WEEK 1

Types of UX Designers:

1. Interaction Designer – Focus on designing the experience of a product and how it functions.

2.Visual Designer – Focus on how the technology or product looks

3.Motion Designer – Think about what it feels like for a user to move through a product

Graphic Designer
Create visuals that tell a story or message, focus on a physical appearance of a product.

UX Designer
Focus on how users interact with a product.

UX Writers – Think about how to make the language within a product clearer, focuses on what should be
the tone

Production Designers – first and final match in tr finished product materials & that the assets are ready
to be handed off to the engineering team.

Assets: everything from texts & images to the design specifications like font, style, color, size & spacing.

UX Engineers – Translate the design’s intent into a functioning experience like app/webiste

UX Program Managers – ensure clear & timely communication so that the process of building a useful
product moves smoothly from start to finish.

Product Development Lifecycle – The process used to take a product from an idea to reality.

Steps:
1. Brainstorming : needs & challenges [Identify the problems and how to solve them]

2.Define : use insights from step 1 & narrow focus [specific & concrete details about the products],
sticking to one problem and designing it’s solution.

3.Design : use of step 1 & 2

4.Test : feedback and work upon them

5.Launch : ready to go!!

Ideal UX Design should be

Usable
Equitable
Enjoyable
Useful
Responsibilities of an Entry level UX Designer
1. Researching : understand audiences and learn about their problems, backgrounds, demographics,
motivations, emotions and life goals.

2. Wireframing:
Wireframes?
Basic structures

3.Prototyping:
Prototypes?
Pre-model version

4. Creating Information Architecture: The framework of a website or how it’s organized, categorized
and structured

5. Communicating effectively: writing mails, creating proposals, pitching ideas to clients

Check for Glossary and other reading material

WEEK 2
User – Any person who uses a product

End User – The specific audience a UX designer creates something for

User Experience – How a person, the user, feels about interacting with, or experiencing, a product

Iteration – Doing something again, by building on previous versions and making tweaks.

Frameworks – Creates the basic structure that focuses and supports the problem you’re trying to solve

Some common frameworks under UX Design are as follows-

 User - centered design – Puts the user front-and-center, process focuses on users and their
needs. It is an iterative process

4 steps for user – centered design:

1. Understand – how the user experiences the product or similar products

2. Specify – narrow down the most important problem of the user after research
3. Design – Solutions to the end user’s problem, come up with ideas how the product will look
like
4. Evaluate – does your design solve the end user’s problem, testing the product with the real
people
 Five elements of UX Design – framework of steps that UX Designers take to turn an idea into a
working product. The 5 elements from bottom to top -

o Strategy : define the user’s needs and business objectives

o Scope : determine what you’re building, decide on features and content to be included
in the product.
 o Structure : how to organize your design & how the user will interact with it
o Skeleton : this can be think of as the layout
o Surface : top level of the user experience
 Design Thinking Process – user- centered approach to problem solving. A way to create solutions
that address a real user problem and are functional and affordable.

5 actionable steps under Design Thinking

o Empathize : discovering what end users really need, can conduct

surveys/interviews/observation sessions
o Define : create a clear problem statement(based on research) i. e. discussing about the users
need to be addressed
o Ideate : come up with innovative ideas or solutions
o Prototype : scaled down version of a product that shows important function
o Test : feedback from the user – centered designs can make changes and improvements or
come up with a completely new idea

Lean UX and Double Diamond

Lean UX – iterative focuses on reducing wasted time and resources, and producing a workable product.
Encourages productivity and collaboration. Lean UX teams are typically cross-functional, which means
you’ll be working alongside team members like engineers and UX researches.

3 Steps-

Think. Explore the problems, solve them, all about gathering research

Make. Creating sketches, wireframes and prototypes, also create minimum viable product MVP-
simple prototype of your design

Check. How users respond to your design and gather feedback from project stakeholders.

