HN Explorer

Ask HN: Tips on finding great interaction designers?

9 points by thomaspun ↗ HN
I'm sure everyone you know is hiring designers. Any tips of 'discovering' or 'attracting' great interaction designers. We aren't just looking for people who put out great pixels (it's a minimum requirement) but designers who get the Apple way. Dribbble? Forrst?

If you are a designer or know someone who may be interested in disrupting the mobile video entertainment (same way Flipboard did to print), please shoot us an email to say hi and I'll tell you more about the exciting things we are working on!

Thx! thomas @ nowbox.com

7 comments

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martinkallstrom
Step one is to learn the lingo. A great interaction designer will not necessarily have any graphic design skills, as that is the graphic designers job. It sounds like you are looking for someone with skills encompassing both disciplines, which you should be very clear about. Just as engineers sneer at recruiters messing up technical terms, great designers have enough options to not apply to positions where the recruiter shows little understanding of the area. It doesn't instill confidence that you will be able to give proper merit to their skill set and experience.
strato
I would add to this that great designers will expect to have input at the product level. It's hard to simplify a product that's not properly thought through.
thomaspun
Of course the designers (in fact everyone on the team) would contribute greatly to the product design. However, we do believe one person needs to drive the vision but everyone on the team will have a say within the constraint.

We also explain all the motives of doing something, i.e., how to make it easy for users to find the next channel to watch... v.s. make these channels look pretty.

thomaspun
Great advice. What do you think of this? Any comment on this? http://nowbox.com/jobs
martinkallstrom
My 2c: The three questions meant to sort the wheat from the chaff don't go nearly far enough. Have a designer write them or at least review them. As they are now there is a million and a half Pinterest users that can answer with a resounding Yes! to all three of them, and only a handful of them will have the grit you are looking for.

There is this dynamic that you need to pinpoint that "A-star" (as you call them) people too want to move upwards in their career, so they want to apply to jobs (if ever) where even they seem just the right amount of under-qualified.

My suggestion for nailing this dynamic would be to up the bonus requirements by adding stuff like this:

* Designed an app spending significant time in the US top 20

* Introduced an interface metaphor on iOS that got copied by Instagram or Evernote

* Worked with graphic design close to the core iOs team at Apple

If you see what I mean? The thought you want to put in the mind of your dream candidate is "Oh man, I wish I had what it takes to apply to this team".

And the mechanic you then apply to get to talk to the right people is to look around Dribbble, Forrst, Lovedsgn and Deviantart and point designers to the ad and say "We think you might have what it takes to be part of our team. Do you want to have a conversation about it?"

Sell your team by setting the bar for entry.

jtothapreston
If you know how to recognize good interaction and visual design, go with your gut instincts. Also the biggest factor in hiring anyone is whether or not you can see working with them.

I've found some of my best interaction designers in juniors, fresh out of college, with crappy portfolios, but where I could see potential in them, and them wanting to learn.

I've also found senior interaction designers, with portfolio's to die for, crazy good experience, and have found them to be not willing to take feedback or with collaboratively with other designers and developers.

You never can tell. My experience has been that it's better to find someone stronger on visual design, information design, and aesthetics and that the Human Factors and usability stuff can be mostly taught quickly. It's impossible to do it the other way around.

I've been hiring and training interaction designers for over 6 years and have a UX agency, so I've become pretty adept at going with my gut feeling and mentoring young interaction designers.