In 2009, the company decided to separate the technical department to establish a production center. Later, the production center was divided into two parts: UI and program. I was also appointed as the company's chief designer. Such changes reflected the company's focus on the technology business. I am determined to upgrade and improve, and I also express my gratitude to the company leaders for trusting me. Although the UI department of the production center has only been established for a few months, all work is progressing relatively smoothly, and the actual work completed is also good. , especially the completion of several urgent projects further proves that this is a team that can fight hard and tough battles! These are inseparable from the sense of responsibility of everyone in this team and the full cooperation between people. I would also like to thank them here very much. I hope that we can continue to protect this unity and cohesion. There will be more arduous tasks ahead. The task is still waiting for us.
Although we have seen some achievements this year, actual problems still exist. Many old problems are still exposed, and we must face these. To be honest, from a real UI level, what we have done is far from enough. Some old program + page thinking and working methods will still become the dominant method in our daily work. Our current UI is far from just that. Superficial stage. What exactly is UI? Why do you want to do UI? How to make UI? I believe that many of us are still confused about this concept.
I saw a piece of news today. At the annual meeting of Alipay, Jack Ma scolded “Alipay” for making him hundreds of billions of wealth. There were no stage decorations, no music background, or even lights at this annual meeting. In the darkness, all Alipay employees heard were pieces of voice from users. All sound clips came from phone recordings from the customer department. The content of the recording is very harsh. There is no common praise and "no good words". It is all accusations, complaints, helplessness, scolding, hatred, and criticism. "It sucks, it sucks, it sucks to the extreme." Jack Ma then took the stage and chose to describe Alipay's user experience on this occasion. As we all know, Alipay is one of the few companies in China that has an independent UED department. It has a relatively complete work process system, talent resources, and presentation stage. Their research and practice on user experience are unmatched by most domestic companies. Because of these, they It has also become the object of study and imitation by many company UI departments. Otherwise, Alipay is an absolutely first-class network application platform in China and even internationally. Jack Ma said in a rage that it is simply for users. When we take away all the aura of Alipay, we see that this is actually a platform for users. Who knows? There is only one answer that can dominate the success or failure of this platform, and that is users. When artificial subjective ideas are imposed on this platform, no matter how reasonable and subjective it is, users may be ignored. When ignored, users will definitely complain. If it is not taken seriously, there is only one possibility. , abandoned by users!
I once saw an article by usability expert Jacob Nielsen, who divided a company's usability maturity into eight stages: 1. Hostility to user experience 2. Developer-centered design 3. Sporadic usability 4. Usability investment 5. Usability department established 6. Systematic usability process 7. Integrated UCD 8. User driven company. Jack Ma's anger towards Alipay is caused by users. It can be seen that if this theory is followed, Alipay has begun to use users to drive the development of the company's products, and Alipay is gradually entering the 8th stage. Looking back, we also use this standard to evaluate the current stage of our company. We will see many problems. The positioning of most projects will be based on the standards of managers and even program technicians. Users here have become "Customers (a small number of users with strong subjective needs)", "customer" satisfaction is our satisfaction. In the short term, certain effects and satisfaction will be achieved, but in the long run, due to deviations in the early stages of the design, the angular velocity theory will continue to change. The passage of time is constantly amplified, so product usability can be imagined. It has become commonplace that the designed products have no beginning or end, or are abandoned halfway. Indeed, we still have a long way to go, and we need to do and improve. There are many more things, many more...
A good Internet product must be designed with the user as the center. In 2010, the company's UI department will not only complete the current interface design work, strictly control product quality, and optimize work efficiency; the focus of the task will be to strengthen the company's product design, Design for usability. This requires great efforts in the division of department responsibilities, work processes, standards and regulations, and personnel structure. We plan to start with product design and information architecture, and use normative theories to guide specific work. Under the premise that the "business architecture" is clear and the "technical architecture" is stable, we will go deep into the research and practice of users and products, and work on some key projects. Conduct user analysis and research, establish communication channels among users, products, and designers, and track and analyze the quality and quantity of user experience during design. The work goal is one: to design products and improve products with users as the center, so that the products can accurately grasp users.
However, we will also look at the company's actual situation. It may not be possible to create a dedicated UED department at present, which requires all department personnel related to product design and user experience: "Give up working alone, and work with more people to achieve better results." Working hard to improve our products and user experience is what we should do most now. "I am fully aware of the difficulties and pressures we will face in this process, but we must stick to the right path, even if the road is full of difficulties and obstacles, everything is for the sake of it. Products, everything is for users. Quoting Jack Ma: "Many companies cannot survive for less than five years. Companies that have survived for more than five years have never had such pain. Without such a setback, the company will not last long. Today I think Alipay has begun to face its own problems." when."
The last sentence is half copied from Brother Bai's words: "It seems that this matter is worth at least another 10 years of our work."