Clara Kliman-Silver: AI & design: imagining the future of UX
In the last few years, the influence of AI has steadily been expanding into various aspects of design. In early 2023, that expansion exploded. AI tools and features are now everywhere, and there are two ways designers commonly react to it:
With enthusiasm for how they can use it to make their jobs easier
With skepticism over how reliable it is, or even fear that it could replace their jobs
Google UX researcher Clara Kliman-Silver is at the forefront of researching and understanding the potential impact of AI on design into the future. This is a hot topic that’s on the radar of many designers as they grapple with what the new normal is, and how it will change things in the coming years.
Clara’s background
Clara Kliman-Silver spends her time studying design teams and systems, UX tools and designer-developer collaboration. She’s a specialist in participatory design and uses generative methods to investigate workflows, understand designer-developer experiences, and imagine ways to create UIs. In this work, Clara looks at how technology can be leveraged to help people make things, and do it more efficiently than they currently are.
In today’s context, that puts generative AI and machine learning right in her line of sight. The way this technology has boomed in recent times has many people scrambling to catch up - to identify the biggest opportunities and to understand the risks that come with it. Clara is a leader in assessing the implications of AI. She analyzes both the technology itself and the way people feel about it to forecast what it will mean into the future.
What role should artificial intelligence play in UX design process? 🤔
Clara’s expertise in understanding the role of AI in design comes from significant research and analysis of how the technology is being used currently and how industry experts feel about it. AI is everywhere in today’s world, from home devices to tech platforms and specific tools for various industries. In many cases, AI automation is used for productivity, where it can speed up processes with subtle, easy to use applications.
As mentioned above, the transformational capabilities of AI are met with equal parts of enthusiasm and skepticism. The way people use AI, and how they feel about it is important, because users need to be comfortable implementing the technology in order for it to make a difference. The question of what value AI brings to the design process is ongoing. On one hand, AI can help increase efficiency for systems and processes. On the other hand, it can exacerbate problems if the user's intentions are misunderstood.
Access for all 🦾
There’s no doubt that AI tools enable novices to perform tasks that, in years gone by, required a high level of expertise. For example, film editing was previously a manual task, where people would literally cut rolls of film and splice them together on a reel. It was something only a trained editor could do. Now, anyone with a smartphone has access to iMovie or a similar app, and they can edit film in seconds.
For film experts, digital technology allows them to speed up tedious tasks and focus on more sophisticated aspects of their work. Clara hypothesizes that AI is particularly valuable when it automates mundane tasks. AI enables more individuals to leverage digital technologies without requiring specialist training. Thus, AI has shifted the landscape of what it means to be an “expert” in a field. Expertise is about more than being able to simply do something - it includes having the knowledge and experience to do it for an informed reason.
Research and testing 🔬
Clara performs a lot of concept testing, which involves recognizing the perceived value of an approach or method. Concept testing helps in scenarios where a solution may not address a problem or where the real problem is difficult to identify. In a recent survey, Clara describes two predominant benefits designers experienced from AI:
Efficiency. Not only does AI expedite the problem solving process, it can also help efficiently identify problems.
Innovation. Generative AI can innovate on its own, developing ideas that designers themselves may not have thought of.
The design partnership 🤝🏽
Overall, Clara says UX designers tend to see AI as a creative partner. However, most users don’t yet trust AI enough to give it complete agency over the work it’s used for. The level of trust designers have exists on a continuum, where it depends on the nature of the work and the context of what they’re aiming to accomplish. Other factors such as where the tech comes from, who curated it and who’s training the model also influences trust. For now, AI is largely seen as a valued tool, and there is cautious optimism and tentative acceptance for its application.
Why it matters 💡
AI presents as potentially one of the biggest game-changers to how people work in our generation. Although AI has widespread applications across sectors and systems, there are still many questions about it. In the design world, systems like DALL-E allow people to create AI-generated imagery, and auto layout in various tools allows designers to iterate more quickly and efficiently.
Like many other industries, designers are wondering where AI might go in the future and what it might look like. The answer to these questions has very real implications for the future of design jobs and whether they will exist. In practice, Clara describes the current mood towards AI as existing on a continuum between adherence and innovation:
Adherence is about how AI helps designers follow best practice
Innovation is at the other end of the spectrum, and involves using AI to figure out what’s possible
The current environment is extremely subjective, and there’s no agreed best practice. This makes it difficult to recommend a certain approach to adopting AI and creating permanent systems around it. Both the technology and the sentiment around it will evolve through time, and it’s something designers, like all people, will need to maintain good awareness of.
At Optimal Workshop, we're dedicated to building the best user research platform to empower you with the tools to better understand your customers and create intuitive digital experiences. We're thrilled to announce some game-changing updates and new products that are on the horizon to help elevate the way you gather insights and keep customers at the heart of everything you do.
