A Guide to UX Careers

A GUIDE TO UX CAREERS ONWARD, search PRESENTED BY User Experience is one of the fastest growing and most exciting segments in the interactive industry. This guide provides essential information on the different career opportunities within UX, national benchmarks for UX salaries, the hottest metro areas for UX jobs, and tools of the trade for UX professionals. JOB OPPORTUNITIES FOR UX PROFESSIONALS USER RESEARCH USABILITY ANALYST INFORMATION ARCHITECT INTERACTION DESIGNER VISUAL DESIGNER UX DESIGNER Visual Designers turn wireframes/prototypes into visual designs that are both user friendly and adhere to brand guide- lines. They rely on keen understanding of graphical research, feedback, analysis, elements, style guides, User Experience Designers are often jacks of all trades within the user centered Information Architects User Researchers provide a deep understanding and insight of user behavior, needs and motivations. Interaction Designers draw upon user data, research and team input to generate interaction Usability Analysts apply user research & usability principles to identify usability problems. They help ensure usability goals are met by identi- fying project objectives, evaluating the success of studies, and measuring focus on scoping, building and optimizing how information is organized design process. Their role centers on creating success- ful user experiences through JOB They offer feedback in all and presented to users. They develop thorough, realistic plans that support organizational user experience objec- concepts that enable seamless, fluid, relevant phases of the design process from project conception, to implemen- tation, to development. DESCRIPTION and engaging experi- ences for users. testing and best practices. brand standards and outcomes. tives. design systems. • Conduct user and task • Investigate and resolve user experience issues through evaluation and testing • Effectively improve upon • Create wireframes, process maps, functional specifications, prototypes • Participate in the • Drive the development and • Create engaging, usable, and effective visual design analyses to identify creation of rapid proto- communication of the user types to illustrate a service or application opportunities improve design process for a given project • Participate in the research, solutions to achieve user JOB centered goals user experience Synthesize research RESPONSIBILITES findings into meaningful and other artifacts to describe the intended • Cooperate with visual designers to solve prob- • Validate the effective- ness of designs through research and usability user experience • Apply user personas and scenarios to develop relevant process and user flow models and communicate action- recommendations and actionable results able insights that materi- ally improve the customer experience analysis, development, and testing phases of the design lems and create full design solutions om projects studies process $130K $120K $110K S SALARY $100K $90K $80K $60K $80k - $117k $66k - $127k $80k - $126k $74k - $115k $60k - $97k $73k - $110k Salary data was compiled from multiple sources including internal data, 3rd party figures, and publicly available information. WHERE ARE THE UX JOBS? New York, New York San Francisco, California Atlanta, Georgia Chicago, Illinois San Jose, California Seattle, Washington Boston, Massachusetts Los Angeles, California Charlotte, North Carolina 10 Washington, DC Dallas, Texas | 12 San Diego, California 13 Austin, Texas 14 Columbus, Ohio 15 Minneapolis, Minnesota 16 Irvine, California 17 Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 18 Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19 Plano, Texas 20 Saint Louis, Missouri City rankings are based on UX job openings as listed on SimplyHired.com. PROJECTS THAT DRIVE DEMAND FOR UX PROFESSIONALS Banners Public Websites Mobile CLIENT-SIDE (1os, Android, WeboS) APPLICATIONS ADVERTISING Social Networking Email Campaigns WEB BASED Intranet / Web Apps eCommerce Sites Video Games Other Devices DRIVING ENGAGEMENT (e-readers, GPS, etc.) Shopping Carts Landing Pages Dating Sites Surveys BREAKDOWN OF UX JOB TITLES 24t% 23% INTERACTION VISUAL DESIGNER DESIGNER UX 26% 18% INFORMATION UX ARCHITECT DESIGNER USABILITY USER 6" 2% ANALYST RESEARCH Percentages represent the breakdown of UX job postings by Onward Search using Recruitics technology. SKILL SET OF A UX PROFESSIONAL MUST KNOW TOOLS OF THE TRADE 20 40 60 80 100 Claimed skills Markup, e.g., HTML, XHTML, XML 87% CSS coding as % Page layout, interface design 78% Image editing and production 64% Front-end programming, e.g., JavaScript 61% Information architecture, wireframing, sitemapping 61% Usability testing/knowledge s7% Graphic design 56% Back-end development, e.g., PHP, Ruby on Rails, ASP 55% Project management 51% Writing, editing 42% Findability/search engine optimization/search engine marketing 41% Accessibility testing/knowledge 39% Other 8% This data was taken from A LIST APART's "Survey for People Who Make Websites." While the survey included UX professionals, web designers, and web developers, we believe these skills are representative of the UX community at large. UX TOOLS OF THE TRADE RESEARCH DESIGN TOOLS PROTOTYPING PollDaddy OmniGraffle Adobe Fireworks Usabilla Visio HotGloo Morae Axure Justinmind Prototyper Feedback Army Balsamiq Mockups iPlotz Crazy Egg Mockingbird fluidIA Webnotes Wirify CogTool Silverback Mock Flow Lumzy Flip Camera Power Mockup The Pencil Project App Sketcher UX Pin Camtasia Studio Pattern Tap UserZoom Cacoo Google Website Optimizer Gliffy Pidoco Google Analytics Paper Sketching Paper Prototyping VIEW CURRENTLY AVAILABLE UX JOBS THROUGH ONWARD SEARCH... presented by: ONWARDSEARCH.COM/UXJOBS ONWARD, search Or contact your local office at onwardsearch.com/locations