Get off the Wagon Train- Get on the UX-Rails



 Before the presence of the transcontinental railroad, people who wanted to travel west had to resort to slow and sometimes treacherous terrain.  But once tracks were laid across the country and there was a designated path on which to travel, journeys west became faster, safer and cheaper.

Travel through projects is not unlike these travels across country. If we stay on the rails and the customer tracks (or key tasks) already laid down, there is a clear way to determine what we do and how we do it. In other words, travel through the project should be faster and cheaper than if we took a route not based specifically on user tasks.

 The FACTS:

• Every project has a set of UX rails on which it travels. 
• Those rails are the customer tasks and requirements. 
• If the project stays on the rails it WILL reach its destination efficiently and effectively.

Over the last 2 1/2 years, I don’t think I have encountered one project that –having adhered closely to the UX-rails- did not reach its destination.

This does not mean that every project has gone on to be published or become a live site. What it does mean, however, is that every project when guided first and foremost y by an understanding of the user, their discreet tasks and corresponding requirements- will naturally arrive at a direction and ultimately the right destination.

This, to me, is the genius of UX.   

From a product development perspective, when there are limitless opportunities of what to create and how to create it, UX work illuminates

1.  The location of the tracks or customer tasks, i.e. those pieces which justify project travel.

2.  How to configure the train for the specific rails, i.e. how many cars (of content) should the train have?  Should these cars be their own train or would it make more sense to attach these cars (of content) to another train. Is what we are hauling the right make-up for what the customer tasks are? Should the cars have open access or do they need to be locked (in the case of curriculum assessments)?

From a financial perspective, UX work indicates early on if there is value in spending our time, money and resources travelling on a particular set of tracks AND it allows us to focus our resources in on providing and creating those aspects of a project that are most important and necessary for the customer to be efficient, effective and ultimately successful in their work.  

From a customer perspective, UX work provides us tools for understanding which travels  will be of most value and most compelling to our customer.

Last, but not least, from a mission perspective, UX work helps us to always remember what we are trying to do and for whom we carry out this important work.

In the end, it is just not possible to go wrong when you ride the UX-Rails!



Photo credit: Bicentennial Wagon Train in 1988. Jacksonholejournal.net