Honestly, is this still a thing? If memory serves me correctly, my first conference presentation was about this very topic. Forgive me for having a little trouble remembering, though, as that was all the way back in the 1980s.
I guess, though, not everyone in UX these days was around back then. Heck, I would imagine the great majority of them probably hadn’t even been born yet.
That said, I do see a lotta UXers without much background in UX as well these days – designers with fine arts degrees, content strategists who studied Shakespeare or did the sports beat at the local paper, project managers who have backgrounds in sports marketing … Funny, though – it was much the same when I started.
But I digress …
I’ve always liked to see these ideas in user terms – i.e., the things that a user might actually ask. Is something wrong? What is it? How do I fix it?
In addition to that, I think it’s also important to speak the same language as the user. So, no “invalid operators,” “bad requests,” or “system error codes.” (By the way, a lot of these come from the days when developers wrote error messages. Don’t be like them!)
Related to that is to “speak human.” Just think of that poor user, who is obviously already having problems. The last thing they need is a “fix” that doesn’t fix anything, or that talks down to them, or confuses them, or makes light of their situation. No better way to guarantee their going from mildly annoyed to seriously pissed off.
Finally, be specific. Be concrete. Use examples. This extends to both how to fix the problem as well as explaining what went wrong (within reason, for the latter – remember who this is being written for). So, no more “enter a valid number,” “please try again,” or “correct name and resubmit.” Human minds tend to be a lot more concrete that abstract. What exactly constitutes a valid number? I can try again, but is there something I should be doing differently? What exactly was wrong with the name I entered?
Overall, think in the terms that the user might. And that’s really the main idea here. No matter who you are or where you came from, just think like the user. And if you look at it that way, it is true – the basics never really go away.
The more things change …
