International UX Research: The Adaptation Spectrum
Researching cultural differences reveals whether to translate text or fully localize an interface. Global products flop when teams ship domestic designs abroad. The footgun is skipping local user testing to validate what actually needs to change.
UX Competitive Analysis: Benchmark to Outperform
UX competitive analysis treats rivals as free design research: reverse-engineer what works and where the market is underserved. Run it before redesigns and repeat quarterly. The footgun is copying visuals instead of analyzing underlying flows and task success.
Assumption Mapping: De-Risk Before You Build
Assumption mapping treats product ideas as bundles of unproven bets. Teams sort beliefs into desirability, feasibility, and viability to find the riskiest ones. It prevents shipping features nobody wants. The footgun is treating the map as the finish line.
Proto-Persona: Sketch Users from Team Assumptions
A proto-persona sketches your team's user assumptions in a quick workshop, creating shared targets without new research. It aligns Lean teams, but the footgun is treating these guessed profiles as facts rather than hypotheses.
ResearchOps Maturity Matrix: Built for Operations
UX maturity scores insights; ResearchOps maturity scores the factory producing them. Use it to audit governance, participant pipelines, and tooling strategy. The mistake is judging research quality instead of operational infrastructure.
Research Democratization: Scale Without Diluting Quality
Research democratization is controlled expansion, not chaos. Non-researchers run simple interviews while pros own complex design. It helps teams move fast when researchers are scarce, but the footgun is untrained staff picking methods or running quant studies.
UX Highlight Reels: Show, Don't Tell
A highlight reel is a shortcut to empathy: short clips that make stakeholders feel the problem. Use them to win executive buy-in when charts fail to stick. The footgun is curating only positive clips; without struggle it reads as marketing, not research.
HMW Questions: From Research Insights to Design Ideas
HMW questions turn research insights into open design challenges that keep ideation focused on real user problems. Teams use them after discovery to prevent pet solutions.
Topline Report: The Research Snapshot
A topline report is the snapshot of a study: goals, key learnings, and context in one doc. Teams use it to align stakeholders days after research, sometimes before full analysis. Never skip the disclaimer or stakeholders will treat impressions as final.
Service Blueprint: The Wiring Diagram Behind User Journeys
A service blueprint X-rays the hidden machinery behind a customer journey. Use it for omnichannel services crossing departments. The footgun is producing generic diagrams untethered from a specific business goal like reducing redundancy.
Insight Statements: Frame Problems, Not Solutions
Insight statements frame what users must achieve, not how. Teams use them in design thinking's define stage to align on the right problem before ideating. The footgun is writing solutions like 'needs a dashboard' instead of goals like 'needs to compare'.
AEIOU: Five Buckets for Field Notes
AEIOU sorts notes into five buckets—Activities, Environments, Interactions, Objects, Users—so patterns emerge from chaos. Use it during field studies to categorize raw data. The footgun is treating its categories as rigid rules not editable heuristics.
UX Roadmap: Strategic Alignment for Research Teams
A UX roadmap trades plans for alignment, mapping work across Now, Next, and Future horizons so teams share one North Star. Use it to justify research spend and prevent silos. The footgun is treating it as a static handoff instead of a living ritual.
Which Figma plugin populates tables with realistic user data?
Tests Figma content automation. Name a plugin like Content Reel, select layers to apply text strings and image collections for names, emails, and avatars at once, and cite grouped content to keep rows aligned. Red flag: manual entry or mismatched placeholders.
Difference between duplicating a page and branching in Figma
This tests version control hygiene in design files. A strong answer contrasts file-bloating duplication with isolated, reviewable branches, and names branching as superior for active projects where main must stay stable and changes need review before merge.
How would you create a dismissible modal dialog over the current screen?
This tests modal architecture beyond visuals. A strong answer covers: dimming the inert background, trapping focus, returning focus on close, and supporting Escape plus a visible close button.
How would you structure a complex reusable Figma table with Auto Layout?
Tests nested Auto Layout and component properties for scalable Figma tables. Build atomic hug/fill cells in horizontal row Auto Layout, then stack rows vertically. Expose cell-type swaps via component properties. Red flag: manual resizing or variant bloat.
Figma Constraints vs Auto Layout: when are Constraints preferable?
This tests resizing logic in Figma. A strong answer states Auto Layout resizes frames to fit content, while Constraints make objects respond to parent frames. It then cites responsive containers, say fluid inputs.
How would you establish design tokens in Figma and sync with production?
Tests design-to-code architecture. A strong answer outlines primitive-to-semantic tokens in Tokens Studio, W3C DTCG JSON synced to Git, and Style Dictionary transforms in CI/CD. Red flag: manual exports or treating Figma styles as the source of truth.
How do you process usability feedback into concrete Figma iterations?
WHAT IT TESTS: Turning usability findings into traceable Figma iterations. A strong answer triages by severity and frequency, maps issues to annotated frames, and versions options in branches. RED FLAG: Redrawing screens immediately without triage.