#42 AI & UX: Navigating the Future of Design with Patricia's 5-Step Guide
16:15 Share

Hello friends and welcome back to the Future of UX podcast. I am your host Patricia Reines and today we have, I would say, a special episode that is demystifying the integration of AI in UX design. And to make it even more practical and special, I prepared a free

AI design toolkit which we will explore today. So this podcast episode comes with a 13 pages pdf guide. I added the link to the pdf so you can download it in the description box in the show notes. It's for zero euros so you don't need to pay for it and you can just download it before you start that episode or even afterwards. You can decide.

And the reason why I wanted to do an episode about integrating AI in your ex is because I feel that this is the most important steps when it comes to the future at the moment, especially talking about AI. So in this podcast episode, I want to talk about

A five step guide of integrating AI in your design process. So this is more like a hands on practical episode. You can download the guide beforehand or even afterwards. But yeah, just like don't forget to do it. So AI is not just a buzzword, although we are hearing like it everywhere, like all the time. If we're at work, at home, everyone's talking about AI.

And I would describe it as a tool that can greatly enhance user experiences. It can automate processes and also offer a lot of un-presented personalization, which I personally think is super interesting. And I'm definitely going to talk a little bit more about that topic in the future.

I think the challenge is definitely understanding how to integrate AI or new tools in your design workflow. And this is what we will tackle today in this episode. I already mentioned download the AI toolkit if you want to, but that's optional. So you can also do that after you listened to the podcast episode. But just that you know, you don't need to pay for it. And it's linked in the description box.

So I already mentioned that I want to guide you through five single steps. In the best case, you do them one after the other. But of course, you decide how you want to do that. So friends, let's break it down into simpler terms and get started with the first topic or the first point of the five step framework. So the first is AI is here to stay.

AI is not just a trend. It's going to be a big part of our future. And what I am seeing at the moment is that some designers are missing out because they think it's just a passing thing. I think there is a very simple way to know if something is just a trend or if it's actually important. I already talked about that in another episode, but I'm just going to repeat it.

If you have a certain technology and you know that it makes people's life better and easier, it's here to stay. And this is exactly what is happening with AI. A lot of people are using AI to GPT in their daily lives and it makes a lot of things much, much easier. So AI is doing that, right? So what we see now is just the beginning.

And I think it's super important, especially for designers, don't miss out. Start to learn how to use AI at the moment because of the design or the design world is changing so much. A lot of the tasks that we are doing at the moment will be completely obsolete in the future. A lot of structures that we are using in agencies or in companies will change. So there is...

a crazy amount of change happening at the moment and I definitely want that you are one of the designers who understand it, to use it to their advantage and who are not the ones who are left behind. So my very first thing is: really understand that AI is here to stay. If we want it, if we don't want it, AI is here and it will stay and it will do a lot of changes to the design industry, if we want it or not. So this is the first thing.

The second topic is: Start small and experiment. So I would recommend you to take some time and look at your own work and think about where you could use AI to make things easier or better. Don't worry about getting it perfect right away. It's just about starting to experiment.

For example, if you don't want to use AI for work yet because it's not allowed, try to use it for your personal life. It can be creating a recipe with chatGPT, with the things that you are still having in your fridge, asking for movie recommendations, entering all the things that you want in the prompt and then asking for a movie recommendation or make a birthday card for a friend, for example.

The goal is to really get comfortable using AI in ways that also help you. So try to experiment, try things out and see how you can actually interact with it. For me personally, when I started to really think about what are the areas for me where I want to integrate AI,

One topic definitely came into my head because this is one area that I'm not a total pro in and I definitely need some support. And this is, I mean, you all know I'm from Germany. I'm based in Berlin.

My native language is German, but all the content that I'm sharing, not only on this podcast, but also on Instagram, you know, the work that I'm doing for my clients is usually in English and I need to translate it at some point. And there also ChachyPT comes in place, rephrasing certain things, making sure there are no typos, you know, all these kind of things, everything around writing for me. Because when I had to look at my own workflows, I had my own

Yeah, areas where I could improve writing is definitely a thing where I need some support and where AI tools can bring me a lot of advantages, I felt. So think about yourself. What are the areas where you feel like, oh, I could, I would like to have some support there that definitely would be super helpful for me?

And now let's get to point number three and this is checking out AI tools. You're probably already familiar with ChatGPT and hopefully already use that on a daily basis. But there are a lot of other amazing great tools.

And after you know that AI will be here to stay and you had a look at your old workflows where you could need some support, it's time to check out new AI tools that you haven't used before just to get a sense of what these tools are capable of and also learning new methods of integrating them. Here I definitely recommend downloading the PDF toolkit. The link is in the description because it contains a list of

sorted by application areas with links, with prices, with information. So a lot of amazing tools that I personally can recommend and it definitely took me some time to compile, get everything together, find all the resources for it because I did this myself so this was not AI to get this list of different AI tools based on the area where they could be used.