What’s new…
Integration with Figma 🚀
Last month, we joined forces with design powerhouse Figma to launch our integration. You can import images from Figma into Chalkmark (our click-testing tool) in just a few clicks, streamlining your workflows and getting insights to make decisions based on data not hunches and opinions.
What’s coming next…
Session Replays 🧑💻
With session replay you can focus on other tasks while Optimal Workshop automatically captures card sort sessions for you to watch in your own time. Gain valuable insights into how participants engage and interpret a card sort without the hassle of running moderated sessions. The first iteration of session replays captures the study interactions, and will not include audio or face recording, but this is something we are exploring for future iterations. Session replays will be available in tree testing and click-testing later in 2024.
Reframer Transcripts 🔍
Say goodbye to juggling note-taking and hello to more efficient ways of working with Transcripts! We're continuing to add more capability to Reframer, our qualitative research tool, to now include the importing of interview transcripts. Save time, reduce human errors and oversights by importing transcripts, tagging and analyzing observations all within Reframer. We’re committed to build on transcripts with video and audio transcription capability in the future, we’ll keep you in the loop and when to expect those releases.
Prototype testing 🧪
The team is fizzing to be working on a new Prototype testing product designed to expand your research methods and help test prototypes easily from the Optimal Workshop platform. Testing prototypes early and often is an important step in the design process, saving you time and money before you invest too heavily in the build. We are working with customers and on delivering the first iteration of this exciting new product. Stay tuned for Prototypes coming in the second quarter of 2024.
Workspaces 🎉
Making Optimal Workshop easier for large organizations to manage teams and collaborate more effectively on projects is a big focus for 2024. Workspaces are the first step towards empowering organizations to better manage multiple teams with projects. Projects will allow greater flexibility on who can see what, encouraging working in the open and collaboration alongside the ability to make projects private. The privacy feature is available on Enterprise plans.
Questions upgrade❓
Our survey product Questions is in for a glow up in 2024 💅. The team are enjoying working with customers, collecting and reviewing feedback on how to improve Questions and will be sharing more on this in the coming months.
Help us build a better Optimal Workshop
We are looking for new customers to join our research panel to help influence product development. From time to time, you’ll be invited to join us for interviews or surveys, and you’ll be rewarded for your time with a thank-you gift. If you’d like to join the team, email product@optimalworkshop.com
It’s no secret - New Zealand has a diversity problem in design and technology.
Throughout her career, Sachi often felt like the odd one out - the only woman, the only Pasifika person, the one who laughed too loud, the one who looked different and sounded different. But as a leader, Sachi has been able to create change.
Sachi Taulelei, Head of Design, ANZ, recently spoke at UX New Zealand, the leading UX and IA conference in New Zealand hosted by Optimal Workshop, on how she is building a diverse team of designers at New Zealand’s largest bank.
In her talk, Sachi shares the challenges she’s faced as a Pasifika woman in design and technology; and how this has shaped her approach to leadership and her drive to create inclusive environments where individuals and teams thrive.
Background on Sachi Taulelei
Sachi is a creative strategist, a design leader, and a recovering people pleaser. She has worked in digital and design for over 25 years, spending most of her career creating and designing digital experiences centered on people.
As a proud Pasifika woman, she has a particular interest in diversity, equity, and inclusion. She has spoken out about the need for more diversity within design and technology and the impact it can have on the technology we create.
Sachi is passionate about giving back - when she's not running after her two kids, you'll find her mentoring Pasifika youth, cheering on young leaders through the Young Enterprise Scheme, judging awards for Women in AI, or volunteering at the local hospice.
Odd one out: embracing diversity in design and technology ✨
Looking and sounding different from her peers, Sachi always felt like she was trying to find her place in the office. She always felt like she didn’t belong.
Sachi has experienced all forms of racism and discrimination as a result of her heritage. These experiences aren’t spoken about and often go unnoticed by the majority. She has held equivalent jobs to male counterparts but received lower pay, and was advised to change her name from Sachi to Sacha on her job applications to improve her chances.
Sachi’s response was to work hard and become great at what she does, which was recognized over time. Slowly, she began to rise through the ranks. However, having reached leadership roles, she struggled to be heard and participate, without knowing why. The advice was given freely by managers to “stick at it”, to “grow thicker skin”, and to grow through the “school of hard knocks”. Although this advice worked at face value and she flourished, Sachi began to feel like a fraud and constantly second-guessing herself. She began to “edit” herself to fit into an acceptable mold and, in doing so, felt like she lost part of who she was.
What is success? 🏆🎯💎
Success often comes in the form of our leaders who have already climbed the mountains of achievement. When you see success in this way, as someone who doesn’t fit the mold, there is pressure to conform to get ahead. Using the same tools and advice given to these leaders, she realized, would actually hold her back.
