User Experience (UX) Designer Skills Interview
Author:
Alycia Damp, PhD IRHRA UX Designer interview assessing key skills required for success. We've also included a few motivation and values questions to help you make the best decisions about your candidates.
Focus area:
Question
1
Why are you interested in making a career move to our company as User Experience Designer? How do you see this opportunity within the context of your career?
What does this question reveal?
Candidate exhibits fit and motivation to join the company
Explore tips
- Is seeking an opportunity to grow by applying and developing multiple skills
- Wants to make a defined impact on others and the organization’s success
- Is motivated to add value to the company's culture and work environment
- Is passionate when discussing how this connects with their strengths/interests
- Exhibits awareness of the role expectations and the organizational context
Question
2
Tell me about a product you've used that has an outstanding user experience. What makes it so great?
What does this question reveal?
Candidate has the ability to analyze UX and understand the criteria for a good user experience
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- Shows an awareness of the criteria that make a UX successful
- Identifies which elements of the product/app/website are done well
- Discusses key UX principles (usability, consistency, flexibility, etc.)
- Emphasizes the balance of user engagement and product purpose
- Connects UX to the success of the company or its business objectives
Question
3
Tell me about the most successful product design project you have participated in. How did you develop your designs in a way to optimize the user experience?
What does this question reveal?
Candidate has the ability to analyze and produce design content that centers around the user experience
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- Clearly describes the project and highlights their unique contributions
- Explains why the UX help made the product successful
- Speaks to their strengths in UX design and how they facilitated project success
- Emphasizes the role that design plays for facilitating engagement with products
- Shares tips and best practices for creating exceptional UX design
Question
4
When it comes to design thinking, where do you see others getting it wrong? How would you coach them to improve?
What does this question reveal?
Candidate has the ability to understand and apply the key principles of high quality design thinking
Explore tips
- Highlights design thinking elements (empathize, define, ideate, prototype, test)
- Conveys a valid understanding of errors one can make when using design thinking
- Suggests tools that can help someone improve their design thinking skills
- Suggests ways to identify performance improvements
- Highlights specific resources or exercises that hone design thinking skills
Question
5
How would you create user personas for our company?
What does this question reveal?
Candidate has the ability to apply design thinking process to create personas
Explore tips
- Engages in design thinking to create personas (empathize, ideate, define, test)
- Collects user information to understand motivations, behavior, mindset
- Analyzes user information and identify behavioural patterns to create personas
- Creates scenarios to understand user flow
- Creates detailed personas by considering many aspects of their character profile
Question
6
Imagine you and a product manager disagree on the placement of a certain feature on the website/app/product. What would you do in this scenario?
What does this question reveal?
Candidate has the ability to work effectively with the product team on task interdependencies
Explore tips
- Utilizes UX expertise to explain their preference for the placement of a feature
- Asks questions to understand the product manager's reason for the placement
- Clarifies objectives of the website/app/product and how feature achieves them
- Understands the PM might be motivated by business versus user objectives
- Ensures the conversation ends with a decision on how to move forward
Question
7
Talk me through some of the best working experiences you have had with other UX and product designers. What did you do to engage with them that made those experiences so great?
What does this question reveal?
Candidate has the ability to build successful and collaborative relationships with core team members
Explore tips
- Highlights great communication and open and honest working relationships
- Understands the professional strengths and weaknesses of other team members
- Communicates to achieve alignment on objectives/problems they are solving
- Engages in feedback loops to share and solicit feedback on others' work
- Shares key takeaways for successful collaboration within design teams
Question
8
Describe how you've conducted user research or usability testing in the past, and tell me about how your research added value to the final design?
What does this question reveal?
Candidate has the ability to effectively conduct and apply user research in the design process
Explore tips
- Describes a systematic approach for conducting user research/usability testing
- Focuses on understanding user behaviours, needs, and attitudes during research
- Explains how user research is integral for designing user-centric products
- Describes how their research informed designs and added value to the product
- Highlights best practices in user research and key learnings from experience
Question
9
Imagine you're asked to update the UX design of a certain feature in our [insert app/product/service]. How would you decide on whether it was necessary to conduct user research as you worked on the updates?
What does this question reveal?
Candidate has the ability to understand the role of user research in design and development
Explore tips
- Analyzes project context (development stage, incremental value of updates)
- Acknowledges user research is valuable at every stage of development
- Considers resources available and timeframe/urgency to inform decision
- Suggests different user research methods based on project constraints
Question
10
Imagine you are given an extensive list of specifications to prototype. With so much information, which key factors do you need to consider before you start creating your prototype?
What does this question reveal?
Candidate has the ability to apply a structured approach to develop prototypes from complex requests
Explore tips
- Defines and confirms the goal of the project (e.g. communication tool, testing)
- Identifies the key features/journey that will create the most value
- Communicate with client to clarify expectations for deliverable
- Understands their audience/who the prototype is being created for
- Identify what to prioritize and prioritize based on prototype objectives
Question
11
In the design development process, when might you skip the wireframe and go directly into the prototype? What are the advantages or disadvantages in doing so?
What does this question reveal?
Candidate understands the value of wireframing and prototyping in the design development
Explore tips
- Acknowledges the importance of wireframing in developing a product
- Considers prototyping when the user interactions are too complex
- Discusses wireframing advantages (inexpensive, quick to complete and iterate)
- Elaborates on how wireframing lowers the likelihood of finding errors and redesigning
- Acknowledges wireframing has limitations with unique and complex interfaces
Question
12
Imagine you are designing a mobile app for a retail store. At the checkout page, would you use a click or a swipe for placing an order? Why?
What does this question reveal?
Candidate has the ability to understand implications of user actions in interaction design
Explore tips
- Suggests either clicking or swiping and justifies claims
- Provides examples from other companies that use a click versus a swipe
- Highlights that swiping is a fast, intuitive, and natural for users
- Explains most users like to navigate mobile apps with one finger (i.e. thumb)
- Notes clicking allows users more time to think before placing an order
Question
13
Imagine you're working on redesigning an interactive feature that currently has complex and confusing navigation components. How would you approach this task and streamline the navigation elements for a seamless user journey?
What does this question reveal?
Candidate displays proficiency in building effective navigation elements in interaction designs
Explore tips
- Clarifies the key objectives for the page and user journey with stakeholders
- Considers new navigation menus with content/feature categories
- Considers breadcrumbs as a navigation aid to help the user navigate effectively
- Suggests using location indicators or pushpins to design a seamless user journey
- Shares any examples of past experience to justify claims or share learnings
Question
14
Based on your past work history and professional experience, in what type of work environment were you the happiest and most productive?
What does this question reveal?
Candidate shares preferences for organizational culture and workstyle aligned with your company
Explore tips
- Discusses attributes that align with your organization
- References different organizational factors (people, place, work, etc.)
- Highlights the values that shaped the environment/culture
- Shares a story from past experience to support their claims
- Justifies why it made them happy and productive
Question
15
What is one thing you wish I had asked you in our conversation today?
What does this question reveal?
Candidate displays self-awareness of unique strengths and value-add
Explore tips
- Gives a response that is relevant to the role in question
- Justifies their suggestion by explaining their value-add
- Exhibits strengths that were not previously covered
- Further demonstrates their value-add and competitiveness as a candidate
