Experience design: how to prevent Groot from killing everyone
During this prolonged lockdown period, I fell into the Disneyplus trap. And I watched all Marvel movies, including the fabulous Guardians of the Galaxy.
There’s this particular scene that summarises why a profession such as Experience Designer exists. I remember once I was trying to explain it to a guy and he replied: “seems airy-fairy to me”. I clearly failed to convey the message.
Now, thanks to Guardians of the Galaxy I am confident I can explain it to anyone, including a child (tested it with my daughter) or senior (tested it with my mum). No bias in my sample!
Let me remind you of the story. Our Guardians are stuck on planet Ego and they must destroy it along with its creator the god-like Celestial by the same name. They’ve got this powerful bomb created by Rocket (“the developer”) on Quill’s suggestion (“the product owner”), but hey there’s a catch. They need to plant it on the brain at the planet’s core and the only one small enough to go there is Groot (“the user”). Alas, they do not have an experience designer.
For those who are not familiar with the characters, everybody loves Groot, but the guy (well it’s a sentient plant) is not the smartest cookie in the jar, with very limited vocabulary and intellectual ability: a dumb user.
And finally, we got to the scene under scrutiny.
Rocket: “Alright, first you flick this switch, then this one, that activates it. Then you press this button, which will give you five minutes to get out of there. Now, whatever you do don’t push this button, because that will set off the bomb immediately and we will all then be dead. Now, repeat back what I just said.”
Groot: “I am Groot. I am Groot.”
Rocket: “That’s right.”
Groot: “I am Groot.”
Rocket: “NO! That’s the button that will kill everyone. Try again.”
Groot: “I am Groot. I am Groot. I am Groot.”
Rocket: “NO! That’s exactly what you just said! How’s that even possible? Which button is the button you’re supposed to push? Point to it. NO!”
Quill: “Hey, you’re making him nervous!”
Rocket: “Shut up and give me some tape! Does anyone got any tape out there? I wanna put some tape over the death button.”
Does that remind you of something? It actually happened in real life.
The Three Mile Island accident was a partial nuclear meltdown that occurred at the nuclear power plant of Three Mile Island in Pennsylvania (US) in 1979.
Have a look at the control room: the user interface in the reactor control room had such big usability issues because of badly designed buttons and labels, that it caused a nuclear accident.
You can read the detailed story from a UX standpoint at https://www.interaction-design.org/literature/article/is-old-news-bad-news
The same applies to Rocket’s bomb. No labels, identical buttons with very different functions placed next to each other, which make instructions difficult to memorise.
So, what role would I play with the Guardians of the Galaxy?
As an Experience Designer I would place labels on the levers and change the colours of the buttons, maybe to green and red.
Uh, wait, how about accessibility and colour blindness? After all, we don’t know too much about Groot’s vision.
Good point. Let’s place a death symbol on top of the death button, and maybe even some braille writing on top of the buttons, which are big enough to allow it.
So, this is my new elevator pitch when they ask me what I do for a living.
I am an experience designer. Think about the Guardians of the Galaxy when they want to blow Ego’s planet. My role would be to ensure that even Groot can operate the device and make it function right the first time, thus preventing baby Groot from killing everyone.
