Every decision we make affects the way real people experience our products. We've all heard the rallying cry for user-centered design, but even those of us who ascribe to that ideal often fall back on our own biases and instincts when it comes to making decisions about how people experience our content and our services. Sadly, this often means we make decisions we think will be good for our “users” - that anonymous, faceless crowd - rather than actually trying to understand the perspectives, surroundings, capabilities, and disadvantages of the actual people who we are here to serve. In this session, Aaron will explore why empathy is a good thing, how empathy empowers creativity, and how we, as a community, can inject more empathy into our work.

1. Designing
Empathywith
Aaron Gustafson
@AaronGustafson
adaptivewebdesign.info

2. Photo Credit: Stuck in Customs

3. Designing
Empathywith

4. Design ≠ Art _
Photo Credit: faith gobleImage Credit: L.e.e

5. Art serves the Artist
Photo Credit: Abby Lanes

6. I’ve been amazed at how
often those outside the
discipline of design assume
that what designers do is
decoration—likely because
so much bad design simply
is decoration. Good design
isn’t. Good design is
problem solving.”
– Jeffrey Veen
“

7. de·sign
/dəˈzīn/
To devise for a specific function or end
Classical: To indicate
Medieval Latin: designare, to mark out

8. David Carson
has been called
“the most
influential
graphic designer
of our times”
Photo Credit: © Marc Eckardt for FontShop, Berlin.

11. It was Art

12. It was Ego

13. subjective,
personal, and
self-indulgent”
Photo Credit: © Marc Eckardt for FontShop, Berlin.
“

14. Your ego is a
bad designer.”
– Christopher Butler
“

15. http://demo.northkingdom.com/ihuvudetpatoyota/index_en.html

16. http://demo.northkingdom.com/ihuvudetpatoyota/index_en.html

17. http://demo.northkingdom.com/ihuvudetpatoyota/index_en.html

20. Just because you can
doesn’t mean you should
Photo Credit: harald walker

21. Design
isn’t about
showing off
Photo Credit: Laurence & Annie

22. em·pa·thy
/ˈem-pə-thē/
From the Greek empathia meaning
“state of emotion”

23. em·pa·thy
/ˈem-pə-thē/
The action of understanding, being
aware of, being sensitive to, and
vicariously experiencing the feelings,
thoughts, and experience of another …
without having the feelings, thoughts,
and experience fully communicated in
an objectively explicit manner

24. Perspective
is everything
Photo Credit: ZeroOne

25. em·pa·thy
/ˈem-pə-thē/
The action of understanding, being
aware of, being sensitive to, and
vicariously experiencing the feelings,
thoughts, and experience of another …
without having the feelings, thoughts,
and experience fully communicated in
an objectively explicit manner

26. em·pa·thy
/ˈem-pə-thē/
The action of understanding, being
aware of, being sensitive to, and
vicariously experiencing the feelings,
thoughts, and experience of another …
without having the feelings, thoughts,
and experience fully communicated in
an objectively explicit manner
Also: the capacity for this

28. Photo Credit: Horia Varlan

29. Photo Credit: schoschie
Author appropriate content

30. Set a performance budget
Photo Credit: Gunnar Ries

31. Photo Credit: lastquest
Consider physical limitations

32. Photo Credit: andrechinn
Don’t create
unnecessary
barriers

33. Credit: XKCD
Don’t force
your agenda
on your
customers

34. Support common
assistive
technology
Credit: windsordi

35. What is hateful to you,
do not to your fellow
man. That is the entire
law; all the rest is
commentary.
–Judaism
Do unto others as you
would have them do
unto you.
–Christianity
No one of you is a
believer until he
desires for his brother
that which he desires
for himself.
–Islam
The Golden Rule
Hurt not others in
ways that you yourself
would find harmful.
–Buddhism

36. Progressive
Enhancement

37. [Progressive enhancement]
keeps the design open to
the possibilities of sexiness
in opportune contexts,
rather than starting with
the ‘whole’ experience that
must be compromised.”
– Ben Hoh
“

38. Egalitarianism
Equality of opportunity,
not equality of outcome

39. Designing
Empathywith

40. Designing with Empathy
by Aaron Gustafson
@AaronGustafson
Further reading:
http://is.gd/readlist_empathy
Slides available at
http://slideshare.net/AaronGustafson
This presentation is licensed under
Creative Commons
Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0
except where otherwise noted
flickr Photo Credits
http://www.flickr.com/photos/aarongustafson/galleries/72157633153882514/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/aarongustafson/galleries/72157633161513316/