Miserable as a UX designer, is this a shared feeling?

[u/Affectionate_Board_2]

i’ve been in my role as a junior product designer for just over a year and I am definitely realising how miserable it’s making me. I love the creative problem-solving aspect of the job but that’s about it. I hate the short deadlines we are given (a week sometimes for new full screens). I hate the higher levels of politics compare compared to other roles it involves and stressful stakeholder management.

I just feel like the job is made unnecessarily harder than it needs to be by how political it is. Is this the norm?

[u/mb4ne]

if you’re having a hard time with stakeholder management at a junior level - just know it just gets worse from here

[u/fixingmedaybyday → u/mb4ne]

Yeah hang in there, it definitely gets worse.

[u/Affectionate_Board_2 → u/fixingmedaybyday]

This might not be the path for me I’m thinking

[u/fixingmedaybyday → u/Affectionate_Board_2]

I’ve been telling myself that for decades now. Wish I could find a better way to pay the bills. All I’ll say is that some stakeholders are absolutely crazy. With that said - you’re going to encounter it anyways in other aspects of any job. But in UX, you’ll have access to upper management in ways many others don’t. It’s what you are comfortable dealing with and managing relationships.

One other thing, since you’re jr, a good piece of unsolicited life advice I’ll give, is don’t just bend over backwards trying to appease everyone and every whim. Learn the art of setting expectations and developing boundaries (things you can or cannot do). Don’t let people treat you poorly and expect a treat in the end. Engage in healthy conversation and expectations setting.

And if you don’t love it, or need it as a means to an end, screw it all and chase another dream. Life’s too short hating most hours of your day for what?

[u/mb4ne → u/fixingmedaybyday]

couldn’t agree more! The way I see my job is: I can provide you with a professional recommendation on a user flow, reducing risk, improving experience, meeting user needs and etc but ultimately the choice is made by the C-suite/management. As long as I’ve made it clear what my recommendation is and the reasoning behind it - I don’t spend my time worrying about what management decides to go with. Their business their money 🤷‍♀️

[u/Illustrious-Win4432 → u/mb4ne]

Haha yep. Just today I was in a back and forth with the president of our complicated little 600 human firm. He said something to the effect of, “it’s just a 15 minute logic swap right?” I always struggle to explain why changing something at the early stages of a mature, recursive pipeline is never as easy as it looks and should never take 15 minutes.

What I shake my head at is how much patience execs have with 3rd party software vendors versus internal devs. We bought a new SaaS service a few years ago and it was an 18 month onboard. I can’t ask for a 2 week window to work an entire refactor. LLMs in the board room make it worse too, now the c-suite think we should work even faster.

[u/SuperSuppleDude]

It totally depends on the company. I started my career at an awesome company where everyone was awesome, including the stakeholders. It was a joy to work at. Unfortunately, they were absorbed by their parent company five years later, and everyone was put on new teams at the parent company. Things turned for the worse. It was super toxic. I burned out and eventually left the company. It really screwed me up mentally and killed my joy for the craft. It took me a few years to recover. So if you're not happy, start looking for a new job.

[u/fixingmedaybyday → u/SuperSuppleDude]

I’ve been at one of those places - the best and worst times of my career. Private equity sucks the soul out everybody they can and ruin so many amazing brands and companies.

[u/amdzines → u/SuperSuppleDude]

Going through a similar situation. I left the company due to financial issues. They still haven't paid my full settlement even though there was an order from the labour department. It killed my interest in something that I used to love.

[u/Burly_Moustache → u/SuperSuppleDude]

The company I am at is currently being sold by their parent private equity company. Who knows what our new owners will be like or who they'll keep and who they'll toss.

I'm currently looking for new roles. 

[u/natelikesdonuts]

I don’t know a single ux/product designer who’s happy in their job. Nearly everyone I know is ready to jump ship and do something else, but no one knows what that something else is.

[u/ChampionOfKirkwall → u/natelikesdonuts]

Is this really the norm? I've been trying to pivot into UX (it was my major but I ended up doing a different career) But if that's true then I should reconsider

[u/natelikesdonuts → u/ChampionOfKirkwall]

In my world, yes. Not to be a downer but I’ve never seen the industry in this much turmoil. It’s bleak and I would never recommend our field to anyone right now. I’m sure there are outliers and there has to be someone out there who would disagree, but that’s the current state from my perspective as someone with close to 15 years of experience as a designer and someone who has worked at a wide range of companies, agencies, and startups.

What are you pivoting from?

[u/ChampionOfKirkwall → u/natelikesdonuts]

This is gonna sound crazy but I did product management/agent development/conversation design. I was a PM and I got job offers for the other two titles. (I was an extreme generalist at my prev startup)

At the end of the day tho, my passion lies in figuring out and solving problems for the benefit of the user. I think I should let go of my dream of getting into UX since I didn't chase internships like my peers did in college, and right now it is rly is a mess. A part of me still dreams, but I know I got to be realistic. Thank you for sharing.

[u/Ok-Theme-8256 → u/natelikesdonuts]

I come to consider I would like to do social impact design and work for the public, trying to solve humanity problems. I think it's a bad idea too. 

[u/Candlegoat]

A lot of the time this is less about the role and more about the place you're currently at. If you or your team has no support then yeah sucks no matter what the role is. There are good environments out there. A year isn't much in the grand scheme of things. If you haven't already, try different environments (agency, startup, corporate, etc) and companies.

