Be honest: product UX rule
A lesson in honesty that’s now become one of my core product rules.
One of my great life lessons came from my old boss, Dave. His test on honesty helped me become a more sincere product designer.
“Honesty is the best policy.” — Benjamin Franklin
Honesty should be a given, but many people hide behind barriers or are not fully transparent when it comes to being honest.
Sometimes it’s a selfish act that benefits themselves or someone over someone else.
Other times it’s because they don’t want the truth to get out — hiding secrets under lifelong pressure to release them.
I believe that doing good things opens doors, but doing bad things ALWAYS comes back to bite you!
“Being honest may not get you a lot of friends but it’ll always get you the right ones.” — John Lennon
The Lesson
One summer, I worked across the pond in Lake George, NY, America. In a music shop, selling bootleg CDs and band merchandise; amongst other brightly coloured things — even tie-dye tees! (who even buys them?).
My American boss, Dave (he looked like Jerry Garcia from the Grateful Dead), had this little test he’d play on new employees — I obviously didn’t know this at the time.
The end of our shift came, and we were both clearing up; Dave had unbeknown to me placed a $100 note on the floor right next to the till I’d been working at — a hair’s breadth away.
“Check if I’ve left anything behind? Before we make our way home.” Dave asked.
I looked around and noticed a $100 note staring up at me from the floor; without even thinking, I walked over to Dave and handed it straight back to him and said, “You must have dropped this?”
He thanked me, and that was that. Nothing more was ever said of the test. Nothing! Not even after a few rounds of Samuel Adams!
I mentioned this test to a colleague the very next day, and she said, “it’s Dave’s way of testing honesty, and you passed! He can now trust you… well done!”
A cunning test that was important to Dave, his way to gauge new employees; his honesty system — dangling a $100 note in front of someone and observing what they do!
Will they pocket the note? Or hand it back? Who could he trust? — his very own qualitative research session.
It NEVER even entered my mind to pocket the $100 note; just hand it straight back to Dave. He was the one who’d given me a summer job after all — who would I be to misuse his trust in me?
The Takeaway
It made sense for Dave to run his live test with me that evening; ‘Dave’s Honesty System’ will have, without doubt, weeded out many dishonest employees over the years — helping remove all the bad apples! Thankfully I passed the test… I’d proven I was one of the good ones!
Honesty is transferable; it’s an admirable quality. It’s both practical and moral.
User Experience is no different. We ALWAYS need to be completely honest with our designs — don’t design no lies!
Dieter Ram’s 6th ‘Principle for Good Design’, states:
6. Good design is honest
It does not make a product more innovative, powerful or valuable than it really is. It does not attempt to manipulate the consumer with promises that cannot be kept.
Design should be HONEST! It shouldn’t manipulate, and it shouldn’t over-promise, and messages need to be fully transparent!
Let the advertisers sell the lies and retire to HELL! Freeing up more room for us UXers at Club Tropicana!
Dave had many reasons for using his ‘Honesty System’, so we should have our reasons to make our designs more honest:
We NEED to follow Design Ethics.
We NEED to avoid Dark Patterns that deceive users.
We NEED to be HONEST with our users.
We NEED to design HONEST products.
We NEED to design NO lies!
Thank you, Dave, for your honesty test that got me thinking way back then and still believing honesty is the best policy — it is!
‘Good design is honest’, and ‘good people are honest’— both go hand in hand.
“Good design begins with honesty, asks tough questions, comes from collaboration and from trusting your intuition.” — Freeman Thomas
References
- Design Ethics.
https://www.encyclopedia.com/science/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/design-ethics - Dark Patterns.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_pattern - 10 Principles of Good Design. Dieter Rams.
https://blog.flipsnack.com/10-principles-of-good-design/
Knowledge is power.
So keep learning, keep preparing, and keep listening.
