More Than a UX Designer - Lisa Wilton

Tell us about your role at Decision Time?

I’m a UX Designer on the Product Team and tend to work as a UX generalist. That means I have the opportunity to get involved in a wide variety of tasks throughout the product design journey, from user research, ideation and prototyping to user testing and evaluation. It’s a varied role, and it keeps things interesting.

How long have you been with the company and how did you come to work here?

I’ve been here now for a year and a half. Previous to Decision Time, I used to be a modern language teacher but left teaching after my son was born and worked part-time as a photographer and writer. I then decided to retrain completely as a full-stack developer and discovered UX design through that experience.

I found out about the job at Decision Time after getting involved in an innovation hub with Catalyst, where I met two Decision Time colleagues who were working on a maths education app. I applied for the role, went through the hiring process, and now here I am!

Describe a typical day working at Decision Time.

My days vary greatly depending on my stage in the design process and the projects I’m working on. Generally, I’ll get on the laptop in the morning and check my email, my calendar and then my kanban in Github to see what’s coming up that day and if there is anything urgent that I need to prioritise in the morning. I could be working on a design in Figma, creating UX deliverables in Miro or preparing for or conducting a user interview over Zoom.

At 10am, we have our product team stand-up meeting where we’ll go through support tickets and the tasks we’re working on and chat about anything urgent. Then, for the rest of the day, I’ll systematically work through the issues I have lined up and attend any necessary meetings.

We have a design sign-off meeting weekly on a Wednesday, so the early part of the week can involve getting designs ready for presentation. The latter part of the week tends to involve making adjustments after receiving feedback.

What do you enjoy most about your job?

The best part of my job is solving problems to improve the product for our customers. Receiving positive feedback about how you’ve helped make something easier for someone is a great feeling. It’s good to know that you’ve made an impact - no matter how big or small.

I also love getting to write user-friendly UX copy. You’d be surprised how much thought goes into even the shortest phrases in our product!

What are the biggest challenges of your role?

One of the biggest challenges is solving the more complex problems that arise. I often joke about how what seems like a small problem at first can become a “can of worms” as there are so many different moving parts and details to consider.

I have to make sure that I’ve considered all the different scenarios that might affect our users but also keep in mind how to avoid any knock-on effects in terms of security, accessibility and efficiency of the product. The solutions I come up with can take an awful lot of serious thinking!

Tell us something interesting about yourself.

I have many pets and apparently have an unnatural ability to attract cats (they just seem to gravitate towards me) . I grow trees from seed and like to garden. I am an avid gamer (it’s not just for the kids!). I have written a few books. I used to sing in a band and play saxophone and violin. I’ve lived in a few different countries including the United States and learnt how to play roller derby in Louisiana and Mississippi.