A friend pointed me to a job post that says as much about the company as who they are looking for. The text of the job post is in italics, with my reactions in bold.

"We are looking for talented people…"

It seems that every third job posting for user interface design or user research starts with this statement.

User Centric is looking for talented people…but instead of posting something traditional, let me take a different perspective and write about what it is like to work at User Centric and hopefully you’ll realize it is where you want to go with your career.

A fresh approach to a standard corporate memo. Hooray!

Our goal is to affect positive change in the user experience. User Centric is a company that is privileged to have projects where the outcomes can influence the lives of millions – or sometimes just a handful. What we do has meaning and it begins with a desire to understand how people interact with technology.

In any given month at User Centric, you might work on a project that will make daily tasks easier for 40 million users… and then switch gears to then work on a different project where the impact is extremely personal (in one example, after a test session, the user thanked me because in her words, "This product will change the way my kids will look at their mother").

As a job seeker, I’d be all over this one because it screams, "We provide meaningful work that even your grandmother could relate to. " People want impact and meaning.

When it comes to understanding user experience, there is no perfect approach in design or single way to capture and measure the experience. We continue to evolve our practices and techniques with each and every project. We encourage our team members to learn and educate their colleagues. User Centric is a place where I can say that I learn something new almost every day.

A learning community, where one can grow, is one of the biggest attractors for smart people.

Ultimately what allows us to enjoy our work is our team. Our employees at User Centric make all the difference. We have found we’re more insightful and creative practitioners when we can leverage the experience and intellect of a great team. And we have fun together! There is a tremendous energy that comes out when our teams work on user research and interface design projects.

Reminds me of a Japanese proverb, "None of us is as smart as all of us." While the proof is in the pudding, the fact that the posting talks about the benefits of team work makes me want to know  more.

User Centric is looking for people who want to make a positive kind of difference – people who want to learn about multiple knowledge domains and work on more than just one type of product. You will never be bored at User Centric.

This last line grabbed me. Simple and compelling. A job where I’ll never be bored.

For an extra treat, take a look at the Interesting Fact section of the bios for each team member.  It’s a great way to show more than credentials, expertise, and experience and put the whole person to a name.

Gavin Lew, a managing director at User Centric, emailed me about how he came to write the job post:

"I just woke up one morning and realized how much I hated the standard job postings. So, I decided to write something different. It turned out to also be a nice way to gauge whether the candidate had a similar perspective. It generated passion and energy for some. Those who made no mention were correlated with candidates who never went to the website to learn about our firm."

Often, it doesn’t take a lot to be remarkable, other than to decide to do something different. What have you done lately that’s memorable and worth talking/blogging about?