Ethical Design: How Creating Ethical Products and Services Benefits Customers and Your Business

Effective user experience (UX) design meets user needs—enabling users to navigate a website or product easily, find the information they require, perform necessary actions, etc. At the same time, a good UX design helps a business achieve its goals, including things like capturing more leads, raising awareness, or generating more sales.

Ethical UX design goes further. This practice focuses on diversity, inclusivity, sustainability, and transparency. Companies that embrace design ethics want to produce a positive, long-term impact on their clients or customers. And by extension, they want to make the world a better place. That’s a lofty goal, of course, but one that’s possible, given the ever-growing impact of digital interactions.

Organizations whose products and services engage more effectively and fairly with broader audiences can have a lasting impact on them. These companies also benefit from developing a brand image of inclusion. By breaking down artificial and unnecessary barriers, they eliminate the perception of separation and invite everyone to give their offerings a look.

What Does Ethical Design Look Like?

One of the hallmarks of ethical UX design is accessibility. However, while that aspect is critically important, it’s just the tip of the ethical design iceberg.

Other vital elements include:

Non-biased research.
It goes without saying that researchers should never make assumptions. But, too often, preconceived ideas and opinions make their way into what should be objective investigations.

Inclusive customer personas.
Efforts to determine the “target consumer” should start by assuming everyone is a potential customer and narrow the field only if clear evidence supports doing so.

Universal usability.
UX design and testing must consider a diverse cross-section of backgrounds and abilities, and make changes as needed to maximize usability.

Sustainability.
The BBC has reported that “The carbon footprint of our gadgets, the…