Has anyone else noticed that, instead of films like Casablanca, Some Like it Hot and Rear Window the 2010 Christmas telly schedule was packed with 80s movies?
I guess 80s movies are oldies now. Or perhaps I’m past my sell-by-date. In any case, one film I found myself getting sucked into was the immensely enjoyable Big.
It struck me that Josh (Tom Hanks) is a like an expert User Experience Designer, as he has an uncanny (!) ability to relate to the target user’s perspective.
I think there is also an interesting social observation in the narrative: Josh’s
ability to critique toys makes him a favourite with the boss, but further isolates him from certain colleagues, who envy him and are suspicious of him.
In my experience, many UX people tend to operate as lone contributors. UX practitioners are team players, of course, but UX is typically a specialist role carried out by an individual– like a goalkeeper on a football team.
The politics of this role worked initially for Josh, but ultimately against him.
In his first boardroom meeting, Josh’s colleague (and nemesis) Paul, gives a marketing presentation about the company’s new Nobot toy. Josh puts his hand up and says: “I don’t get it.”
Much to Paul’s irritation, Josh gives a user experience critique of the “building that turns into a robot.”
The tables are turned later in the movie, however, when Josh has to design his own toy. Josh comes up with an electronic comic book. In the boardroom presentation, Paul raises his hand mischievously and says, “I don’t get it.”
For Josh, the solution to this irritating office politics issue is to walk out — he decides in that moment to reject adult life and become a child again.
In a real boardroom, when you’ve made someone sore and they decide the reject your idea just to get you back, that option isn’t available.
Office politics are something that the real UX practitioners have to live with. And it’s easier, even fun, to critique or review a product or website, but much more difficult to expose your own design to the criticism of others.
Comments
Sarah Madden / Jan 7th, 2011 / 3:42 pm /
I love this movie. I seem to remember that Tom Hanks first gets a data entry job, before being promoted?
Because he’s a kid he’s better with computers than the adults, and the guy in the cubicle next to him has to ask him to slow down.
I think there’s it’s implicit in the film that people tolerate childlike behaviour from computer geek types.
Maybe that’s why Google or Microsoft make their workplaces more like student campuses.
Are UX people geeks?