6 principles-

 Move forward
 Stay Curious
 Test ideas in the real world
 Externalize your ideas
 Reframe deliverables as outcomes
 Embrace radical transparency

Double Diamond

It breaks down UX design into two main phases: research and design. Each phase has 2 steps-
1. Discover the problem
2. Define the problem
3. Develop Solutions for the problem
4. Deliver the product
4 principles that inform the double Diamond process;

1. Focus on the user

2. Communicate
3. Collaborate
4. Iterate

NEXT BILLION USERS- they are people who are just starting to use the internet

Issues facing next billion users –

 Cost – People with few resources tend to buy less expensive devices with low RAM and limited
storage
 Connectivity - don’t have continuous access to the internet
 Digital Literacy
 Literacy

Designing cross – platform experiences & the four c’s

Platform – The medium that users experience your product on(mobile
web/apps/tablets/wearables/TVs/smart displays)

The platform you select should be the one that best meets your end users needs. Later you can design
for additional platforms. Besides consistent user experience across platforms, consistent brand identity
is also important.

Brand identity – The visual appearance and voice of a company

Screen Size – The first consideration when designing for various platforms is adjusting design elements
and features to fit different screen sizes.

Interaction - In addition to the size of the screen, you also need to consider the way users
interact with each platform and how those interactions might affect your design decisions. .
Different groups of people will interact with your product in different ways, like using a screen
reader, closed captioning, or a switch device.

Content Layout - In the world of UX design, layouts refer to the way that information is
organized on the screen.

Functionality
There are a lot of reasons why users might choose one platform over another, but functionality
and the kind of tasks they want to complete is a huge driver.
The 4 Cs of designing for multiple platforms –

1. Consistency: Most companies have specific design guidelines that need to be followed in
order to stay consistent with their brand identity, which refers to the visual appearance and
voice of a company. When designing a product, it’s essential to stay true to the company’s
brand guidelines in order to maintain consistency across platforms and drive brand
 awareness. Maintaining a consistent design helps improve the user experience and build trust,
because users can expect the design to feel familiar across platforms and products.
2. Continuity : Continuity in design means that users can maintain their progress as they move
from one platform to the next. Without continuity, users can become frustrated if the progress
of their experience does not carry across platforms.
3. Context: It’s also important to consider the context of each platform you’re designing for. This
means thinking about when and how users prefer to interact with certain features on different
platforms.
4. Complementary: One way to create a great cross-platform user experience is to make sure
that the design of each platform adds something new for the user.
Mobile users tend to be goal-oriented & they are focused on completing a single task.

Examples:

YouTube

For a lot of people, YouTube is a go-to source for watching endless hours of video content.
The YouTube mobile viewing experience complements and smoothly transitions from a
desktop browser.

WebMD

WebMD is a healthcare website where users can learn about the symptoms, diagnosis, and
treatments related to a wide variety of medical conditions. The WebMD “Symptom Checker”
allows users to click on certain areas of a body map and get a list of possible symptoms
associated with those body parts.

Airbnb

Airbnb is an online rental platform where users can list their own space to rent or book a stay
in someone else’s space. The Airbnb user experience on a desktop computer is
straightforward and similar to other rental sites, where you can filter your search based on
your needs. The mobile app seamlessly integrates these same features and allows for
continuity throughout the booking process.

Responsive Web design – allows a website to change automatically depending on the size of the device.

Universal design – The process of creating one product for users with the widest range of abilities and in
the widest range of situations. One-size-fits-all

Inclusive Design – (Solved for one, extend to many) Making design choices that take into account
personal identifiers like:

Ability/Race/Economic Status/Language/Age/Gender

Accessibility – The design of products, devices, services, or environments for people with disabilities.
Categories –

o Motor
o Deaf or hard of hearing
o Cognitive
o Vision

Equity-focused design: Designing for groups that have been historically underrepresented or ignored
when building products.

Equality – Providing the same amount of opportunity and support

Equity - Providing different levels of opportunity and support for each person in order to achieve fair
outcomes.

Social model of disability

Defines a disability as being caused by the way society is organized or how products are designed, rather
than a person’s ability or difference.

Equity focused Design

Thinking through all the aspects of a designed product and making sure the product is both accessible
and fair to all genders, races, and abilities. Plus, the designs need to specifically consider
underrepresented and excluded groups.

Assistive technology (AT)

Any products, equipment, and systems that enhance learning, working, and daily living for people with
disabilities.

 Color modification – increases the color contrast on a screen to make it easier to see for users
with low vision or eye strain.
 Voice control – help people with limited dexterity, allows the user to navigate and interact with
the buttons and screens on their devices using only their voice. Switch – An assistive technology
device that replaces the need to use a computer keyboard or a mouse
 Screen readers – The software works on mobile and web devices and reads out loud any on
screen text. Also read any interactive elements, like buttons, along with non-visible text, like the
button names, and any alternative text for images.
 Alternative Texts – translates visual interface into a text-based user interface. It essentially uses
words to describe any meaningful image for someone who isn’t able to see the image.

