What is a UX unicorn, do UX unicorns exist, and should you become one?
UX comprises various specialties such as researcher, information architect, visual designer, interaction designer, UX writer, software developer, and usability tester. We often see job ads like “UI/UX designer with coding skills” or “Senior Product Fullstack Designer” that search for candidates with experience in all those areas.
A person who has expertise in all UX disciplines is called UX unicorn. This person can do everything about user experience in a project, replace a team and do the whole work alone.
Do UX unicorns exist?
Like a unicorn is a mythical beast that only exists in fairy tales, the UX unicorn is a mythical employee. Many people in the design industry heard about them, yet just a few people saw them. UX unicorn is more a myth than an actual person you can meet on your project. Even when a person says, “I’m a UX unicorn,” most of the time, the person specializes in one or two disciplines and has mediocre experience in other disciplines. It is easy to check that — learn more about the person’s background.
Calling yourself a “UX unicorn” when you apply for a job can give you a bad reputation. When seasoned designers see an application that says “I’m a UX unicorn” or “I’m a design rockstar,” they assume that a person has ego problems, especially when a person has only a few years of experience in the industry.
UX professionals have to be humble.
Why companies are looking for UX unicorns?
There is a couple of reasons why companies are looking for UX unicorns. First, companies believe that it’s possible to cut costs by hiring a single person capable of doing different things. Second, companies believe that a person with skills in various disciplines can help the company improve its design process.
No need to say that both assumptions about UX unicorns are incorrect. Even when people have relevant skills in different disciplines, they can do only one thing at a time. Second, UX unicorn cannot solve poor management strategy decisions or lack of vision. In other words, UX unicorns are not a magical solution for organizations’ problems.
Job ads that look for UX unicorns demonstrate one thing — they show the employer’s low level of UX maturity.
Should I become a UX unicorn?
It’s tempting to become a person everyone is talking about. But it’s better to resist that temptation and think about what you need to do to become a UX unicorn. You will need to invest 10,000 hours of work in every discipline that constitutes user experience. Yes, you need to invest 10,000 in research, another 10,000 in visual design, another 10,000 in coding, and the list goes on. And only after that, you can consider yourself a UX unicorn. It means you have to dedicate about ten years of your life to getting practical skills in all UX areas!
It’s extremely hard for one person to be great at all very different disciplines that make user experience.
What can also happen once you start learning different disciplines, you will find that you like a particular discipline more than others. For example, you might like user research more than visual design. In this case, you will naturally be more willing to invest more time learning user research. As a result, you will become a dedicated user researcher (someone who specializes in user research and have deep insights on how to do research) with mediocre visual design skills. And that’s absolutely fine because most projects nowadays are created by teams, not individuals.
It’s good to be someone who knows a little bit of everything yet, specializes in one or two particular things.
Design is a team sport. A team of dedicated specialists working on a project can demonstrate excellent results because every team member specializes in one particular thing.
Forget about UX unicorns, and become a T-shaped person
A T-shaped person is a multi-skilled professional capable of many different things but an expert in one particular discipline. Knowing a little bit of everything won’t make you a unicorn, but it will give you a significant advantage — you will better understand your strengths and weaknesses. And this will help you know the areas where you can make the most significant impact on a project.
Plus, the skills acquired in one discipline can be applied to different fields. For example, when you’re an expert in visual design and have average skills in coding, you have much better ideas about the technical feasibility of your design solutions. In other words, you won’t design something that the engineering team cannot build.
Follow me on Twitter
Want To Learn UX?
Try Interaction Design Foundation. It offers online design courses that cover the entire spectrum of UX design, from foundational to advanced level. As a UX Planet reader, you get 25% off your first year of membership with the IxDF.
This post contains affiliate link(s)
