Many years ago, I studied graphic design and I was a graphic designer for five years until the recession hit. I moved into marketing within a university for a few years and then I gradually moved into content production. In the content production role, I was doing bits of UX, like user research, and that eventually led me to seek out a qualification in UX.<\/span> I was on maternity leave from 2020 until 2021 and during that time, I kept seeing UX jobs with many of the big global companies come up on LinkedIn: UX designer, user researcher, UX strategist, UX consulting\u2026 I was like, \u201coh, what’s going on here? It’s a little industry<\/a> that\u2019s developing\u201d. <\/span><\/p>\n When I looked at the job descriptions, there was a lot of chat around user centred design in human behaviours. It sounded like something I had been tapping into within my content job. <\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n When I looked at what they were looking for, some of them wanted a UX qualification so I started looking for courses.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n When I went back to my job after maternity leave, I was on a mission to get involved in projects around UX and fortunately at that time there was a big website redesign project that my department was responsible for. Whilst working on this project I suggested to my line manager the benefits of putting a team member through the UX Design Institute\u2019s Professional Diploma in UX Design<\/a> and I started the course in October 2021.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n\n I searched for a masters in UX and found one in Falmouth University, which was too far away and expensive. I kept searching and a couple of courses came up online and the UX Design Institute ranks high on Google, so I clicked on that. When I noticed that it was accredited by GCU, which was the university I was working for, I started asking around within the uni. <\/span><\/p>\n I spoke to someone within GCU\u2019s University to Business Education<\/a> school and they said that the course is fantastic, even though the course is based in Dublin they’ve got a really good career mentoring service. So, I was happy with that. When I read the reviews of the course, I had pretty much made up my mind.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n I\u2019ve got a design degree<\/a> and an MBA. My dissertation was a big task in itself but I enjoyed the research part of it. <\/span><\/p>\n But if I’m honest with you, it was more about gaining confidence and being able to talk to someone about UX with confidence. I can talk about design and content, but to have gone through a course and gained more knowledge around UX\u2026 it\u2019s the simplest of things.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n Like the simplest of UX examples would be when Colman talked about the user experience of pushing and pulling a door – It sounds totally simple but it\u2019s putting user experience into context and being able to explain that to stakeholders<\/span><\/p>\n It was pretty challenging. The good thing about the course is that it\u2019s at your own pace. You could always submit a project at the end of each month and I accepted that as a challenge for myself. It was comforting to know that if you missed a deadline, you could submit it within the month. Because it was funded through my work, I could allocate some time in my working day to watch some of the online learning videos.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n The course was really really thorough, which was amazing, but I do remember saying to my husband \u201cthere\u2019s a lot to do\u201d. However, there were big gains from it. I surprised myself by passing the projects! <\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n But I knew what I was doing was a benefit, so that’s why I put the time and the effort into it. With my two boys, it was a case of as soon as they went to bed, I was working on the laptop.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Yeah, you get the email saying that you\u2019ve passed and I was like, \u201cwow!\u201d\u00a0 For the last project I got a high percentage and I was like, \u201cNo way!\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n
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\n<\/span>Once I got that, I evolved from content production to user researcher with Skills Development Scotland<\/a>. I’m now in the service design department with three UX\/UI designers and we now have two user researchers.<\/span>
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\n<\/span><\/p>\nWhy did you want to get qualified in UX?<\/b><\/h3>\n
What research did you do into different UX courses?<\/b><\/h3>\n
You have a background in design but how did the course add to your existing expertise?<\/b><\/h3>\n
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\n<\/span>How did you find during the course work on top of your own employment and also having two small kids?<\/b><\/h3>\nDid this course help you build your confidence?<\/b><\/h3>\n
How did you find the experience of building your portfolio?\u00a0<\/b><\/h3>\n