Final Reflection
If I’m being completely honest, after I took CS147, I swore I would never take another HCI class again. It was a lot, like a lot of work, and at the time it felt overwhelming in a way that made me question if design was even something I wanted to keep doing. And then I took this class.
Within the first week of CS247, after just dipping my toes back in, I realized something I didn’t expect, I actually like this. Not just the idea of design, but the process, the messiness, the iteration, the constant rethinking. It didn’t feel like I was just completing assignments anymore. It felt like I was trying to understand people.
Before this class, I thought design was mostly about usability and aesthetics, making things intuitive, clean, and efficient. I understood that users mattered, but I didn’t fully grasp how much design shapes behavior. I saw products as tools people use, not systems that actively guide what people do.
This project completely changed that for me. Working on our accountability app made it clear that we weren’t just building features, we were trying to influence human behavior. That realization hit me hardest when we decided on the accountability text feature. On the surface, it seemed simple, send reminders, help people stay on track. But the deeper we got, the more I realized that even something like a text message carries weight. It can motivate someone… or it can stress them out. It can feel supportive… or it can feel like pressure.
That tension stuck with me. One thing I really loved about this class was how real everything felt. We would come in with ideas we thought were solid, and then testing would humble us immediately. For example, we assumed things like likes and comments were obviously clickable, but users didn’t see them that way at all. Or how the order of “complete,” “in progress,” and “not started” actually affected how people interpreted their progress. Those moments were lowkey humbling, but also really valuable. They reminded me that just because something makes sense to me doesn’t mean it makes sense to everyone else.
At the same time, I’ll be honest, there were moments I didn’t love. The open-endedness of the class could be frustrating. Sometimes it felt like we were just iterating without knowing if we were moving in the right direction. But looking back, I think that uncertainty was part of the point. Real design doesn’t come with a clear roadmap.
A big challenge we ran into was around flexibility. Our initial design was pretty structured, users set goals, tracked them, and that was it. But during testing, people wanted more control. They wanted to edit their goals, adjust things, make it fit their actual lives. At first, that felt like it was breaking our system. But eventually, we realized the system was the problem. We redesigned it to be more flexible, and that shift really changed how I think about design. Sometimes the best thing you can do is loosen control instead of tightening it.
Ethically, this project made me think a lot more deeply than I expected. Our app is built around nudging, trying to help people follow through on their goals. And I think what makes our approach okay is that users choose to opt in. But I also started thinking about how easily that could cross a line. If we made the notifications more aggressive, or added more social pressure, it could quickly go from helpful to overwhelming. That’s something I didn’t think about much before this class, but now it feels impossible to ignore.
Privacy was another layer. Accountability often involves sharing progress, which means there’s a level of vulnerability. We tried to design in a way that gave users control over what they share, but I can definitely see how future versions of something like this could overstep. It made me realize that privacy isn’t just about data, it’s about trust.
This class also made me more aware of who we’re designing for. It’s really easy to default to designing for people like yourself, especially at a place like Stanford. But not everyone interacts with technology the same way. Thinking about inclusivity and edge cases wasn’t always something we got perfectly right, but it’s something I’m carrying forward.
If I think about what I’ll remember years from now, it’s not going to be a specific feature we built. It’s the shift in how I think. Design isn’t neutral. Every choice, what you show, what you hide, what you prioritize, affects people in real ways.
If I could go back, I would do more testing earlier. That’s probably the biggest practical lesson I’m taking away. Now, I see design as something deeper than I did before. It’s not just about making things work, it’s about making sure they work for people, in a way that actually supports them.
And honestly, the biggest surprise of all? I went from saying never again after 147… to realizing this is something I genuinely want to keep doing. Next time I’m building something, I’ll test earlier, question my assumptions more, and think harder about the impact, not just whether something works, but how it makes people feel. And I think that’s the biggest thing this class gave me.
