeah, at least on my part, the recruiters I spoke with kind of got their kind of had a clear understanding of the

enough experience or enough of a good understanding of the market to have clear expectations or job description. So it's not the case for my personal experience. And also, I know that I had this, somebody asked me, I think it was in a Clubhouse conversation recently, the question about crazy design titles. And I thought, wow, this is such a great question, but I don't have an answer to it because I don't remember. Probably

Probably there were instances where I thought I raised an eyebrow or I thought, okay, this title kind of sounds sketchy and it's probably not what it's called. But I don't have anything outrageous except for recommending people to go and have fun on designtitles.com, which is a site that generates crazy design titles. Like, yeah, let me just do it right now.

because it's something I just saw. Yeah, mixed reality alchemist is one or brainstormer for absurd branding and qualitative imperfection. So I think that, yeah, it's a joke site. It's a funny, humorous site, but at the same time, it kind of,

shed light on the problem the industry has. But yeah, I personally don't remember anything outrageous to share right now. Do you have anything? That's great that you didn't remember it. At least we have a hope. I think the craziest thing

Yeah, I think the craziest title I've seen, and again, just remember that I was working as a freelancer, working with startups a lot. So the typical crazy title I would see was UX Ninja or UX Unicorn or UX, all those magical creatures that...

basically say that you will do everything if you go and work with us in our startup you'll be our slave and you'll do everything so that's what it what kind of vibe it gave me when I saw those titles but I think it was around 2015-ish or 16-ish when I was actively doing the freelance work for startups and um and that was um yeah some strange title at

I've kept seeing a lot. Luckily, I don't see those titles anymore, happily. By the way, great resource. It's really cool and fun. So if you want to have fun with design titles, go ahead and check out the designtitle.com. We'll also leave this link in the notes under this episode. So have fun there. But I think we can just start slowly wrapping it up. And yeah, let's try to share our top three takeaways for today. Do you want to start?

Yeah, I think the most important part is that the most important takeaway is that we shouldn't contribute to the mess.

is that we should, we have a responsibility as designers as to not necessarily educate, because we don't want to be superior to the employers or the companies, but to help them understand what their needs are, what their problems they're facing from a design standpoint are, what type of person they need in their company. So maybe when we apply for a job, also treat it

like a design problem and try to help those people understand whether they're looking with the right criteria for the person they need or maybe they should adjust their responsibility, their job description, their expectancies and so on. Expectations, yeah.

So this is one thing that we have a responsibility ourselves. I think it's the most powerful takeaway for me. The second thing that I think is powerful is the fact that

A product designer is actually encompassing more than UX designer, which means that the design role is evolving towards having more meaning, more responsibility and ultimately more power, which I think is great for any company in the world to have design roles.

be more powerful, better represented in the company. And so, yeah, I think that evolving from web designer to UX designer and now to product designer is a sign that design is actually winning.

It's getting more appreciation. It's getting more responsibilities, a broader scope, which is a good sign, I think. So, yeah, this is the number two takeaway. And the third takeaway would be that if you want to be a product designer, then you have to be able to master to be a design generalist, if you want, and master pretty much everything.

all parts of the design process end to end. So be able to understand business objectives, company goals, understand the technical limitations, and also be a good designer in terms of what the design process entails. So running the discovery, being able to

explore, diverge on different solutions and then pick the best solution based on the context and then also be there for the execution part. So a product designer pretty much has to do everything, which on one hand is a huge responsibility, but on the other hand, it's great because it can bring more value to creating products.

So this is me. I'm done. And I'm going to hand over the mic to you. Yeah, it's like, it's like, okay. Clubhouse. Yeah. Clubhouse has my reflexes. Yes, exactly.

I still can't, I'm now not active on Clubhouse. I think I'll go there on just only for those roundtables we have on Wednesdays. So I'm not like, so when people are so, I'd say professionally say like, this is me, I'm done speaking. Thank you. Hello. Thank you for the introduction and blah, blah, blah. I'm like, oh, how do I do this? They're so well-spoken. I need to learn how to do this. I feel like I'm still catching it up. But yeah, yeah.

