Posts by Trevor Alexander
5 Free Figma UI Design Kits To Save You Time
As a UI / UX designer, a lot of your value lies in the unique solutions you can provide to a business and development problem, not redrawing buttons and drop downs over and over and over. (I discuss how to focus and improve on this value in my book). But thankfully Figma is LOADED with…
Read MoreThe best free courses for UI / UX Beginners in 2022
As opposed to running out and buying any number of design courses, I’d suggest starting with some free Youtube courses to get some experience and momentum on your side. Learning a UI / UX Tool To best begin learning aspects of UI and UX, it can be useful to have familiarity with the tools that…
Read MorePowerful Truth: You CAN Create a UI / UX Design Career With No Background in Design
Absolutely! Anyone who likes solving creative challenges and wants to make things work better can certainly have a career in UI/UX. At its core, UI and UX are looking to improve 2 things: how something looks and how something works. There likely are countless time when you used a website or application and grew frustrated…
Read MoreChapter 9 – Stay Late with Developers
Individual commitment to a group effort—that is what makes a team work, a company work, a society work, a civilization work. ~Vince Lombardi Nobody likes to stay late at the office. Ideally, you’ll work at a place that respects work-life balance. But as an important milestone nears its deadline, or your team is striving for…
Read MoreChapter 8 – Design Is Not as Important as Code
If there’s one thing you learn by working on a lot of different Web sites, it’s that almost any design idea-no matter how appallingly bad-can be made usable in the right circumstances, with enough effort. ~Steve Krug I’ve often used the following reductionist metaphor with designers I’ve hired and managed to explain why code is…
Read MoreChapter 7 – Appreciate and Value Your Clients
People don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care. ~Theodore Roosevelt You bring your car into a mechanic because something isn’t working right. The mechanic pokes around a bit and believes they can help you. But first they need to ask: “Is this alternator a Remy, and do you have…
Read MoreChapter 6 – You Should Learn Some Code
Everybody should learn to program a computer, because it teaches you how to think. ~Steve Jobs You can hear the usual pushback against this idea immediately: “But I’m a designer . . .” It doesn’t matter. Learn some code. “I want to focus purely on my discipline!” It doesn’t matter. Learn some code. “I…
Read MoreChapter 5 – Don’t Nickel and Dime
I don’t know a single person who has achieved success without doing a solid percentage of things for free as a jockeying chess move to their success. ~Gary Vee Visiting a friend one summer, I learned of an awesome tech product that his father was building. He discovered I was a designer and asked…
Read MoreChapter 4 – The Market Will Tell You What You Can Charge
Value is not determined by those who set the price. Value is determined by those who choose to pay it. ~Simon Sinek There is a lot of discussion around price points for designers, both for hourly wages and flat fees for projects, but you should approach it simply. Want some guidance? Charge as much…
Read MoreChapter 3 – If You Think Your Competition Is Fiverr, You’ve Already Lost
People do not buy goods and services. They buy relations, stories and magic. ~Seth Godin To bemoan the cheap and quick design output that is available online is a critical error in how to think of your own value. It’s all too easy to point to this cheap offshoring as the reason you can’t…
Read More