Do programmers really make bad designers? And does it need to be that way?

The delineation line between the roles of developers and designers tends to be pretty stark, and often the responsibility of designing for the user experience gets put squarely on the shoulders of the designer. But what about teams without a designer? Or programmers who crave a little more creative freedom? Or perhaps our mode of thinking about UX in general just needs a bit of an overhaul.

In this presentation, we'll talk about what it means to design with the end user in mind, and why it's so important that developers think about it, too. We'll discuss: * Why we worry about user experience at all, and what happens when we don't * Basic theories of UX that apply to just about everything * How to think like a user * Designing for UX even when you don't have a UI * Simple best-practices and resources to start upping your UX game

In the end the goal will not be to replace what designers do (we still have our uses...right?), but to shed light on an important aspect of software development that doesn't just stop with the designer.