Created: December 10, 2022 8:30 PM
by EJ Makela, August 2022
Comments or questions? Contact me!
📌 ABOUT THIS ARTICLEIn the summer of 2022, following a couple months of experience as a student in the UX: The Beginner’s Guide course, I wrote down some observations & ideas regarding IxDF and community. I hope to revise soon it to incorporate new insights. I’d really like to get your feedback so I can take it into consideration. You can find a comment form at the end.
— EJ, December 2022
The material content in the IxDF courses is very high quality.
- Other UX professionals that I’ve met in UX-related Discord groups tend to agree with me.
The price for the self-directed certificate courses are very affordable, especially compared to the Google UX Design certificate program.
- My family is on a tight budget, so this affordability is very important to me.
As I started spending time on the IxDF courses, I encountered issues with the message boards. For example:
- There doesn’t appear to be a search function, so it’s hard to find a post that you want to revisit. Conversations only seem to be sorted in two ways, i.e., most recent and most popular.
- Although I am notified via email when someone comments on or likes something I wrote, it can be challenging to find it. The email contains a link, but this only opens the high-level topic; the actual post needs to be found manually.
- Overall, the built-in system has a lot more friction compared to contemporary messaging and social networking systems.
- These issues were similar to (but still better than) my experiences in the Google UX program. My experience with Google led me to drop that program and try IxDF. (See the “About Me” section for additional detail.)
I spent significant time trying to find and connect with an online IxDF community, but I came up short.
- One of the early assignments was to organize a meetup, which I was interested in doing anyway in hopes that I could meet some fellow IxDF-ers.
- I did find the local IxDF Minneapolis community Slack, but this group was (and still is) pretty inactive.
- I saw a post and comments on the IxDF discussion board about an unofficial international Slack workspace, but joining it required an up-to-date invitation. (The invitation listed on the post had expired, and the person who started the discussion thread was no longer an IxDF member.)
- I’ve posted several inquiries on a number of UX Discord servers, asking how many people were IxDF students or alumni, but it was a small number, especially compared to the Google UX courses.
If the issues above are agreed to be a broader problem, or if there are other common issues with how well the online communities are working, then I suggest that they be approached as a UX problem.
- Use standard methodology, e.g., design thinking, to address it.
- View as an opportunity to involve IxDF students or recent alum.
Reach out to successful/active IxDF groups, and seek their feedback.
- Are they noticing any problems?
- Do they seem “successful?” If so, what’s working? Can they offer any insight or ideas?
- Do they see any need for significant improvement?
Consider bringing all the separate IxDF Slack workspaces under a single workspace.
- Instead of workspaces that are restricted to local IxDF groups, bring all the groups together under a single umbrella.
- Utilize features that allow groups to more naturally coalesce, for example, channels for locals/SIGs/students/alumni.
- Consider using Slack features to manage larger groups, such as sidebar sections, user groups, and huddles. (Note: these features require a paid plan. For more info, see “Consider the costs of Slack vs. Discord.”)
Try out some low-risk experiments. For example:
- Partner up with an active, well-run, non-IxDF online UX community, such as Design Squad. Some special channels could be set aside for IxDF-focused activity
- Create a new, unofficial forum with some select students, alumni, and one or more mentors.
- Choose early participants based on their level of activity in the official forums, i.e., those on the IxDF website and Slack channels.
- If any experiments are deemed successful, consider formalizing them.
Consider pros & cons of Slack vs. Discord.
- Slack workspaces have greater security controls and require an invitation to join.
- Discord servers can be made publicly joinable, but still offer admin controls.
- Slack is generally considered more professional, whereas Discord is more casual.
- Others pros or cons?
Consider the costs of Slack vs. Discord.
- Both platforms provide free plans.
- Paid plans for Slack are based on the number of users. Starts at ~$7/user/month.
- Discord provides extras for a single server regardless of user count. Starts at $5/server/month. Individual Discord users can also opt to pay for additional features.
Define a regular schedule when community systems are re-evaluated.
- This could be annually/bi-annual during normal time, or be triggered following a significant event, such as a pandemic or societal conflict.
- Ask: Are the systems meeting the needs of the current population(s) and the state of the world/locality?
- Ask: Who is not participating and why? Is anyone being left out?
- Ask: Have there been any changes to technologies or cultures that would suggest changes to how the community systems are organized? For example, do people tend to work more remotely than they used to? Has technology advanced to make online gatherings easier, more accessible, or more commonplace?
My name is EJ Makela, and I have been a member of IxDF since mid-June 2022.
- IxDF profile: www.interaction-design.org/ej-makela
- LinkedIn profile: www.linkedin.com/in/ejmakela
I’m currently enrolled in the following IxDF courses:
- User Experience: The Beginner’s Guide (65% complete)
- Design Thinking: The Ultimate Guide (9% complete)
Any significant learning experience requires a social component, at least for me.
- I feel a need to share experiences and collectively problem-solve with peers.
- I benefit from listening to professionals, mentors, and alumni, and I want to build relationships with them.
- I want to share knowledge that I’ve gained, and I want to help others who need my advice.
- This type of activity can keep me energized and help me to move forward on my learning journey.
- I want these social interactions to be logistically easy, and I want to feel a sense of growth, both professionally and personally.
- If interacting socially becomes too challenging, or if I don’t feel that it is making a positive difference for me and others, my participation level will likely drop.
I was briefly enrolled in the Google UX Design certificate program, but I switched to IxDF.
- One major concern that I had with Google’s program was their low-quality “discussion boards,” which were hosted via the Coursera platform.
- These boards would accept postings from students, and you could read recent posts, but it was nearly impossible to converse with other students or build relationships with them.
I was drawn to IxDF partially because the website advertised samples of active student discussions, and it mentioned the existence of local IxDF meet-up groups.
- I was also impressed by the quality of the materials and its association with people like Don Norman.
Later in the summer, I searched for UX communities on Discord, and I’ve become active in a few of them.
- This has included occasional online meetups that were highly diverse (ethnically, gender-wise, and across continents).
Examples of UX communities found on Discord:
- The Collective Studio, where I volunteer as a moderator
- Design Squad UX Community, co-founded by Vy Alechnavicius (@vaexperience)
- Google UX Course Unofficial Forum, which I found after I dropped from Google’s program
If you have any comments or questions about this article, please send me a message via the following form. I’d love your hear your thoughts! ❤️
https://chilipepper.io/form/melting-orange-anaheim-42de1460-6c0b-4d26-a35a-390de6a7b506
Photo credit: Gyan Shahne / Unsplash / Used with permission
Copyright info: This article was authored by EJ Makela, and it is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
