#30 Need to Cut Costs? Hire a Designer!
“UX? Service Design? No, thanks, we’re not focused on innovation or growth right now. Our priority is cutting costs. Anything that isn’t absolutely essential needs to be kept to a minimum.”
This mindset might seem logical, but it’s actually costing companies more than they realize. Many businesses only see experience designers (UX, Service Design, etc.) as critical in times of growth, but what if they were actually your biggest cost-cutting asset?
Yes, experience designers help improve engagement, conversions, and revenue. But they also create operational efficiencies, eliminate waste, and prevent costly mistakes, making businesses run smarter, not harder.
When products and services are easy to use and designed with purpose, customer support demands decrease, employee workloads lighten, and expensive errors are prevented before they happen.
In my 30 years in the industry, I’ve never seen so many highly skilled experience designers available as right now. The current job market presents an incredible opportunity for forward-thinking companies to bring in top talent at a time when efficiency matters most.
Why your next hire should be an experience designer
Here’s why your next hire should be an experience designer—especially if cutting costs is your top priority.
1. Reduce Customer Support Costs
Every confusing step in a process leads to more customer inquiries, refunds, or complaints, and all of these increase costs. Experience designers identify friction points and uncover their root causes before they become costly problems, ensuring users can complete their tasks without needing extra support. The result? Fewer help desk tickets, lower staffing requirements, and a significant reduction in operational expenses.
2. Streamline Workflows to Boost Efficiency
A well-designed internal system means employees spend less time on repetitive tasks, fixing errors, or dealing with inefficiencies. Experience designers simplify workflows, optimize interfaces, and remove unnecessary steps, saving valuable time for everyone. When employees can focus on high-impact work instead of fighting against cumbersome processes, productivity (and profitability) naturally increase.
3. Prevent Expensive Rework and Failed Initiatives
Even in times of budget cuts, most companies continue launching new features and services. Doing so without truly understanding user needs often leads to costly redesigns or, worse, complete failure. Experience designers validate ideas early, ensuring businesses invest in solutions that actually work—eliminating wasteful spending on misguided projects.
4. Increase Retention and Reduce Churn
Acquiring new customers costs far more than keeping existing ones. Experience designers can help you reduce churn by helping you understand WHY customers churn, and by making interactions more intuitive and frustration-free. When customers are satisfied, they buy more and stay longer.
5. Lower Training Costs and Onboarding Time
Clunky systems and confusing processes increase the time (and cost) of training new employees. Experience designers improve processes and interfaces so that systems are intuitive from day one, reducing the need for extensive onboarding programs. Employees ramp up faster and make fewer mistakes, which results in lower training expenses and a more efficient workforce.
6. Bridge the Gaps Between Teams
Marketing, product, development, and customer support all shape the customer experience. Too often, they operate in silos, which leads to misalignment, inefficiencies, and inconsistent user experiences. Experience designers bridge these gaps by, e.g., creating a shared product vision, aligning teams around customer needs, and fostering cross-functional collaboration. When teams collaborate better, time to delivery is reduced, and customers feel the difference.
Now Is the Best Time to Hire
Right now, there’s a golden opportunity—many large corporations have made short-term cost-cutting decisions, letting go of highly skilled experience designers. For forward-thinking companies, this means access to an incredible pool of talent who can help drive efficiency and savings.
In the short term, an experience designer can help reduce your costs, and when the timing’s right, they can shift their focus to growth and innovation without skipping a beat.
So… What are you waiting for?
If you don’t know where to start, reach out and I’ll help you.