So for example, I find all the prompt generation tools for websites like Wix that is integrating at the moment very, very interesting. Because with just a simple prompt, you can create a whole website. This is maybe not interesting for your personal website, but maybe for the clients you're working with.

I personally use WordPress Elementor for my websites and even there are a lot of AI mini integrations, mini features like AI headlines, AI text. So when I'm entering a text, AI is checking if there are any typos or also rephrasing it automatically in my website tool.

So like I mentioned, check out AI tools. I can recommend the tool kit that I prepared for you because there are a lot of tools with all the prices, the websites where to find it, a lot of Figma plugins that you can use that I can recommend for you. So definitely check it out. Let's move to point number four. And this is the part where you actually integrate things in your workflow.

So after you analyzed yourself, you checked out different tools, you tried a lot of things, you focus on what are the things that are here to stay. So what are the things that you actually want to integrate in your workflow in the long term? Things that you maybe even want to discuss with your team about getting their opinion on or discussing of like if the team should actually use this tool to be more productive, for example.

So I found that I try out many tools, but also not all of them provide real value. And that's also totally okay, right? So in the first part, you just experimented. It's about finding what really benefits you. And although there are some tools that are great and that I'm integrating in my workflow on a day-to-day basis, there are also some tools that I have tried out once and realized I can't really use them.

For example, at the moment I'm doing a lot of presentations for talks, for workshops, for proposals. You know, I'm doing a lot of workshops for clients, especially around AI, a lot of keynotes. And I still make these presentations in Keynote. So in the presentation tool that comes with your MacBook. Even though I use, of course, ChatGPT and other tools like Adobe Firefly or Midjourney for image generation.

But I couldn't find an amazing presentation tool that is good enough for me that I could use it for my presentation, that actually helps me to structure the presentation, prepares the text and everything.

So I couldn't find a tool yet. I will keep an eye out. Though this might change in the next weeks or months or years. I assume it definitely will be. But at the moment I couldn't find a good tool. I think the presentation tools that are out there are interesting but nothing that is enough for what I am looking for. So in this part of the framework, point number four is

After you try things out, really reflect on what did work well. What do you actually want to integrate in your workflows? And what are also the things where you feel like I don't really want to integrate it. It's not interesting for me. And just like leave it behind. That's totally fine. And last point. And this is...

Closely related to the point number four. So point number five is really stay updated. A lot of new things are coming and it's super important to keep trying new things. I just mentioned the presentation topic and now that I'm uploading the podcast episode, maybe yesterday someone published a new AI presentation tool. So there is something online at the moment.

And here's really important that you always need to rethink everything. There won't be a point where you can say there is not a good presentation tool, so I'm going to do it in Keynote forever. Things are changing all the time. So you always need to have like one eye on all the updates that are happening.

And if you stick with it, this decision will positively affect your entire future. Because I definitely feel that this point where we are at the moment is a turning point for the design industry, for the creative industry. So I feel if you are a designer, if you are a creative and you want to have a great future, then we keep up to date with all the things that are happening at the moment because there's so many changes. So stay on it.

We are going through a lot of exciting times as a community and I think it's super important to support each other. I see many people sharing their knowledge online and want to learn and want to discuss things and I absolutely love seeing that.

I think as a community, we should go through that together, share learnings, share insights and support each other. I also share content around AI on Instagram almost on a daily basis. So I hope that's helpful to you. And as a little reminder at the end.

Don't forget to download the workbook if you want to do that. The AI guide for this episode to get started with also some cool resources and insights to keep you up to date. So a little summary of the five steps. I think the first, and although that sounds so easy, but it's not so easy for many people, understand that AI is here to stay. It's not going anywhere. It's not a trend. It will change the creative industry forever.

it will change the creative industry and I don't want to scare you but it's so important to really get what is going on at the moment. And then point number two where you go a little bit inwards and focus on yourself, analyze yourself, think about what are the areas where I need support in, where I would like to integrate AI tools, where I just need, you know, a little help maybe.

Number three is really checking out AI tools, trying things out, everything, being really open about it and curious. Of course, cautious when it comes to ethical considerations and data and privacy, but be really curious about the things, try different things out. And then point number four is try it out and use it. So really

think about how you want to integrate them in your workflows in the long term and also what are the things that you don't want to integrate what are the tools that are not helpful to you and just like leave them behind for now

And the last point, stay updated. A lot of things are changing. A lot of updates are happening. So keeping up to date is the key here. Okay, my friends, I hope this podcast episode was helpful to you. My goal with this episode was to make it a little bit more tangible, a little bit more hands-on so that you have some things to get started with, um,

And yeah, if you have any questions or just want to say hello, you can always reach me on Instagram at your ex.patricia. And yes, I'm super excited to see where this is leading us. Thank you so much for listening and hear you in the future.