Introverted UIUX Designers

Careers & Mentoring
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#1

Hai everyone, I am Niko Prianto from Indonesia. I work as junior UI/UX designer at a pretty huge company in Indonesia, and everyday i get to work with a lots of colleagues and personalities, arranged meeting with a lot of stakeholder and more personalities mixed in. Because of the company’s huge scale, I need to handle about 4-5 projects at a time. And sometimes, working with a lot of strangers can be overwhelming for an introverted person like me haha. Sometimes, I just don’t know how to connect with stakeholders or my colleagues. But I really want to get better at this because it’s a part of the job.

Can anyone shares their perspective or experience on this “introvert skin” side of this job?

Thanks in advance!

#2

You can work with anachronistic methods like surveys, that don’t need talking. Give them room to express themselves digitally with tools you find that collect data the way you want.

#3

like figjam, miro, or any other whiteboarding tools?

#4

Yes, definitely. How’s talking on the phone or with stuff like zoom? Sometimes it’s really important for follow up questions and the like.

If you have a survey, leave some place for your stakeholders to express themselves. I did surveys like this and they work great :+1:

#5

thanks for the advice Marco! Surveys really helps yah because we have enough prep time to prepare the list of questions we want to ask, and process the feedbacks for the next step of research

yeah i guess i’m having psychological bias where I only comfortable working, talking and doing interview with people that similar to myself. I think it’s called implicit bias if I’m not wrong. I think it’s important for the job that i need to overcome that bias

#6

Hey Niko!

I can relate. I work as a senior UX designer/Researcher at a major consultant agency where I am involved in 3-6 inhouse projects at a time with different clients and stakeholders, and with different internal project managers, designer and developers. I share an office with ~60 collegues and we are around 8000 employees in total.

I also happen to introverted and somewhat awkward and uncomfortable around people, partially explained by the fact that I have an autism spectrum disorder diagnosis. I think it is of great importance to allow oneself to be comfortable with being uncomfortable. I love talking to users and stakeholders, getting to know the problems and contexts, but as soon as the workshop is over I’m done. I don’t push myself to engage in small talk just because I feel I should, and I rarely have a genuine interest in the people I work with. Not with my clients and not with my collegues.

The things I learn about the people I interview are just data really, even when I strongly empathize; attributes and behaviours I describe and put in a document and use to draw conclusions about possible solutions to thier problems. I do not care about these people, and I do not feel bad that I don’t.

In order for you to do your job, you don’t have to connect to and make an effort to get to know the people you work with. You only need to understand them in their roles and their contexts, and understand their problems. As long as you are passionate about research, design and problem solving, and this shows, no one will (should) require that you also make an effort to be talkative or popular. Just do your job well, and be the awkward genius. That being said, some of the best friends I have are people I’ve met through work, I just don’t expect to find them there.

Hope this helps, what you are describing should not have to be a hindrance in your professional capacity.

3 Likes
#7

Hi! I can relate it too. You have to practice these situations, and over time you became better in this. Presentation and communication skills is pretty important in the field, but it could be developed. And spend more time with yourself. :slight_smile:
In your freetime try activities that could reload your energies. Spending some time alone is always helps me.

#8

I find user interviews quite intense. I recently started working with a UI designer tag teaming and found it more enjoyable and less intense.

In getting to know people you work with, you need to know what makes them tick, what will catch their interest. I am working with a team in a project that extends a larger one we’ve worked on and I knew from past conversations what the key interests for them would be, so I focused on those aspects in the project kick-off. Also you have to be sure that introvertedness doesn’t get mistaken for lack of confidence.

#9

thanks for your advice!! appreciate it :grin:

but in order to know people’s interest we need to make effort first engaging conversation with them right? the tough part is to assess user’s thought and interest. sometimes it can be awkward when conducting user interviews haha because we barely know them…

yeah i think I’m also struggle on the shy part, cause like you said, i’m also lacking of confidence

1 Like
#10

I’m in the same boat. My last sentence was relating to perception others may have of you rather than any actual attributes you may have. I have learnt to put on a front of extravert confidence that helps me a large part of the time.

I have had to run a fair few roundtables, workshops, presentations and even recently a company wide talk about neurodivergence. 10-20 years ago, i would have mumbled through but practice really does make perfect as they say it does.

#11

yeah guess you were right then… It’s my choice to dive in this industry, and I got to fight harder as always… thanks for ur advice Rachel!! its an eye opening one

It’s my commitment being put to a test

1 Like
#12

Interesting topic

#13

Thanks for this interesting solution!

#14

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#15

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#16

A really good topic! I’m also quite introverted and I feel that it has let me down in job interviews, presentations etc. it’s a shame that this could also hold you back, especially in such a competitive jobs market.

I was listening to a podcast from Bonanza Design in Berlin, and they recently had a discussion on this topic, and made the very good point that employers should be more open minded about hiring introverted designers, and in fact they can often be more thoughtful and empathetic, very important traits in product design.

Of course with practice, as an introverted person, I’m sure that I can improve and become more confident in certain situations, especially when communicating ideas in a team. However, I don’t think that being introverted should ever be considered a weakness. It just means you have a different POV from more extroverted designers. Maybe a combination of these kinds of designers would make an excellent team. Thoughts?