How is Enterprise UX different?

Some years back, this term started gaining importance — Enterprise UX. This has various definitions. The one that resonates with most of us at f1studioz is “Designing UX for the Enterprise”

I have written the post from the perspective of UX Design agency working with enterprises. However, most of the points mentioned below are relevant even if you are working as a full-time Designer in an Enterprise.

The Enterprise UX is different than consumer UX in various ways:

1. The Enterprise products are used for longer duration of time, and being in the product usually takes up most amount of the work day for the users. This means that as a Designer every little productivity gain that we can bring in, enhances the experience of the user multi-fold.
2. Unlike consumer applications, the workflows are a lot more complex and involve multiple roles for the users. With multiple roles, comes the complexity of the privileges of these roles, their setup, the approvals, logs etc.
3. As a designer, you do not start from Ground Zero. You are expected to know the basics of the domain, the lingo of the industry and the technology too. It’s important that you are prepared.
4. Learn to work with constraints. The ideal design option is almost always not feasible due to Time and Cost constraints. The other important aspect is the Platform limitation. We need to tone the design down (if that is even a concept) to ensure we move ahead.
5. The time with the stakeholders. Unlike working with startups or individuals, the time that you get with the Enterprise product stakeholders is limited. You might get to meet the relevant stakeholders for one hour in a week and then work for the entire week from the inputs received.
6. The dirty P word — Organizational Politics. Working within a matrix organization would mean trying to ensure we understand the power dynamics, conflicting priorities from various stakeholders — read Product Managers, VPs, UX Heads etc. and eventually help the product and the organization in the best manner possible through our UX. Design by consensus is death by a thousand cuts.

Let us know what point resonates to your working environment the most and also let us know in comments if there are more considerations that you face.