A memorable experience; that is part of what drives user experience design and the need to perfect an experience, or lay the path to a positive one.

When I was child I remember waking up on weekend mornings to the sounds of Marty Stouffer’s voice narrating the Wildlife nature show on the local PBS station. That memory makes up an experience that I don’t think I could trade for a couple of reasons. Reason one: I think of my dad; his love for nature and spending his time away from work either outside in the nearest mountains or inside watching shows about the outside. Reason two: the shows were usually very interesting, reeling my brothers and I in if we were simply passing by on our way to get a drink from the kitchen during intermission from playing legos in our rooms. Experience. That’s what we had, and it is now positively embeded in our memories for what it’s worth.

The responsibility of the user experience designer, in the case of the web, is to take into account a user, in an environment with which they intend interact, and determine the best way to make their experience positive and memorable. While not all website experiences can rival those of our best embeded childhood memories, we can aim for a fluid interface and well thought out navigation to keep a user coming back. As part of that aim, we must adhere to standards for clean coding and best practices, continue to learn new techniques in usability design for both frontend and backend interfaces, do compatability testing to cover the intended viewing devices, and keep in mind that our experience should be findable.

I love user experience design. It gives me the opportunity to aim for efficiency in the flow or layout of something, and taking into account someone who will experience it. I have always loved to create things like illustrations, sculptures, or user interfaces. But, I especially enjoy the control I have over how someone will experience what I create.