Course Description:
When you are in an ethical debate at work about a product or UX design that clearly focuses on business goals at the expense of customers, the experience can feel very isolating. What can you do?
In this course, you will learn how ethical debates have many moves in common, not unlike a chess game. You will learn moves you can make to stop debates before they start, like responsible setting of KPIs and brainstorming unintended consequences. You will also learn common arguments from folks in business, legal, executive, and product roles and how to counter them. Finally, you will learn all-new moves involving research, brand equity, and the psychology of moral judgments that give Comm Leaders an edge.
This course is about learning how to do well by doing good. Assignments include weekly 5-slide persuasive decks and a final group-project making a storyboard of a full ethical debate. Readings will alert you to societal issues around Dark patterns in UX design, Privacy and employee surveillance, Socially-responsible marketing and Ethical uses of AI.
This class is a good match for students who:
• have some understanding of the fundamentals of human centric and UX design;
• want to work on a portfolio-level group final project built on the foundations of moral, psychological, and business principals;
• are keen to engage in ethical debates with peers and the instructor
Meets Law & Ethics requirement.
University of Washington
Department of Communication