A UX Designer is a Great Catch
BRB, updating my Hinge settings to “UX designers only.”
Looking for the perfect partner? I’ve got a hot tip. UX designers, researchers, writers… there’s all kinds of us out there and guess what? We are hot commodities not only in the workplace, but also in love.
Your interest piqued? Know this: our whole job revolves around being empathetic. Daily we practice recognizing the goals, needs, and pain points of people outside of ourselves. We are practiced collaborators and communicators; we are thoughtful, insightful, and clever. Sound good? There’s more!
1. We do our research.
My ex-fiancé bought me a coffee table book about Banksy for my 30th birthday. If he had done some research, he may have come to the realization that some iteration on this gift was needed before handoff. A UX designer would do some user interviews by texting your friends and family, create an affinity map using the key insights from those conversations, and use the trending buckets to guide next steps. We would ensure you end up with a gift that is appropriately meaningful, functional, and delightful.
2. We look for the why.
As designers, we aren’t just concerned with what you do. We want to know what you’re thinking, saying, and feeling, too. If you say something suspicious like I’m not hungry, internally our brain is doing this:
3. We can take feedback.
No one, and I mean no one, takes feedback like a UX designer. We are extremely accustomed to having our work routinely shredded to pieces. Some of us actually live for that stuff, which is another bonus to dating a UX designer, if you’re into that sort of thing!
We didn’t load the dishwasher to your liking? Time for feedback. We won’t be offended, take it personally, or hold it against you. In UX bootcamp I learned to deliver my critiques in sandwich form. For example, the dishwasher feedback may go something like this:
Thank you for loading the dishwasher; I feel loved when you share the daily household tasks with me. Next time, the knives should point down, not up, because it hurts when they try to stab me as I take them out. I appreciate your participation and look forward to unloading the dishwasher together again soon!
4. We’re people savvy.
Your mom’s coming to town, but you’re not going to sweat it if you’re dating a UX designer. We spend a lot of time in meetings. A whole lot. We meet with everyone and their mother! And we have to convince them all that the work we’re doing will serve everyone (and their mothers, too). Rest assured, we will be professional, engaging, and prepared. We might even bring a deck to answer the inevitable question: What is it exactly that you do?
5. We have a growth mindset.
An essential skill of any UX designer is the capacity to grow and evolve, and a big part of that is getting out of our comfort zones and stretching ourselves. Life will be exciting with us, and it will only get better with every iteration of our partnership. Basically, the longer you stick with us, the better we get. You can pretty much build yourself a super partner if you support our work with corporate buy-in, health benefits, and the option to work remote. You get out of UX design what you put into it!
If you’re a UXer currently in the market for love, work, or in my case both: I hope this treatise on love serves as a reminder that you are not an impostor; you are a catch! Be brave and put yourself out there, because you deserve to be seen. Until we meet again, I wish you good fortune in your various searches; your dreams might just be a whiteboard challenge away!
