The first time I heard about "User Experience", UX , was around 2005 at Georgia Tech. At that time, I thought it was an innovative and fantastic approach, that shared some principles with a Japanese methodology I had been using for several years (QFD).

 

I worked for over 20 years as a Quality Manager of international automotive and energy industries, where my participation in the design of final products was limited. However, I always tried to apply the UX concepts and tools in my work (in the formats I designed, in the devices we designed for our inspectors ...) I consider that we are all designers, and even if we design something simple, we all have users to help solve their problems! 

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A couple of years ago, I left the industry to take the lead of the consulting firm my father founded (OYAMAT). I considered that UX was very related to quality, productivity, and safety (our consulting areas), and therefore I decided to join the Interaction Design Foundation, IxDF. It was very exciting to discover all the courses and literature available and it was really hard to choose where to start. I selected the track related to UX and Virtual and Augmented Reality (VR/AR) courses since we were dreaming about starting SEREX, to enhance training and knowledge sharing with digital technologies. 

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I consider that the IxDF has helped me very much to lead SEREX. We develop digital experiences and although the technologies we use are very exciting, without the support of UX concepts and testing, these technologies could be sometimes hard to use... And if something is hard to use, it is hardly useful.

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UX is something all people need to learn about, not only "designers". We all work for others; we design and deliver products/services to others. We solve for our users... Or just frustrate them. 

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As a policy of SEREX, we always take the lead in understanding customer needs (beginning of projects) and in assuring usability, together with our users ("hand-shake" and closing of challenges). We sometimes request assistance from our partners in the development of a technical project or a technology implementation, but UX needs to be led and signed by one of our co-founders (ideally, myself). 

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I believe SEREX has been successful because of our UX approach. We develop fast-prototypes, discuss them with customers and users in the early stages, and are always open to learning. This is a key factor; we know that our projects or digital products are never "perfect"... We are humble about that, we know that there are always things to be improved, and we talk with our customers and users to find about them and "learn together with them".

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When we share with our potential customers at SEREX some of the things that we have developed, we sincerely explain that "it is great because we did it together with our customers/users". And when a design has "the invisible hand of the user"... It usually leads to a successful product or service. IxDF has provided us important concepts and tools that we use for our customers and for developing our team. In SEREX we proudly state that in our company, the letter "X" is because "we always close assuring our UX". 

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