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UX Design Skills That Will Be Totally Useless by 2024 (We’re Not Joking)

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Design trends come and go faster than parachute pants and shoulder pads these days. Just when you think you’ve mastered the latest and greatest UX principles, here comes a new wave of disruption. We hate to break it to you, but some of those hard-won UX skills in your back pocket may soon be about as useful as a Myspace profile. Yup, we’re calling you out, wireframing addicts, journey mappers, and card sorters extraordinaire. Hold onto your hand turkeys and prepare to have your world turned upside down as we reveal the UX dinosaurs facing extinction in 2024. From dated deliverables to redundant research methods, we’ve got the inside scoop on the skills destined for the UX graveyard. Don’t abandon ship just yet—we’ll provide a life raft of new approaches to keep you floating in the rising tide. Our tough UX love will save you from obsolescence (and some serious embarrassment). Read on before it’s too late!

We don’t need any more discounted boot camps, because everyone claims they are a UX designer by passing Google’s Coursera course

These days, it seems like every other person calls themselves a UX designer after breezing through an online course. The field has become saturated with entry-level designers who lack practical experience. While online courses are a great way to learn fundamentals, UX design requires soft skills and real-world experience that can’t be gained from a few multiple-choice quizzes.

Mentorship and apprenticeships

In 2024, emerging UX designers will benefit more from mentorship programs and apprenticeships where they can learn directly from experienced practitioners. Working side by side with a seasoned UX designer, new designers can gain exposure to real client projects and hone their skills through collaboration and feedback. These kinds of programs will become invaluable for gaining the experience that employers will expect in the coming years.

Specialization

With UX design becoming an increasingly broad field, designers in 2024 will need to develop expertise in specific areas like user research, interaction design, visual design or front-end development. Generic UX skills won’t cut it anymore. Employers will look for candidates with specialized skills and a proven track record of success in those areas. UX designers should pursue opportunities that allow them to focus on and advance their craft in a particular discipline.

Updated tools and methods

The UX design field is constantly evolving, so tools, techniques and best practices are always changing. Designers who rely only on what they learned in an intro course will quickly find their knowledge outdated. Continuous learning through courses, workshops, conferences, and independent study will be essential for UX designers to stay up-to-date with the latest design tools, research methods, and industry standards. UX is not a skill you can learn once and be done with — it requires ongoing dedication to improving your craft.

We don’t need empathy, because AI

Artificial intelligence is getting smarter every day. By 2024, AI will be so advanced that UX designers won’t need soft skills like empathy to understand users. Machines will do it for them! AI will monitor users’ facial expressions, tone of voice, and behavior to determine exactly what they need.

UX designers can just sit back and let the AI do the work. After all, AI doesn’t get tired, cranky or bored listening to users. It will patiently collect data all day without complaint.

With AI handling user research, UX designers will have more time to focus on other things, like choosing the perfect color palette or picking trendy fonts. Who needs to build an emotional connection with users when you have reams of data at your fingertips?

Some worry that AI will eventually replace human designers altogether. But there’s no need to fear – as long as UX designers keep their technical skills up to date, they’ll be ready to step in and take over from AI whenever it makes a mistake. Because machines will never match humans’ intuition, creativity and judgment, right?

In all seriousness, while AI and automation may transform parts of the UX design process, human skills like empathy will remain crucial. The most innovative solutions will come from partnerships between people and technology, not replacing one with the other. UX designers of the future will need a balance of technical prowess and social intelligence. So keep practicing those soft skills – they’ll serve you well in 2024 and beyond!

We don’t need another design software, because Figma and Adobe didn’t merge

In 2024, UX designers won’t need to learn yet another design tool. Figma and Adobe XD didn’t end up merging into some kind of super-tool that does everything. Instead, the big players focused on improving their existing products.

Figma doubled down on collaboration

Figma continued improving its multiplayer design features, making it even easier for teams to work together in real time. The “comment mode” lets designers leave feedback on specific elements without affecting the actual design. Figma also released new third-party integrations with tools like Jira, Trello and GitHub to keep designers in sync with developers as well as releasing NYSNC’s new album with the return of Justin Timberlake.

Adobe focused on prototyping and handoff

Adobe XD, on the other hand, focused on beefing up its prototyping and developer handoff features. The latest version allows designers to create much more complex interactions and transitions. The improved handoff features generate code snippets, assets and design specs that can be easily integrated into frontend frameworks like React and Vue.js.