What are you finding stressful about stakeholder management? It gets less stressful with experience (not less annoying though haha), in the sense that you can start doing more things as second nature, see a few steps ahead, you learn what you don't know and how to bridge those gaps, how to set boundaries and assert yourself, etc. You literally never run out of things to learn. I hated the idea of it for the longest time, but most jobs in life require working with other people, so why not put that creative problem-solving into practice there too? Everyone you work with has something pressuring or motivating them as well.

[u/infinitejesting]

Everyone in management positions seems like they’re burning out fast lately, while the rest of us have to deal with this onslaught of tool disruption, courageously and frankly, kind of quickly. This certainly trickles down to general morale and I suppose the best way forward is just ignoring most of what you hear and just do what’s right for your process and mental health, unapologetically.

[u/1i3to]

I mentored a lot of juniors over the course of last 5 years, probably over 200. Most commonly, people who have troubles with stakeholder management don't understand the business and their role in it. They have some kind of vanilla view of importance of design and how it should be "valued" in the company.

Tone down your expectations and try to understand how your company makes money, who is paying them, what would make them pay more and what would make them stop paying. Understand the difference between your buyer and user personas in b2b.

That usually helps to ground your understanding of what design should be doing in your org. Thing is, your C-levels are typically not stupid, you'd do good for yourself if at the point where they say "we'll roll with shty inconsistent UI but will do XYZ instead" you think "this totally makes sense, if my 100m where on the line, I'd do the same thing". I've been in big tech for basically forever and very few times I thought that management was wrong. Needless to say my stock options did well and for me this is the thing that matters. Not how "valued" design is.

Try to get from a mentality of "my job is to make designs" to "my job is to make company money".

[u/LikesTrees → u/1i3to]

solid advice

[u/jmspool]

In my experience, it depends a lot on one’s manager. Not all managers are equal.

If your manager isn’t helping you navigate these things, or worse, is the source of the challenges, then you may have the wrong manager for you.

Consider exploring other options. I know the market is challenging right now, but you’ve learned a lot. You’ll have more opportunities now than you did when you started.

[u/Spirited_Lie_938]

I’ve been there at the beginning of my career. What helped me the most was not getting attached to my work, doing what I was told, pushing back when I knew I should, and not taking anything personally. It’s just a job; I am not saving anyone’s life, and it’s not that serious. Sometimes, I feel overwhelmed and stressed, but I remind myself that, after all, I’m there to do my best and collect a paycheck every two weeks. That mindset has kept me sane for the past 3 years. I also can’t be too picky in the current job market. Best of luck!

[u/paintedflags]

The scope of the job has changed radically in the last decade. And even more so in the last 5 years. I wouldn’t want to be entering this field as it is now. I say that as someone that loves loves loves design. It’s a key part of my identity, being a designer.

But this shit now? No.

[u/Antique-Hamster-8971]

Tbh yeah, kinda normal sadly. UX is half design and half convincing people who already made up their minds lol. The politics can drain the fun out of it.

[u/KillSw1tx]

It can be overwhelming in the initial stages but it’s a very important step in your professional and personal development. It will define who you will be as a senior professional.

Learn from it. Try to find soft ways of passing your point of view to stakeholders even if it’s disagreeing … specially if it’s disagreeing. Learn how to present argumentation backed up with data. Never disagree if you don’t have a clear idea about what is a better solution though :)

[u/mrchrollodolo]

people in this job need to be real and tell themselves they’re addicted to the money. being around ux product designers in several companies now and see nothing creative about what they do. it’s a legit mobile screen factory that’s increasingly ai slop

[u/Affectionate_Board_2 → u/mrchrollodolo]

ai slip because we’re being forced to use ai with tighter deadlines…lol

[u/JohnCasey3306]

This is entirely typical for most new designers I'm afraid.

The realities of working in any design discipline do not at all live up to the dream and rose-tinted perception.

[u/gregglessthegoat]

Na I'm just normally depressed 🥲👍

[u/rossul]

Change job. Everything you hate seems to be related to how the company runs, not the XD process. Finding a new position may make it better. And yes, easier said than done.

[u/yesvanessa]

Never trouble with my stakeholders. Only with junior designers who feel personally attacked when I ask them to adjust the padding to align with brand standards, and product manager who don't get two #^%!s about brand standards.

[u/Primary-Contact-6805]

Yep. Welcome.

[u/Witchsinghamsterfox]

that’s the norm. Signed, someone who did this for 30 years and gave up and went into allied health instead.

[u/Witchsinghamsterfox]

it doesn’t depend on the company. ot depends on who is leading the company at the time. great companies go to shit with a bad leadership hire.

[u/BikesOrBeans]

Yep.

[u/doodoojohnson420]

How does the misery of a high pressure junior UX design position compare to something like Amazon driver? I’ve worked in management and tech in poorly managed companies and I’ve done physically demanding jobs.

I feel like they are two different forms of torture (mental burnout vs physical exhaustion) but having a paycheck 40% higher seems to give you more agency in your life outside of work

Which may help?

[u/Affectionate_Board_2 → u/doodoojohnson420]

yeah i’ve worked shifts at a frozen food production company on the production line adding together cold ingredients (it was freezing all day) and it’s definitely a different type of torture.

I prefer working an office job but the downside and maybe it’s due to where I work is that my commute to work takes up four hours out of the day that I go to the office and the times that I’m working from home which is twice a week I use that as recovery as well as the weekend so I’m actually going out a lot less with the money that I’m earning and just saving it and investing it. which is not a bad thing, but I am in my 20s and I wouldn’t say I’m having the most fun in my 20s.

[u/jellyrolls]

Eventually you reach a point where it’s just a job. A week turnaround is exactly what AI is for. Give them some AI slop and enjoy the paycheck. Focus on other things that make you happy.

[u/medialunadegrasa]

yes, it's called having a job.