The User Experience Team of One: A Research and Design Survival Guide

Now I won’t lie, I am starting off in the field of UX and am in the process of finalizing my first iteration of my portfolio. With some tools under my belt from school, and this book, I feel confident to start at a new job. What I love about this book is that it is laid out like a cook book full of recipes, except this one tells you WHEN and WHY you should do each UX method, in a easily-glanceable couple pages. I know for a fact I will keep this book wherever I go when I become employed. Junior or senior, I think anyone can benefit from this book - even those just gaining interest in UX. With so many methods and terminology, this book has it all in one place, easily accessible for anyone.

UX, while less new than many thing, is still a field where it feels really hard to grasp the basic concepts and get a good overview of what the field has to offer. This can be incredibly frustrating for newbies getting into the field (I fall in the first category), experienced UX designers attempting to get others onboard, and UX skeptics who don't understand the value or resources needed for the field. As someone who wanted to get a better idea of the field for a career change, I was looking for a book that would provide a comprehensive overview of the UX field, especially since many places don't have an established UX system. For me, the User Experience Team of One was exactly the resource I was looking for. It provided and overview of the field, ways to advance personally and professionally, and most important - it also talked about how to advocate within your role if you are the sole UX Designer in an organization. The main chapters which talk about design, research, and testing methodologies among other topics, also provide helpful tips for remote workers, ways that you can bring your coworkers into the UX design process, and a "if you only do one thing" section for the time-pressed professional. I took off one star due to the fact that the book unfortunately is very small, leading to many of the images being incredibly tiny and hard to read. It makes a nice, light book for my train ride, but hard to read in practice. Overall, if you only do one thing when trying to get an overview of UX.... read this book.

Item as described.

Absolutely brilliant from start to finish. This book has some sterling advice, clearly based on real experiences and provides practical solutions to the aspiring UX practitioner, as well as the more experienced professional. Personally I found the practical tools the most helpful out of any book I've come across. Being able to apply good user experience techniques fits hand in hand with understanding the theories so having some real templates, guides and tools to get others involved in the process of user experience design is incredibly helpful. Alongside the theories and tools, this book finally provides guidance and advice on getting others involved in the user experience process. These ideas and guides don't just apply if you're working on your own as a freelancer or contractor but work equally well if you're the only person in a team or organisation that seems user experience as something to care about. Whether you're someone interested in learning more about user experience or already a practicing professional in the field, I highly recommend you get a copy of this book. It's worth more than it's weight in gold.

This book is a very good addition to your library if you are practicing design