Realizing true value through our uniqueness 🪐🦋
Sachi recounts the treatment of Japanese-American citizens in the U.S. in the years following Pearl Harbour, where Japanese-American citizens were moved to concentration camps. This happened despite an official report finding conclusively that there was no threat from this population. Even though Germany and Italy were also at war with the U.S., for example, citizens with Italian and German heritage were not treated this way. This caused immeasurable pain, shame, and fear for the victims, and fostered a head-down, work-hard mentality in order to try and forget the treatment they received. This attitude, Sachi believes, was passed down to her from her ancestors who experienced that reality. Sachi explains that while there are many things that can hold someone back in life, creating meaningful change starts with introspection. Often, that requires us to work through fear and shame.
Reflecting on her heritage, which is part Samoan and part Japanese, Sachi started to embrace her unique traits. In her case, she embraced the deep empathy and human compassion from her Japanese side and the deep sense of community and connection from her Samoan side. Her uniqueness is something to celebrate, not to hide behind.
Becoming a leader and realizing this, Sachi wanted to create a team culture based on equity, openness, and a sense of belonging – all things that Sachi wished for herself on her journey.
Why it matters 💫
Once she understood herself and what she wanted for her team, Sachi set to work on building a new team culture. Sachi breaks down key learnings from how she turned this vision into reality.
Define
Define what diversity means for your team. You need to clearly understand what it is you want to achieve before you can achieve it. For Sachi’s team, they knew that they wanted to create a team that was representative of New Zealand. Sachi knew, for example, that she had a lack of Māori and Pacific representation within the team. Māori and Pasifika represent 25% of the population. So, an effort was made to increase ranks by hiring talent from these cultures.
Additionally, Sachi focused on creating new role levels - from intern right through to graduates, juniors, and intermediate-level positions. This helped to acknowledge age differences within her team and also helped to manage career progression opportunities.
Effort
It can be difficult to achieve diversity and inclusion and it requires a lot of work. For example, Sachi learned that posting an ad on job boards and expecting to receive hundreds of Māori and Pasifika applicants wasn’t realistic. Instead, partnerships were built with local design schools, and networking events were consistently attended. Job referrals from within the team were also leveraged, as well as establishing a strong direction for recruitment specialists within the organization.
Sachi also recognized that, as a leader, she needed to be more visible and more vocal about sharing her views of the world and what she was trying to achieve. It was important to be clear about the type of culture she was building within her team so that she could promote it.
In less than a year her team grew (from 11 to 40!) which meant a focus on building an inclusive team culture was required. The central theme throughout this time was, “You have to connect to yourself and your strengths first and foremost, before you can connect with others and as a team”. This meant that the team used tools like the Clifton Strength Finder, in order to learn about themselves and each other. Each designer was then encouraged to delve into their own natural working styles and were taught how to amplify their own strengths through various workshops. This approach also becomes handy when recruiting and strengthening potential weak spots.
Integrity
It’s important to have leaders who care - you can’t do it on your own. There can be pain points on the journey to creating diversity and inclusion, so it’s necessary to have leaders who listen, support, and work through some of the challenges that can arise.
Benefits of diversity and inclusion in design teams 👩🏼🤝👨🏿
Why push for diversity and inclusion? Sachi argues that the benefits are evident in the way that her team designs.
For example, her team:
Insist that research is done with diverse customer groups
Advocates for accessibility when no one else will
Understand problems from different perspectives before diving into a project
Most importantly, the benefits show up in the way that each other is treated, and the relationships that are built with key stakeholders. Diversity and inclusion are wins for everyone - the team, the organization, and the customer.
In today's digital landscape, delivering exceptional user experiences is no longer optional – it's essential for success. At Optimal, we're committed to empowering UX professionals and organizations with the best-in-class tools and methodologies to create outstanding digital products and experiences.
In this blog post, we'll explore practical use cases that demonstrate how Optimal's research platform can drive meaningful improvements across various UX scenarios.
Use case 1: Make Collaborative Design Decisions or A/B Test a Design
Refining an existing product? Launching a new website? Rebranding? Optimal's user research platform empowers your team to make informed, collaborative decisions. Here's how to leverage our tools for impactful results:
Use First-Click Testing to evaluate the effectiveness of different design options.
This method provides valuable insights for A/B testing decisions, ensuring designs resonate with your target audience.
4. Qualitative Insights: Deep dive into user preferences
Conduct follow-up interviews or focus groups using our Qualitative Insights to gain a deeper understanding of user preferences and experiences with different design options.
Explore the 'why' behind user choices to inform more nuanced design decisions.
5. Prototype Testing: Validate interaction flows and usability
Use Prototype Testing to observe how users interact with early-stage designs.