AT’s may include prosthetics, pointing devices, electric wheelchairs, power wheels, eye gaze and head
trackers, and a whole lot more. It can also encompass something as low tech as a pencil holder.

Check for GLOSSARY

WEEK 3
Design Sprint – A time-bound process with 5 phases typically spread over 5 full 8-hour days.
Design Sprint Goal – Solve a critical design challenge through designing, prototyping, and
testing ideas with users.
5 phases under design sprint are :
 Understand
 Ideate (Also start preparing for phase 5)
 Decide
 Prototype
 Test
Benefits of Design Sprint
 Save time
 Create a path to bring a product to market
 Prioritize the user
 Test product before launch
 Values every person in the room
 The best ideas rise to the top
 Time to focus
 Lowers risks of an unsuccessful market debut
 Versatile Scheduling at any point during your project.
When to Sprint?
 Many potential solutions to challenge?
 Cross- functional teams needed to weigh in?
 Challenge scope wide enough?
Basics to plan a design sprint –
1. User research
2. Call in the experts (understand phase)
3. Find the right space
4. Gather supplies
5. Establish Sprint Rules
6. Plan introductions
7. Post Sprint Planning
Sprint Brief – A document that you share with all your attendees to help them prepare for the
sprint.
Sprint Leader – the person who sends out the sprint brief to the team.
Retrospective – A collaborative critique of the team’s design sprint.
Key questions : what went well and what can be improved
Benefits of retrospectives –
1. Help to work better as a team.
2. Improves how you communicate with clients
3. Point out areas where you can grow as an individual.

WEEK 4 Introduction to UX portfolios

Portfolio – A collection of work you’ve created that shows your skills in a certain area.
WYSIWYG – What you see is what you get. These builders feature user-friendly WYSIWYG
editors, offers tutorials and even more templates to start form. Common website builders I
include Squarespace, Wix and Webflow.
Squarespace -It is a great option for UX designers who are new to website building.
Webflow- It is a creative tool designed for flexibility and is a strong website builder if you want
to make a truly unique portfolio. Having a basic level of HTML and CSS.
Wix – It is a strong choice to create your portfolio website without needing to code. It is known
for its intuitive technology and user-friendly drag and drop editor. It offers customizable
designer-made templates and design features that give you creative freedom to build the
portfolio you want.
1. Put your UX Design work front-and-center
2. Prioritize the UX of the site
Domain – Address of your website
Tips for a good portfolio
1. Establish your personal brand
Personal brand – the way in which your personality, unique skills, and values as a
designer intersect with your public persona.
2. Tell a story
3. Be concise
4. Keep your navigation simple and intuitive
Navigation- the way users from page to page on a website
 5. Go beyond the template
6. Include a diversity of projects
7. Feature case studies
Case Study - Leads the user through your design process from the beginning to the end.
While making a case study, you may enter the following details:
 Project’s name and duration
 Your role
 Project goal
 Research
 Intended audience
 Sketches or wireframes
 User testing results
 Final design
 Conclusion about what you learned
Caution- not to share non-disclosure agreement if signed any.
Non – disclosure agreement is a contract an employee might sign when working with a business, in
which they agree not to share sensitive information.

8. Make your website responsive

9. Test your website

Writing best practices in a portfolio:

“About me” page

 Kind of work
 Passions
 Current work
 Credentials
 Notable projects, clients or awards
 Contact information

Tips for writing in your portfolio

 Use as few words as possible

 Avoid complicated language
 Avoid jargon
 Include keywords
 Inject personality
 Find a trusted editor

Personal Statement – A one or two-sentence phrase thar describes what you do and what you stand for
LinkedIn is an important site for networking and job searching. Employers are likely to check your
LinkedIn when considering you for a job. LinkedIn is built for business and networking purposes, so your
profile will have space to talk about your work experience, goals, and achievements.

Twitter profiles have limited space, so keep your information short and sweet! Even with limited text,
you can still talk about your goals and what you do professionally. Twitter is more of a glimpse into your
personality, personal brand, and interests.

