We attended the Create Leicester Day Event at The Curve Theatre in Leicester to meet and mingle with the local digital design community and hear from seven inspirational experts.
Here’s our round up of seven things discussed at the event that really resonated with us:
Ben Holliday, Chief Design Officer at FutureGov told us that when you open a project to other people you get different perspectives, reactions, even different uses. And while connecting with others, you create new and more holistic ideas, so open up, make your project visual for the office, ask for colleagues and users to participate and you will have the best result.
UX & UR consultant at Sparck, Helen Joy, reminded us that we can sometimes feel as though we sit in a digital bubble when working in this industry and when designing for others we should remember there are several different scenarios that change the accessibility people will have towards technology. No assumptions can be made, the users need to be understood and design needs to be as self-explanatory as possible.
User research is the best way to make sure you get out of the bubble and design what needs to be designed. Picture from Helen Joy‘s talk
Emma Parnell, Service Design Lead (secondment) at Addaction explained that she’s believes no matter how complex a project is, designers can turn all the ideas into something visual and tangible that makes sense to everyone
Jaskiran Kang, Lead UX Designer at ESFA spoke about how working somewhere that stands by its values gives employees more autonomy and creates a good atmosphere as everyone feels empowered knowing they are working towards the same goal
Jaskiran Kang explained how finding a workplace that has the same values and visions as you is the right way to work
The BBC’s Creative Director of Content Discover, Dan Jones, discussed the path he takes with ideas. He says that looking into the future and finding the most preferable outcome, then tracing back to how you got there is key. Although you also need to make sure the possibilities you don’t want to come to fruition, don’t happen.
Dan Jones showed us how designing for the future works and the power of backtracking to achieve more meaningful results
Johan Adda, designer at Clear Score and founder of Chapito Toys focused on a topic that was mentioned in the majority of the talks: the importance of simplifying. Simplify systems, process, projects, everything. It makes design more accessible, communication easier and the product more efficient.
Johan Adda’s talk recap
Lily Dart, Head of Design Systems at Lloyds Banking Group told us about how good design systems can align teams, give them autonomy, save time (which saves money in return), reduce risks and maintain consistency.
To find out more about this topic, UI/UX Designer Geri Reid wrote a blog post about building the design system for Lloyds Banking Group.
