User Experience is one of those areas where you need to be the best for you to have an impact. That’s because, without the right skills and a creative mind, you can easily end up as a jack of all trades, with no specific area of speciality. Nevertheless, it is quite a lucrative area, since it’s a skill set needed in all forms of designs ranging from enterprise software graphics to app development. To help you better understand this field, here are 5 things to know about user experience education.
(Top 5) Best Things to Know About User Experience Education
1. The Field is Leaning More Towards Industry Education
While user experience education is taught in institutions of higher learning, there still exists a gap between what is taught in the classroom and the skills that the market is looking for. That’s why the trend is moving more towards industry-driven education. Vocational institutions are offering user experience education on the rise. These institutions teach skills that are tailor-made for what the industry needs. In essence, anyone looking to pursue user experience education can still benefit from taking a certification course, just like they would with going to college.
2. Formalisation is Gaining Traction
User experience education is a relatively young space. That’s why even in institutions of higher learning, it comes in a wide variety of forms. Some institutions focus on the technical aspects of user experience, while others are taking a hybrid approach to teach user experience. However, the bottom line is that user experience education is getting formalised, and in the future, it will be more standardised in how it is taught in institutions of higher learning.
3. You can Learn User Experience Online
While user experience education is getting formalised, demand for these skills is also pushing people to learn all about user experience through online avenues. This demand has led to an explosion of online courses teaching user experience on platforms like Udemy. As such, for anyone looking to venture into user experience education, and doesn’t have the time to join a formal institution, there are lots of online platforms that you can use to acquire this knowledge.
4. A Cost-Benefit Analysis is Important Before Paying for UX Education
There are courses that one can take just for the sake of gaining knowledge. User experience education is not one of them. This is a course that is tailor-made for industry, and learners expect to profit from it. As such, before you commit money to user experience education, make sure you have all the information you need about your prospects in the market. As long as the cost of education doesn’t require a lengthy break-even period, go for it.
5. It Requires Strong People Skills
While user experience education is valuable, practitioners of UX need to work with experts in other areas of technology. For instance, a UX expert needs to work with programmers and project managers, among others. To make the most of user experience education, take a course in communication skills as well. This can help you work better with other professionals, and achieve more success in the projects you work on.