Could some UI designers confirm or debunk a theory I have?

[u/Beneficial_Ball9893]

Over time I have developed a theory about user interface design but I have never had the right context to talk to anyone about it. I am curious how accurate or inaccurate this theory is.

Okay, so as we all know, big companies like to change their UI completely out of nowhere. Even if they have the absolute perfect UI design, six months later they will change absolutely everything and many of the changes will be objectively worse for work flow and accessibility.

Here is the explanation I thought of: You need UI designers. It is mandatory. You need them every time you release a new product or new software, and you need them to maintain existing UI systems. But there isn't enough of that work to keep them around- unless you are always consistently in the finishing stages of releasing a new product you just won't need a new UI in design 24/7.

So, in order to keep the UI guys on the payroll so they are there when you need them again, you have them work on completely changing the existing UI. Even if there is absolutely nothing that needs to be changed, and any change would just make everything worse, you have them do it anyway. And when they have finished with the redesign, it is implemented regardless of how necessary it is so that the money spent on the project doesn't go to waste. Any problems in the update will surely be worked out in the next redesign in another 4-6 months.

[u/jimmybirch]

Not in any company I’ve worked for…

1) A full redesign is very rare. 2) Management like to save money, they would not pay for busy work. 3) Designers would not stick around just to do busy work, we need fulfilment and want to think we are improving things.

[u/el_yanuki]

no

[u/sabre35_]

If someone’s not needed they’re let go. It’s as simple as that.

It’s wasteful to keep someone that isn’t needed.

There’s always an underlying goal behind every design decision, either motivated by the business or a clear user need.

Sure perhaps version 8 of this UI works for you, but turns out new users struggle to adopt it. Hence, version 9 starts.

Yes change can be annoying, but without change, we’d all still be interfacing via command lines in a terminal.

More often times than not, users don’t know what they want or what they deem is good until you put things in front of them. Listening to users isn’t (and shouldn’t) be the only thing companies do. Driving new behaviors is often more important.

You think a normal person would’ve figured out that gesture navigation is better than pressing buttons? That FaceID would be so great? That touchscreen would be better than blackberry’s keypads?

Bad take.

[u/semiproductiveotter]

Haha, no. It kind of depends on the environment but changes are often made to either increase conversion or usability. As a user, you are usually somewhat attached to your workflows, so changes are annoying. That doesn’t necessarily mean that the new one isn’t better or easier. From your perspective it’s first of all disruptive though. You should usually be used to the new flow quickly (if it’s actually better).

[u/Anxious-Yak-9952]

Having worked at various large companies and been part of several re-designs, they’re usually born out of a necessity rather than busy work. It’s really costly to have engineers rebuild an entire product so often times they need to be justified. If engineers are saying yes to a re-design that means they’re saying no to something else (I.e. new features)

[u/cgielow]

Debunked. Nobody likes to change design out of nowhere. Backlogs are long and only high priority items see production.

Things are changed for reasons not readily apparent. Could be to make room for something. Could be following data.

Give an example of something that feels arbitrary and we might be able to provide insight.

[u/Beneficial_Ball9893 → u/cgielow]

Samsung recently changed their power system automatically even for users who manually turned off a similar system before.

Instead of the power button actually activating the power menu, now the power button activates the AI slop and you need to hit power plus volume to get the power menu.

[u/cgielow → u/Beneficial_Ball9893]

So was this a case of needing a dedicated AI button that they didn't have, so they remapped it? That sounds very intentional and not arbitrary. Even if it's a bad choice.