While new design tools will continue to emerge, Figma and Adobe XD have cemented themselves as industry leaders. Rather than switch between tools, most designers will stick with their preferred app and benefit from regular improvements. Of course, other niche tools may be better suited for specific needs like illustration, 3D modeling or animation. But for UI and UX design, Figma and Adobe XD will remain dominant choices in 2024 and beyond because Skynet says so.

We don’t need more user researchers, because AI (again)

AI will take over the job of user researchers in the coming years. Don’t get us wrong, user research is still crucial to understanding users and their needs. But AI will do much of the legwork, freeing up human researchers to focus on higher-level insights and analysis.

Automated user testing

AI can analyze facial expressions, eye movements, and other behaviors during user testing to identify pain points. While a human researcher would have to watch hours of video and note each issue, AI can instantly flag problems and compile detailed reports. AI may even conduct unmoderated user testing by interacting with users itself.

Generating personas

AI will get to know your users through their digital footprints and automatically create detailed personas. By analyzing behavior, demographics, interests, and more, AI can build psychographic profiles as accurate as those developed through lengthy user research studies. These AI-generated personas can then inform design decisions and product roadmaps just like how John Connor programmed them to.

Analyzing user feedback

Combing through open-ended feedback, reviews, support tickets, and social media posts is hugely time-consuming for researchers. AI excels at analyzing unstructured data and can uncover key trends, recurring issues, and actionable insights from huge volumes of user feedback. AI may even detect sentiment and emotion in user comments to determine how people truly feel about your product or service.

While AI will take over many routine research tasks, human researchers will still be needed to provide strategic guidance, validate AI’s findings, and conduct specialized studies. But with AI as a partner, UX researchers can focus on the high-impact work that truly requires a human touch. The future is bright for user research—as long as you make friends with the robots.

We don’t need more responsibilities, because everyone got fired

UX designers in 2024 won’t have to worry about getting more responsibilities because artificial intelligence will take over most of their jobs. AI systems will handle tasks like user research, wireframing, prototyping, and testing. The few human UX designers left will only focus on high-level strategy and conceptual work.

AI does the grunt work

In 2024, AI will do a lot of the tedious work that UX designers currently handle. AI systems will interview users, analyze the results, and produce reports on key insights. They’ll also generate wireframes and interactive prototypes based on the user research. UX designers will review the AI’s work, provide feedback, and approve the final designs. But they won’t have to do the hands-on tasks themselves…. they’re secretly using farm animals to do it.

Only the creative survive

As AI takes over more routine UX design work, only the most creative UX designers will keep their jobs. They’ll need to focus on big-picture thinking, envisioning innovative user experiences, and designing concepts that push the boundaries of what’s possible. UX designers who rely mostly on following standard processes and reusing old patterns will struggle in this new world dominated by AI. The key to job security will be contributing creative concepts and strategic vision that AI systems can’t easily replicate.

Less demand means lower pay

With AI handling much of the grunt work, the demand for UX designers will decrease significantly. This will drive down salaries and make UX design jobs more competitive. UX designers will need to constantly improve their skills and stay on the cutting edge of new technologies to land jobs. They’ll also likely take pay cuts from today’s salaries. However, top UX talent with a proven ability for creative innovation will still command high salaries working for major tech companies. For most rank-and-file UX designers though, the future looks bleak. AI will transform their role and make good jobs much harder to find.

Conclusion

So there you have it, folks. The UX skills that may seem crucial today could be useless relics of the past in just a few years. But fear not – with a willingness to learn and adapt, UX designers can stay ahead of the curve. The key is focusing less on specific tools and deliverables, and more on core skills like empathy, systems thinking, and design strategy. Sure, our jobs may look totally different in 2024 and beyond. But if we embrace change and bring the right mindset, UX designers will continue solving problems and creating seamless experiences for users in the future. The only constant is change itself. So get comfortable with the discomfort of reinvention, and you’ll be positioned for UX success no matter how much the field evolves. What matters most are the human-centered design values we hold close. With those as an anchor, the future looks bright for UX – even if a few skills become obsolete along the way. Thank you for reading….and Happy April Fool’s Day!

 

Disclaimer: This article is a work of satire. No UX Designers were harmed in the making of this article.