Call for Proposals

Call for Proposals

Our call for proposals has now closed. Thanks to everyone that submitted, you’ll hear from us in December with the outcome.

We are looking for new and experienced practitioners alike to share stories, lessons, and tricks of the trade. Submissions will be accepted until October 8, 2018 at 11:59pm PST.

About submitting to present at UXPA 2019:

  • You’ll be asked to choose from a selection of pre-defined topics and types. Your type choice indicates the format of your session and the topic will determine which track your session forms a part of.
  • Every submission will be reviewed by at least 5 reviewers prior to our topic and type chairs, along with the wider conference committee to create the conference program.
  • It’s very important to take time writing your submission, you’ll need to provide enough detail to convince the reviewers and conference committee that you have the relevant skills and experience to successfully deliver your session.
  • You are required to review 3 proposals for each proposal you submit.
  • Please note the PRIMARY speaker per accepted session will receive a $250 discount off their 3-day conference registration.

 

When you’re ready to start your proposal create a COMS account (the website we use to manage the review process).

 

SUBMISSION TYPES

Full-length Presentation (60 min)

Presentation sessions focus on a practitioner’s ideas and experience with usability methods, skills, philosophy, design, business case studies, or other relevant topics. Speakers should plan ample time for innovative audience participation within the 60-minute allocation.

 

Panel (60 min)

Panels can cover the same areas of interest as presentations or go little beyond the traditional UX topics.  Good panel topics are the ones with different aspects to discuss on. There should be 3-5 domain experts as panelists representing different perspectives or aspects to the topic at hand. Submissions should include a short, anonymous position statement from each potential panelist. Like previous years, 2019’s panels will have a 60-minute time slot.

 

Pre-Conference Course (Half-Day: 4 hours / or Full-Day: 8 hours)

UXPA pre-conference courses allow attendees to extend their knowledge with half-day and full-day sessions led by experienced and skilled UX professionals.  These courses are classroom-style sessions, where instructors teach attendees specific user experience knowledge or skills. Courses will include presentations covering in-depth explorations of a topic, as well as discussions and activities to allow attendees to share and practice their new skills.  

We are looking for courses on a range of topics, including design, evaluation, research, and UX management. Courses can be targeted for novice or advanced user experience professionals, or for a more general UXPA audience.  

Note: Course leaders are entitled to an honorarium, either in the form of direct payment ($1,000 for full day and $500 for half day) or greater conference registration discounts (TBD).

 

Poster (5 min talk during a 60 min time slot)

Posters are a way to present research results, new ideas or concepts in an informal, visual and interactive manner. Presenting is very informal: a few people will gather around as you talk them through your poster. Make sure to include what you did, why, how and what you’ve learned. It’s a great first step into presenting at conferences. Your research, ideas or concepts don’t need to be complete; you can even use the session to pick the brains of professionals to help move your thinking forward.

It’s often helpful for submitters to include an image depicting the planned layout of the poster. There is no official template for posters, so be creative and find the best way to tell your own story. Selected poster presenters will be responsible for printing their own posters.

 

SUBMISSION TOPICS

 

Career Development and Management

Whether you’re thinking about your next career move or planning to continue growing at your current organization, it can be important to consider your goals and the steps you can take to get there. This track is all about growing and developing as UXers, and navigating the challenges of UX management. Some key topics include:

  • What’s motivating you to continue developing your skills?
  • What’s the next step in your career, and how are you going to get there?
  • Why and how do you develop your hard and soft skills?
  • Why do you practice UX instead of managing a team (or vice-versa)?
  • What are the differences in key skills for practitioners vs. managers?
  • How does the practice of UX differ if you’re working in a large company, small company, agency, or as an independent consultant? What are the advantages and challenges of each, and how does a practitioner determine which is the best environment for their own personality?
  • Why do you evangelize UX as a force for change?

 

Design Psychology

Have you used knowledge of psychology and human factors to create usable, findable, useful, and desirable experiences?  The Design Psychology track welcomes submissions from all areas of design (visual, graphic, front-end, content, user interface, interaction, information architecture, industrial, etc.) that discuss:

  • Applications of techniques and methods rooted in behavioral/social/cognitive psychology and human factors
  • Psychologically-driven solutions for learnability, efficiency, memorability, error prevention, and satisfaction
  • Design for people with a broad range of physical and cognitive abilities
  • Other related topics that are inspiring, interesting, and/or informative

 

Innovation and Emerging Technologies

The practice of UX continues to rapidly evolve beyond the desktop. People’s interactions and experiences are taking place over multiple online and offline platforms. What is the latest and greatest technology you are working with? What do you foresee happening in the near future in these areas:

  • Advanced design for accessibility, diversity and inclusion
  • Virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR)
  • Future of mobile
  • Internet of things (IOT)
  • Artificial intelligence (AI)
  • Voice User Interface (VUI) and chatbots

 

Interaction and Visual Design

Many UX practitioners who don the label of “interaction”, “web”, or “visual/graphic” designer often wear many hats but are primarily responsible for crafting a desirable, pleasing, and memorable experience between the user and the product. What are the new set of concerns and challenges that you face today as a designer? How has the role of visual, or interaction designer evolved in the rapidly changing field of digital product design? Areas of concern may include:

  • Visual aesthetics–new trends and best practices
  • Gestalt theory and principles of design
  • Design systems and strategies
  • Motion and sound design
  • Responsive vs adaptive UI
  • Designing for users with physical impairments or technological constraints
  • Design sprints and the new agile team environment
  • Design presentations and documentation
  • New workflows, systems, and design tools that have improved your productivity, collaboration, and efficiency

 

Tools and Techniques

There are a wide variety of techniques and tools UXers use to be better at what they do. There are  tools to be more productive, save time or money, communicate, move a project along, or simplify a process. How have you used any of the following to achieve those goals?

  • Research tools and techniques, such as journey mapping, card sorting, and contextual inquiry
  • Design tools and techniques, such as Design Studio, specific design or prototyping applications, and low-fidelity prototyping
  • Development techniques and tools, such as HTML5 prototyping, extreme programming, and developing for accessibility
  • Evaluation tools and techniques, such as remote user testing, 5-second testing, tree tests, A/B or multivariate testing
  • A new  tool or technique or one that isn’t in the above list

 

UX Strategy

Many claim the next step in the evolution of UX is becoming more strategic. How simple should it be to get UX practitioners to get involved in the bigger decisions and longer-term direction of the business? How can we simplify our own processes and bring greater efficacy and efficiency to our UX work? Subcategories would include:

  • ROI – How do we overcome the gap between our ability to plan/report ROI and the clients’ expectations of it?
  • Getting access at the Board of Directors level. Is it necessary? If so, how do we achieve it?
  • What role can Big Data and quantitative methods play in helping UX gain traction within organizations?
  • How can UX help set the vision and the long-term objectives?
  • Where does UX strategy sit amongst all the other strategies – business, communications, digital, content, social media, etc.?
  • Agile and UCD: How do they work together? Or don’t they?
  • Lean UX vs. Lean Startup: What can the two movements learn from each other?