It’s pretty common to design an initial version for yourself, then iterate after receiving one or more forms of user feedback. This method is especially appropriate when the application or its interface is so unlike what people are used to that their feedback won’t be useful until they can work with a fairly complete prototype–and data they really have–to obtain results they really need.

I think two related points that you made in comment 4 are also very important: “we can correct and adapt to our biases” and “I know what the users’ experience is like, either because I’ve done the research or I’m using it myself.”

A designer who is “correcting for biases” is able to set aside what they know and perceive what an average person might. A clue that they are doing this, or trying to, is that they refer to the target user in the first person, e.g.: “I don’t see a ‘Buy’ button. I am confused. I think I’ll click ‘Back’.”

In the 48 years that I’ve been doing user research and software design, I’ve often been able to neutralize my biases. Whenever possible, I take it a step further and try not just to be “less like me” but also “more like the user.” One way is what I call “method design”.

A method actor studies a character until he or she can think, feel, react and express just like the character would. A method designer does the same through various means including formal ones like lab and field studies and informal ones like having a family member or housemate in the target market. If, when I design for “me”, I am accurately playing the part of my well-understood “character”, then my design will be more likely to work for my target user than if I had designed it for my real self.

As you say, “I know what the users’ experience is like because I’ve done the research.”

Imprecise or misleading labeling was not improved by the eschewing of labels in favor of icons in “metaphor” craze way back when. Ted Nelson (I think it was) wrote an article about this in Brenda Laurel’s book: (I had to look it up just now because it was such a great quote.) “In the popular iconic world, it becomes a new style of screen clutter. You face a screen littered with cryptic junk: the frying pan, the yo-yo, the bird’s nest, the high-button shoe.”

Words can fail to communicate in similar ways (though far less spectacularly).

You’re right that the designer is immersed in the design’s details, therefore making it hard for themselves to see things from the viewpoint of the user who isn’t immersed.

But that immersion is a bias. And we can correct and adopt to our biases, as long we know they are there. For example, 37signals’ policy of having the designers and developers directly answer support calls gives them the perspective of how others experience the design.

There is no notion of a typical user. But there is a notion that I know what the users’ experience is like, either because I’ve done the research or I’m using it myself.

In other words you’ve thought too deeply about the problem to continue.to qualify as a ‘typical user’.

Admittedly, I was a little shocked: it offended my user-centered design sensibilities. “I don’t want YOUR house, I want MY house.” I think my wife sensed I was about to blurt this out, and she kicked me under the table.

Despite those initial reservations, the design process has been very successful. Designing for himself gave the architect a starting point, and he got there quickly. We went through many revisions, but it was only by looking at the concepts could we react, discuss, and decide. The final design? Not necessarily where he would want to live, but as the concepts evolved, Sarah and I could take more ownership of the approach.

Right now I’m designing an application to support customer support reps at a dental insurance carrier. It’s a complicated application with lots of data points. We’ve got lots of good input from users (I conducted a brainstorming session with them) and they remain involved in the design process. But I kicked off my design process by asking myself, “OK, if I were answering phones, fielding 100+ calls a day about insurance benefits, what would *I* want out of this application?”