Technology aside, what interaction design means to Manasi Agarwal is caring about the world in general, and people in particular
How has your experience as interaction designer at Google been so far?
MA: Since March 2018, I’ve been working as interaction designer at Google London, Android platform UX. The most rewarding part of being a designer at Google is the knowledge that the work we do has the potential to impact millions of people across the globe, in all walks of life. The range of product and services we offer also makes the internal design team discourse very engaging, with new patterns, insights or debates that emerge almost on a daily basis. It’s also a privilege to work in a company with so many passionate, driven and extremely smart people who are a great source of inspiration and definitely keep me grounded in the reality of how much more I have to learn and grow.
What challenges does an interaction designer face?
MA: I think interaction design and research are having a bit of a golden moment these days, boosted by a sense of techno utopianism that has pervaded our lives over the last decade or so. The challenge then is a more reflective, internal one: we have to be increasingly conscious of the power we have to influence product decisions and think deeply about the kind of impact these products and services can have on people, now and in the future. It is a question of drawing a balance between being either too risk averse to try anything novel, staggering under the weight of the responsibility of its possible legacy, or focusing so much on building, shipping (and that Silicon Valley favorite term, ‘disrupting’), that short term goals totally cloud your judgment as gatekeepers of what is allowed to see the light of day.
What are you presently working on?
MA: I can’t really go into the specifics, but broadly, I’m working on finishing up parts of the UX in the Android 11 release, which went to beta a month or so ago. Alongside we’re also starting to think about the things we want to improve for our users in the 2021 update. I am part of a team that works on the on-boarding and out of the box experience for Android users, so it’s a critical user journey that changes and evolves every year. I learn something new every day!