Remember, it’s USER experience

I just spent two days watching users pick apart my precious design concept. I've had better nightmares. As a designer it’s easy to make assumptions, since that is part of our job, but when real user behavior doesn't agree, it’s time to let go of your precious and pay attention!

Getting real user feedback, formal or guerilla, is critical to my success as a UX designer, but it’s hard. It’s much easier to dig into design software and spend far too long tweaking details in isolation. Even a brilliant, collaborative team can lose track of actual user motivation and behavior. Ignorance is bliss? Bliss will flee when the project explodes on the launchpad.

So, don't forget the U in UX. Test early and often for best results. Next up: Fixing everything those heartless perfect little users didn’t love.