Test navigation, UI components, and task flows to ensure your prototypes align with user expectations—before costly development begins.
6. Interviews: Capture rich, contextual feedback
Conduct live, moderated Interviews directly within Optimal to explore user reactions and behaviors.
Use screen recordings and notes to uncover deeper insights behind user choices and refine design decisions with confidence.
By embedding user insights at every stage, your team can confidently design experiences that don’t just look good but work for real people. Optimal empowers you to make faster, more informed decisions that drive meaningful outcomes across your organization.
Use case 2: Developing effective content strategies
Developing a robust content strategy is crucial for intranets, help documents, websites, and product copy. Optimal's user research and insights platform empowers you to create content that resonates with your audience and drives engagement. Here's how to leverage our tools for effective content strategy development:
1. Card Sorting: Organize content intuitively
Use Card Sorting to understand how users naturally categorize and group your content.
Gain insights into users' mental models to inform your content hierarchy and organization.
Apply findings to create a content structure that aligns with user expectations, enhancing findability and engagement.
2. Tree Testing: Validate information architecture
Employ Tree Testing to confirm whether information placed within your proposed hierarchy is findable and understandable.
Identify areas where users struggle to locate content, enabling you to refine your structure for optimal user experience.
Iterate on your information architecture based on concrete user data, ensuring your content is easily accessible.
Test different content structures and then compare them with each other using the task comparison tool available in Optimal to understand which structure is most likely to drive users to perform the targeted actions.
3. Qualitative Insights: Analyze language perceptions
Review internal tools and processes to streamline content creation workflows.
Compare content experiences across desktop and mobile devices for consistency.
Gather event feedback to inform content for future marketing materials.
Analyze customer service and support interactions to identify common issues and FAQs.
Conduct usability testing on existing content to identify areas for improvement.
Key questions to explore:
What's working well in your current content?
What's not resonating with users?
What are users' first impressions of your content?
How do users typically interact with your content?
How well does your content foster empathy and connection with your audience?
By systematically applying these research methods, you'll develop a content strategy that not only meets your organizational goals but also deeply resonates with your audience. Remember, content strategy is an ongoing process. Regularly use Optimal's tools to assess the effectiveness of your content, gather user feedback, and iteratively improve your approach for continued success.
Use case 3: Increase website conversion
Empower your team to boost conversion rates by leveraging Optimal's best-in-class user research and insights platform. Here's how you can unlock meaningful improvements:
1. Qualitative Insights & Surveys: Uncover user motivations
Conduct in-depth interviews or targeted surveys to gather rich, qualitative feedback about user experiences, motivations, and pain points on your site.
Add an intercept snippet to your existing website to survey users as they come to your website to get a clear understanding of user motivations in context.
Analyze responses to identify key themes and opportunities for optimization.
2. Tree Testing: Optimize navigation structure
Use our Tree Testing tool to evaluate the effectiveness of your site's navigation structure.
Identify areas where users struggle to find information, enabling you to streamline pathways to conversion.
3. Card Sorting: Enhance information architecture
Leverage Card Sorting tool to understand how users naturally categorize your site's information.
Apply insights to refine the layout of product features or benefits on your landing pages, aligning with user expectations.
4. Prototype Testing: Validate Design Changes
Develop prototypes of new landing pages or key conversion elements (like CTAs) using our Prototype Testing tool.
Conduct first-click tests to ensure your design changes resonate with users and drive desired actions.
5. Follow-up Qualitative Insights: Iterate and improve
After implementing changes, conduct follow-up interviews or surveys to gauge the impact of your optimizations.
Gather feedback on the improved user experience and identify any remaining pain points.
By systematically applying these research methods, you'll gain the actionable insights needed to create a more intuitive, engaging, and conversion-friendly website. Optimal empowers you to make data-driven decisions that not only boost conversions but also enhance overall user satisfaction.
Embracing mixed methods research
To truly unlock the power of user research, we recommend a mixed methods approach. By combining quantitative data from surveys and usability tests with qualitative insights from interviews and open-ended responses, you can gain a comprehensive understanding of your users' needs and behaviors.
For more information on mixed methods research and how it can enhance your UX strategy, check out our detailed guide: What is mixed methods research?
And that’s a wrap
Optimal's user research and insights platform provides the tools and methodologies you need to deliver exceptional digital experiences. By leveraging these use cases and adopting a mixed methods approach, you can make data-driven decisions that resonate with your users and drive business success.
Remember, great UX is an ongoing journey. Regularly employ these research methods to stay attuned to your users' evolving needs and preferences. With Optimal as your partner, you're equipped to create digital products and experiences that truly stand out in today's competitive landscape.
Ready to elevate your UX research? Explore Optimal's platform and start unlocking actionable insights today!