Medium, Dribbble, and Behance are great places to talk to other designers, get feedback on your design
work, and look for jobs. Medium is a blogging website, where you can post opinion pieces on different
design-related subjects. Dribbble and Behance are sites where you can share snippets of your work to
show your design skills to other designers and employers.

Dribble – the designs that people share here are small snapshots of work that highlight as a particular
skill or interest like branding, product design or topography. Dribble has a robust job search forum,
including a job board and a freelance marketplace.

Behance – here you can find full-time jobs, freelancing and internship opportunities.

Medium – It’s a popular blogging platform featuring articles on all kinds of topics.

Networking – Interacting with other people to develop professional contacts and learn more about a
job industry.

Imposter Syndrome – The belief that you’re unskilled, inferior to others or bad at your job, despite your
successes.

Steps against Imposter syndrome –

 Acknowledge your thoughts
 Own your accomplishments
 Make a list
 Have a conversation
 Realize you aren’t alone

HIGHLIGHTS FROM COURSE 1

 Learned what makes a design good for the user

 Identified different disciplines within UX & what sort of tasks you might do as a UX designer
 Learned common tools, frameworks, and platforms used in UX Design
 Identified steps of a design sprint and how an entry – level designer takes part
 Started developing your portfolio, personal brand, and online profiles.

2 Course

I'm a student interested in learning about UX Design. Since, I'm jobless and don't earn, I'm incapable
of paying the fees for the certificate course for now. I personally feel that learning should not be
 bounded by anything. I can hardly manage to pay for my college fees and rental expenses. Receiving
the help from this financial aid on Coursera will not only help me to overcome my inability to pay
but will enhance deeper learning about the concerned subject as well as add on to the resume and
professional profile. As Coursera has been a leading platform in providing such quality online self-
paced learning programs for a lot of people like me, I want to avail this opportunity too and not let
my financial condition be a barrier to my knowledge and learning. I want to be a part of this
community, engage and network and participate in the discuss forums. As Coursera has been a
leading platform in providing such quality online self-paced learning programs for a lot of people like
me, I want to avail this opportunity too and not let my financial condition be a barrier to my
knowledge and learning.

The certificate course will help me gain a competitive advantage in the market through learning this
specially designed professional course for UX Design learners which I can put on my resume as well.
Employers will search and identify me as one of the verified and credit worthy UX Designers in the
industry and hence it will increase my chances of getting hiring into a company. It will boost my
overall learning and perspective about the topic. I believe that all the valuable learnings from this
course, will surely help me to stand out in the crowd and getting noticed. Getting placed into a good
paying job to support my family and myself is my dream. I want to create a strong job profile in the
UX Design field as it's a new hot topic in the industry and there is a lot of scope in building a career
in such a domain. I want to connect and learn about it even more when I finish this course. It will
open a complete new horizon for me. I want to start as an entry- level designer and then be a
specialist in the UX Content Writing.

I don't have the income or this much money to pay, it's difficult for me to arrange even for the
low-interest loans. I'm barely able to manage funding my college fees. Taking a loan will harden
my situation. It would be a great help, if I can manage to learn this course with the help of the
financial aid. It will brighten my living and growth prospects as an individual and help me land
into a good job so that I can support myself.

Course 2 > Empathize, Define and Ideate

WEEK 1
UX Research – focuses on understanding user behaviors, needs, and motivations through
observation and feedback. The goal of UX is to prioritize the user.
Foundational research – Research that takes place before anything is designed.
Goal – help define the problem you would like to design a solution for. This research includes
talking to the users and identifying their paint points when using a product.
 What should we build?
 What are the user problems?
 How can we solve them?
There are lots of research methods for conducting foundational research, but many of them
are based on observations. Common foundational research methods include:

 Interviews: A research method used to collect in-depth information on

people's opinions, thoughts, experiences, and feelings. You’ll often conduct
interviews of your target users themselves.
 Surveys: An activity where many people are asked the same questions in order
to understand what most people think about a product.
 Focus groups: A small group of people whose reactions are studied. For
example, your focus group might bring together eight users to discuss their
perspectives about new features in your design. A focus group is usually run by a
moderator who guides the group on a certain topic of conversation.
 Competitive audit: An overview of your competitors’ strengths and
weaknesses. You'll conduct your own competitive audit later in the course, so you
will understand this research method well!
 Field studies: Research activities that take place in the user's context or
personal environment, rather than in an office or lab.
 Diary studies: A research method used to collect qualitative data about user
behaviors, activities, and experiences over time. Often, a user will log, or diary,
about their daily activities and provide information about their behaviors and
needs, which can help inform your designs.

