Pivoting into UX design

If you're completely new to UX, you need to devote time to learn about UX and design in general.

In no particular order, I think you should:

Find a good curriculum to follow

I vividly remember not knowing where to start when I was pivoting into UX, but I knew that other universities offered whole degrees on UX design and HCI, so there were syllabi for 101 classes out there somewhere.

I would recommend Google searching for UX syllabi at universities like USC, CMU, UCSD, etc. Here's also an are.na channel full of design school syllabi.

To this day I still have a folder on my laptop called syllabi that's just syllabi from classes that I never got to attend, including classes at my own university.

Sketch your ideas out

Assuming that you have no background in design at all, it'll take a bit for you to start getting used to designing with software.

You might not be able to make something look pretty or how you want it to in Figma or Photoshop or whatever software you're working in, but physical sketching bridges that gap in the meantime.

Sketching is also an increasingly rare (and highly valued!) skill.

Here's a great video of Raphael Schaad, founder of Cron (acquired by Notion as Notion Calendar) talking through his sketching process, as well as his 2024 Config talk.

It's important to not just sketch, but sketch a lot. The idea is that sketching more makes you less attached to what you're creating, which is often the problem with newer designers.

Your sketches are not supposed to be pieces of art. You have to get used to compromising, iterating, changing fast. If there are any that you're particularly attached to, write out the reason.

Learn Figma

Figma is by far the industry leader in design software.

It's incredibly important that you know how to use it well to get your ideas across. This includes familiarity with both Figma itself as well as FigJam, which is used for low-fidelity brainstorming and flow mapping.

Nobody expects you to become a Figma whiz in a month, but the quicker you get used to using shortcuts, the more effective you'll be at (ironically enough) reducing the so-called "fidelity gap" — i.e. the time it takes for you to most accurately replicate the idea you have in your mind into pixels on the screen.

Read books and listen to podcasts

Self-explanatory, but you need to have a good grasp of what UX theory is and how it's been outlined. Don Norman's The Design of Everyday Things is basically considered the design bible, and it's a good starting point.

Design and UX isn't just about making things look pretty—this can take a long while to fully grasp.

As a starting point, I'd also recommend Jon Yablonski's Laws of UX website (I printed them out as posters and put them on my wall in college) and Nielsen Norman Group's Usability 101 & 10 Usability Heuristics for User Interface Design.

You don't have to memorise these per se, but taking notes on these and having them in the back of your mind is a great resource.

Understand the basics of visual and graphic design

I know I just said that design isn't just about making things look pretty, but knowing how to make things look pretty is vital — not just for your design education, but also for getting a job (and doing that job well, lol).

Start taking more notice of the visual design that surrounds you in day to day life, both on- and off-screen.

Go into a bookshop or library and take photos of the covers that you like the most. Take photos of the covers that you don't like.

Write out the reasons why you like and don't like them. Is it the fonts? The colours? The hierarchy?

Learn how to effectively word your reasoning. This is essential to learning how to critique design, and how to communicate with other designers when giving feedback.

If there's one that you particularly like, try recreating it as well as you can in Figma.

Sidenote / hot take: a huge pet peeve of mine is when people use the word "clean" to describe graphics. I get that you think it looks good, but why is it clean to you? If the only thing you can say about why something looks good is that it's "clean" then maybe it's not that clean?

The best way to get better at visual design is to cultivate your design taste, which is similar to cultivating any other sort of taste — through exposure.

are.na is a great way of finding beautiful things, as well as Fonts in Use, the editorial platform It's Nice That, BP&O, and Twitter, which segues well into the next section.

Join Twitter / Bluesky and follow prominent members of the online design community

It's really, really, really important to stay up to date with what's happening in the design world. I think Twitter & Bluesky remain the most relevant platforms to do so.

You don't have to post anything right off the bat.

Hopefully your reading list helps inform your first few follows, and from there you can check who they're following/interacting with frequently, and build a decent list for yourself that keeps you up to date with what's going on.

As someone who's been in more of a niche industry (i.e. games), this is also a great way to get to know (of) people who are leading the discourse and innovating.

It's also a good vibe check for certain company cultures.