Driving Digital Transformation with User Experience - Highlight of Quebec's 2017 UX Day event

Québec's International UX Day 2017, presented by Capian, UX -co and Les Soirées UX, took place on November 1st 2017. For this 3rd edition, more than 150 professionals from the digital community came together from all over the province of Quebec.

Held each year in November, this event is an opportunity for the digital professional community to come together around an issue we all care about: making sure that the digital evolution takes into account the human needs and the associated challenges. The main goal of this day is to have experienced professionals give an overview of the state of UX and how they overcame challenges, so that participants leave this day with the confidence that they can face their own challenges in their organizations.

We invited 7 speakers from various industries and we owe them the success of the event; big thanks for your presence.

Québec's digital hardware store - Canac's project

First, thanks to Simon Goudreault, Director of Business and Web Technologies at Canac, who was our Honorary President. We ended the event together with an interview during which we discussed the challenges posed by the digital transformation of Canac and retail stores.

Adopt a hat and get out of the digital transformation alive

We launched the event by presenting to the 150 guests on site a brief workshop on the Six Thinking Hats Method. With a practical case, we took a look at a business opportunity from different perspectives. Our presentation was intended to provide participants with tools to help them align their vision with their business objectives (and those of their clients). Given the participation rate, we can say that the exercise was a success!

Design Thinking, or how to navigate in unknown lands

The talk of our second speaker of the day, Corinne Leulier, focused on the subject of Experience Design. Director of Customer Experience at Klee Group, Corinne has shown how experience design can boost the performance of companies using it. With real business examples, Corinne showed participants how to achieve their goals and offer the best experience to their customers.

Storytelling and Social Media, has content become the customer experience?

Jacinthe Busson, co-founder of Fastory, Elegantt and Kontest, talked about Storytelling in the era of Social Media. Our speaker demystified this new practice of Content Marketing, exposed the issues involved and provided us with practical advice to help us optimize the user experience of our digital platforms.

Facilitate the change of a corporate culture through EX (employee eXperience)

Nadège Bide, Head of UX and Desgn Thinking at Palo IT in Paris talked about the concept of Employee eXperience (EX). EX can be the key to success for companies undertaking a digital transformation. With returns on real customer cases, our speaker showed that there's no miracle recipe, and that the role of the designer must go beyond the design of ready-made solutions.

Well-deserved lunch break

Our participants were then able to enjoy a well-deserved lunch break to discuss the topics covered in the morning. Thanks to Le Cercle, who welcomed us for a third year. The success of this event would not have been possible without the valuable collaboration of the entire team.

Learn to juggle SEO and UX in the Inbound Marketing era

Frédéric Charest, Marketing Director at Gestisoft presented a topic he's passionate about: Inbound Marketing, SEO and UX. During his presentation, Frédéric exposed the challenges of optimizing the user experience AND SEO at a time when content marketing is becoming more competitive, while presenting good and bad examples.

Beyond UX: The Importance of the Customer eXperience (CX) for Successful Digital Transformation

Catherine Gauthier, Senior Customer Experience Consultant at CX4 Lab, presented the last talk of the day. After detailing the differences between UX and CX, Catherine touched on the issues facing companies striving to deliver a consistent and satisfying experience to all of their customers.

One major contribution of UX in digital transformation: the redefinition of business models

Although we don't have the video of her conference, we still wanted to highlight the presence of Chrystel Black, from JDA in Montreal. Chrystel has made us aware of the challenges facing software companies in adapting to new technologies by telling us how JDA has implemented UX methods to apply organisational changes through different projects.

Thanks

Thanks to our quality speakers, the day was a great success! A special thank to Corinne, Jacinthe and Nadège who came all the way from France to be with us. The 150 participants and ourserlves are grateful that you have traveled a long way to come and share your unique experience.

We also want to thank the City of Quebec Economic Development Strategy, which greatly contributes to the financial support of the Les Soirées UX events.

Finally, we thank you, the participants! You have been present in large numbers, from all over the province of Quebec, and have ensured the dynamism and the success of the day. Knowing that the digital future of Quebec businesses is in the hands of passionate and interested people like you, we are more than confident for the future!

Who knows; maybe we'll see a fourth edition of the International UX Day! Send us your suggestions of topics and speakers, whether it is in UX or any other digital domain. We want this event to be thought for and by our participants.

Thank you again and see you soon!