Avoid Bad Design Jobs

2021-04-25

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Why We Specialize

UX/UI Design is a specialized career path. It takes years of college and/or self-study to develop professional-level skills. It's not something you can learn over a weekend.

Like Medicine, Information Technology is a huge field. No one person can know it all.

One area of knowledge is not equivalent to another. In other words, it's unreasonable to expect a tech support agent to know how to build a web application.

Just like you'd never expect a Nurse to know how to do brain surgery.

Both the Nurse and Surgeon are in the field of medicine and have spent years learning their specialized skill sets. Their skills might overlap in some small areas but their skill sets are not equivalent.

Three Reasons Your Job Title Matters

  1. College curriculums teach specific skill sets based on a job title.
  2. Your title connects your skill set to your salary range.
  3. Job tiles are search terms on job listing sites like LinkedIn, Indeed, and CareerBuilder.  

With sites like Glassdoor and Salary.com there is no excuse for employers to not know the differences. Those who low-ball on salary or combine two or more jobs are being shady to save money.

Here's an Example of a Bad Design Job

This was listed as a "UX Design" role for a mid-sized company. But when you look at the skill sets they want to fill this role it's clear this is 5 jobs in one.

It is unrealistic to redefine the skills for a job title to save money and hope to fool smart people. The people with the intelligence and skills to do this level of work are smart enough to see through this game.

I've highlighted the individual jobs hidden in the example below with different colors to make it easier to pick them out. If this was a true UX Design job it would be 90% blue.

UX Designer Job Description

Here are the questions the CMO is looking for the candidates to answer.

Job Description: Company X is looking for a UX Designer to drive increased conversions from digital and social campaigns and continuously enhance our websites to improve the overall patient journey and drive new patient growth. We have experienced exponential growth in digital patient acquisition over the past year and are continuing to grow via a combination of growth in our existing 80+ clinics as well as the addition of new clinics across the country. We are looking for a creative, analytical, and detail-oriented UX Designer to join our team.

The UX Designer will be responsible for the design and execution of high-conversion digital experiences across multiple brands. This includes the design of new features and products from wireframe to implementation. You will analyze, test, execute and help us reach business goals.

Top candidates will have a proven background in driving digital conversions via UX design and implementation. The UX Designer will be a part of a team that includes a design, content and media professionals. The role reports directly to the Chief Marketing Officer.

Essential Functions and Responsibilities

Minimum Qualifications

Preferred Qualifications

  1. Digital writing experience
  2. Agile marketing or change management
  3. Experience with a call tracking and analytics software such as Invoca
  4. Experience with Contact Center as a Service (CCaaS) tools  

Job Competencies

  1. Strong understanding of design and know how to use your technical finesse to bring a website to the next level
  2. Passion for improving the patient journey through innovative and creative internal campaigns
  3. Self-starter, thrives in a fast-paced environment, and can pivot when necessary
  4. Experienced in mobile design
  5. Effective at collaborating across teams to review features, challenges, and designs
  6. Focus on accurate and effective execution
  7. Ability to define, measure and action on meaningful KPIs
  8. Ability to manage the full journey – from wireframes to design to implementation
  9. Solid understanding of the power of good form and function, style standards and the impact UX/UI has on the brand
  10. Passion for design standards and details
  11. Highly organized and a great project manager
  12. Top-notch communication skills  

What does a good UX/UI Design job description look like?

Looking for a UX/UI Design role is not easy. It's a new field and many employers confuse and combine it with other skill sets.

I've formatted the following job description into two parts for clarification. All Information Technology workers need to have a minimum set of professional skills.

Professional Skills

On top of that UX/UI Designers need to have the following knowledge and skills.

UX/UI Designer

What is the average salary range for a UX/UI Designer?

Use "UX Designer" as a search term on any job listing website.
Look for job descriptions with salary ranges.

The range depends on where you are in the world, your experience, and the company you're working for. In my area, the range is $70k to $125k. In larger cities it's higher.

What UX/UI Designer roles should I avoid?

When searching for a job avoid listings that have these red flags:

Remember the old saying,

"A jack of all trades is the master of none."

Employers are always looking for ways to save money and maximize profit.

In most situations, the employer needs a team of people. But either doesn't want to pay the cost or lacks the budget to hire enough talent.

So they try to find a "Unicorn" to do 3 or more jobs under a single job title for one low price. What they fail to realize is these job listings will never attract top talent and the people who apply for them are desperate.

These "Jacks of all trades" will become overwhelmed with the workload of 3 or more jobs. The quality of their work will be mediocre at best. Causing technical and/or legal debt at worst. They will eventually burn out and quit, or mess up badly and get fired.

These cheapskate employers are setting up their employees for failure, and themselves for frustration. They would be better off cutting back their expenses in other areas and investing in the people they need.

Also, avoid Agencies that want to rent you out to clients on a per-project basis. You might as well be freelancing because you'll have more freedom and get paid better.