Anyways, so coming back to the top three takeaways, I think I would just build up on what you just said in terms of being a generalist and give a small disclaimer. And at least maybe it's my perspective or my opinion. So take it with a grain of salt. But I think it's correct that you need to start as a generalist. You do need to understand all those different parts and puzzles and process and being this person that sits in different departments and collaborate because you

know ultimately designer ux designer is the very inter um interconnected like role but i would say still that once you feel like confident being ux designer or product designer depending you know what the title in your company is but um once you feel confident i think it's still important to start building specific specialities and really just try to observe what interests you most

and where do you feel like you could be most valuable, where you think you could be, I guess, bringing more most value, your natural skills, your maybe talents, where you notice you are more excited and maybe try to develop extra specialties there. So people could naturally reach out to you if they need somebody who have a better take on a specific topic. For example, in our companies, even though we have a lot of designers,

Relatively, of course, but we have a lot of designers, but we do still have like this kind of map of specialties or passions that everybody has. And if, let's say, we want somebody who is more excited about UX writing, we know who to reach out or somebody who is more interested in quantitative design.

you know, studies, we know who to reach out to. So it's still very helpful for more UX mature companies to have somebody who have at least interest in some specialities, but you do need to wear all those different hats. And speciality is it's once you reach, let's say, middle level, you can start building up on top of that. That's just my small disclaimer.

In terms of the takeaways of today's conversation, I would say that I like the idea, but I don't know if it's legit to speak it or to claim it. I wouldn't say it's claimed, but I think I like when we somehow between the lines said that PED is the product design is the new UX of some sort. And like you said, historically, it was somehow brought up by Facebook, Facebook,

when they were hiring crazily a lot of product designers, not UX designers.

Don't look necessarily on the title. Is it PD? Is it UX? Look at what is written in the description, what you will be working on, what would be your responsibilities, what would be the scope on which you'll be working on. And the title applies to it, could be different. And maybe, so yeah, focus on the responsibilities, but the role or the title of it, it doesn't really matter. And maybe you just, as a life hack, go for the title that pays best

more, and a particular in your market. And I think that was also an advice given by Maureen on that roundtable. I really, really loved it. So if it's called PD UX, it is the same thing. If the, you know, responsibilities are the same, maybe just pick the role that sounds like it's better paid and that's it and go for it. The role, the title is not so important, but what is important is what you will be doing on a day-to-day job. Maybe.

Another takeaway from today, and again, it's something that was kind of encompassing this whole conversation is that UX is not regulated. And so your role, the title, the label of it will really depend on your demographic and your company maturity level. So don't look at the roles like, you know, there is regulated standards and you just have to pick one and go for it. Um,

It's really nuanced and depends and like everything in design, it depends. So be careful with the roles and don't think that you can find one role and it will, one title and it will mean something.

It's your job to go ahead and read more about it and ask all those questions in the interview, like Ioana said, in the interview, asking the questions like, what kind of roles do you have? Who is responsible for what? What will be my responsibilities, and stuff like this. And maybe one great sign that the company is probably UX mature is when you ask them, what kind of design roles do you have? And they would say that we probably have research, we have UX writers. If you hear those roles or titles, probably...

It could be a good sign. Again, they could confuse the titles, still the case, but it could be a good sign that company knows what they're doing and they know that UX writer is the thing and UX research is the thing and you as a product designer, for example, would be responsible for

these responsibilities somehow in between. So try to ask all those questions in the interviews when you're trying to apply so you don't end up in a situation when you are hired as the UX designer but you somehow need to code and I don't know do all other type of things branding. So yeah be careful with that. You probably want to look for the company that knows what is UX design and what are the basic responsibilities of your designer.

And yeah, just like you said, the last takeaway, and I think I'll just add to this, that we do need to start thinking, have more conversations on regulating UX industry or in general, the IT industry, if it actually needs to be a part of the bigger conversation. We do need to start thinking about not just titles, but certification, but skill sets, but responsibilities,

and stuff like this, because if we keep evolving with the same pace we had so far, in five years from now, all the new people who are interested in turning into design, I think they will be just scared from the first moment and they would never get into because it's going to be a pure mess. I hope that's not going to happen. I hope that since we start having these conversations more right now, and if Nelson is talking about

these topics in the beginning of the conference, in the energy courses. I think that's a good sign. So probably, probably we are moving in the right direction.

And it was unavoidable. But let's see how it all turns out. And probably if we keep doing those episodes, Joanna, in one year or two, we will see a little change in the market, which I would be hoping for. And that's it from my side. Done speaking. Great points, as always.

Yeah, I think this was it for today. Of course, the conversation is really broad and complex and it has a lot of nuances and a lot of points that we didn't get the chance to make, but it remains an open topic and maybe we tackle it again at some point in the future.

But yeah, I think it's great that we had this conversation. Maybe bring the value we can bring to this topic table. And thank you so much for another awesome episode. Thank you to everybody who is listening and check out our other episodes. And I'm going to let you give the social media...

promo moment traditionally you can always find us online in social medias particularly on instagram as honest ux talks feel free to dm us ask us your questions submit your topics if you're currently experiencing something if you're confused about something feel free to just drop us a message we'll definitely try to cover it in the nearest episodes and that's it for today thank you so much again and yeah see you on the next episodes bye bye bye