Design research - Research that takes place during the design phase
Goal – Inform how the product should be built. It gives designer a chance to reduce the
problems that occur as users interact with your prototype.
 How we build it
Additional research methods that might be used to conduct design research include:

 A/B testing: A research method that evaluates and compares two different
aspects of a product to discover which of them is most effective. For example, you
might have users evaluate two layouts for the homepage of your app to find out
which layout is more effective.
 Cafe or guerrilla studies: A research method where user feedback is
gathered by taking a design or prototype into the public domain and asking
passersby for their thoughts. For example, you might sit in a local coffee shop and
ask customers if they would be willing to test your app design for a couple of
minutes and provide feedback.
 Card sorting: A research method that instructs study participants to sort
individual labels written on notecards into categories that make sense to them.
This type of research is largely used to figure out the information architecture of
 your project, which we’ll discuss in the next course of the program — Course 3:
Build Wireframes and Low-Fidelity Designs.
 Intercepts: A research method that gathers on-site feedback from users as
they engage in the activities being researched. Intercepts are often conducted in
the field, so this type of research is often considered a subset of field research. An
intercept study can provide quick, high-level feedback

Post Launch Research – It can be used to evaluate how well a launch feature is meeting the
needs of users.
Goal – understand how users experienced the product and whether it was good or bad user
experience.
 Did we exceed?
Research methods you might use to conduct post-launch research include:

 A/B testing
 Usability studies - is a technique to evaluate a product by testing it on
users. The goal of usability studies is to identify pain points that the user
experiences with your prototypes, so the issues can be fixed before the product
launches.
 Surveys
 Logs analysis: A research method used to evaluate recordings of users while
they interact with your design, tools, etc.

Qualities of a good UX researcher ?

1. Empathy – ability to understand someone else’s feelings or thoughts in a situation
2. Pragmatism – practical approach to problem - solving. Pragmatic people are focused on
reaching goals.
3. Collaboration – ability to work with a range of people, personalities, and work styles.
Categorization of Research
 Basis of research on the who conducts the research
 Primary Research – Conducted by yourself. For eg. Survey users, interview users or
conduct a usability study
 Secondary research – Uses information from books, articles or journals.

 Basis of research on the type of data collected

 Qualitative Research (Why) – Focuses on observations. Based on interviews
Answers questions like why or how did this happen
  Quantitative Research (What) – focuses on data that can be gathered by counting or
measuring. Based on surveys of large groups of people using numerical answers.
Answers questions like How many? How much?
Common Research Methods
1. Interviews – collect in-depth information on people’s opinions, thoughts, experiences,
and feelings. These are usually conducted in person and include a series of open-ended
questions where the researcher asks the user about their experience.
2. Surveys – It’s an activity where many people are asked the same questions in order to
understand what most people think about a product. Surveys allow us to hear from a
larger number of users. Include a mix of Qualitative & Quantitative questions. Most
useful after you have initial understanding of the user’s pain points & want to solidify
that by surveying a larger number of people.
3. Usability Studies – Help us to evaluate a product by testing it on users. Goal – To
identify pain points that user experiences with different porotypes, so the issues can be
fixed before the final product launches. Usability studies help demonstrate if a product is
on the right track or if the design needs to be adjusted. There are lots of ways to test usability,
both in person and online. It’s a good idea to record your usability sessions, either audio or
video, so you can reference the user data as you make design decisions later on in the
process.

KPI’s - Key Performance Indicators are critical measures of progress towards an end goal.
The KPI’s for an app or new product launch might include things like how much time the
user spent on a task or the number of clicks they used to make a purchase.
Benefits of Secondary Research
 Saves time and money
 Immediately accessible
 Backs up primary Research
Drawbacks
 No first-hand user interaction
 No specific user feed back

Benefits of Interviews
 Understand what users think and why
 Ask follow up questions
Drawbacks
 Take time and money
 Small Sample Size
Benefits of Surveys
 Large sample Size
 Fast
  Inexpensive
Drawbacks
 No in-depth feedback
Benefits of Usability Studies
 Firsthand user interaction
 Challenge our assumptions
 In-depth feedback
Drawbacks
 Only measure how easy a product is to use

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