What Can You Learn from a UX Writer?

With all the talk about UX strategy, it's timely to ask, "What can you learn from a UX writer?

A lot, it turns out. 

UX writers are wordsmiths who, in the words of Google's HR department, "advocate for design and help shape product experiences by crafting copy that helps users complete the task at hand."

In simpler terms, they write product instructions.

UX writers preach a 5-point gospel:

• Say it simply. "The words you use need to be as easy to understand as a green light," says UX writer Ben Barone-Nugent. Users won't pause to ponder complex sentences. You need to let them barrel through.
  
  
• Say it economically. Brevity is simplicity's kissing cousin, and comes from omitting the obvious. "I happen to know that it's an actual fact that Procurement orders extra accessories the department doesn't need at least on a weekly basis" simply means "Procurement orders unneeded accessories every week."
  
  
• Use graphics. "You want your users to be able to wield your product without even thinking," Barone-Nugent says. "This means you need to help them move beyond the words you write." The right graphics will do the trick.
  
  
• Focus on impact. "Content doesn’t exist, only experiences do," Barone-Nugent says. Words and sentences aren't important. Instead of calling attention to themselves, they should "meld with your product and go unnoticed."
  
  
• Test. Don't roll out writing without an advance review. Ask others to read your writing before you send it to the intended audience.

SMOG

When advised to make an "easy change" to some piece of software, developers will respond, "Sure, it's just a SMOP."

A Small Matter of Programming.

Wikipedia defines SMOP as "a phrase used to ironically indicate that a suggested feature or design change would in fact require a great deal of effort; it often implies that the person proposing the feature underestimates its cost."

We're about to install a regime with no experience outside business. It plans to make the easy changes that will make America great again.

It's just a SMOG.

A Small Matter of Governing.

Sorry, Charlie, You were Ahead of Your Time

While Charlie Manson may soon depart us, his legacy won't.

It's woven into the fabric of American business, perhaps for decades to come.

The man whose name is nearly synonymous with cult, Charlie mashed Dale Carnegie, L. Ron Hubbard and The Beatles into a world-changing pseudo-philosophy that hypnotized the naïve suburban kids he recruited. He called his cohort "The Family," and their compound "The Cave," and kept his minions spellbound with large doses of LSD.

Today's cult leaders—tech-company CEOs—use names like "The Team" and "The Campus," and dispense chocolates instead of LSD.

Charlie, of course, was Charlie, not a CEO. He pimped girls, not software; lived in Death Valley, not Silicon Valley; and landed in prison, instead of a mansion.

Sorry, Charlie. You were ahead of your time.

Bookies

Americans still read books, according to a new Gallup poll.

In fact, they're reading books at the same pace they did 15 years ago, before the onrush of mobile gadgets.

Nearly half (48%) of Americans read from 1 to 10 books last year; 35% read over 11.

The findings suggest "book reading is a classic tradition that has remained a constant in a faster-paced world, especially in comparison to the slump of other printed media such as newspapers and magazines," Gallup's analysts say.

While young and old adults read slightly more of them, books are read by all age groups (kids were excluded from the poll).

The majority (73%) of Americans read printed books; only 20% read books on e-readers.

If you're at a loss for a title to select, consider one of David Bowie's Top 100 Books.

Post-Competence

Pundits call ours the post-truth era.

I think it's the post-competence era.

In fewer than 10 days, we've seen:

• Mariah Carey botch lip-synching before 11.6 million viewers on live TV
  
  
• Walt Disney recall 15,000 Minnie Mouse infant sweatshirts due to a choking hazard
  
  
• Express (published by The Washington Post) illustrate its cover story on the Women's March on Washington with the male symbol
  
  
• Yahoo Finance Tweet "Trump Wants a Much Bigger Navy" using the "N word"

Dan Lyons' 2016 memoir, Disrupted: My Misadventure in the Start-Up Bubble, provides a strong clue for why we're engulfed in post-competence.

Taking his cue from Steve Jobs, Lyons calls it "the bozo explosion."

Bozos explode in companies when "B players hire C players, so they can feel superior to them, and C players hire D players."

Of course, there's another, more powerful force in effect: companies' drive to profit at their customers' expense.

That drive manifests itself every day in companies' ready willingness to subject customers to post-competent employees—and to the fiascos they create.