Big Design Latin America 2016 was held in Quito, Ecuador. This workshop was designed to help different practitioners understand how their work rolls-up into the broader UX umbrella and to help foster an ongoing UX Community in the region.
Presented at the Enterprise UX Meet-Up in Austin 2.24.16
Discusses ways UX professionals to build and gain trust in organizations that aren't immediately disposed to support them. Examine the different roles that can help you along with understanding their concerns and pressures. Use the tools you already have to shed light on the value UX brings to an organization.
Establishing Trust (presented by Ken Courtright)
Today's Growth Consultant Digital Footprint 2014
November 14-16, 2014 - Day Two
Concourse LAX (Los Angeles, CA)
From Stranger To Prospect: Capturing More Web Visitors And Converting More Of...Noisy Little Monkey
Acquiring new visitors to your website from Google and the various social channels which now exist is ever more difficult in today’s competitive marketplace. Jon will reveal the secrets from successful campaigns which have driven new traffic and converted leads into sales.
Real Deal MeetUp Event | How To Have Success Automating Your Real Estate Busi...Charles Blair
In this presentation you'll learn how a complete real estate newbie wholesaled, rehabbed, land-lorded and raised over 3.4 million dollars in private financing, In her first year as a real estate investor...
Presented at the Enterprise UX Meet-Up in Austin 2.24.16
Discusses ways UX professionals to build and gain trust in organizations that aren't immediately disposed to support them. Examine the different roles that can help you along with understanding their concerns and pressures. Use the tools you already have to shed light on the value UX brings to an organization.
Establishing Trust (presented by Ken Courtright)
Today's Growth Consultant Digital Footprint 2014
November 14-16, 2014 - Day Two
Concourse LAX (Los Angeles, CA)
From Stranger To Prospect: Capturing More Web Visitors And Converting More Of...Noisy Little Monkey
Acquiring new visitors to your website from Google and the various social channels which now exist is ever more difficult in today’s competitive marketplace. Jon will reveal the secrets from successful campaigns which have driven new traffic and converted leads into sales.
Real Deal MeetUp Event | How To Have Success Automating Your Real Estate Busi...Charles Blair
In this presentation you'll learn how a complete real estate newbie wholesaled, rehabbed, land-lorded and raised over 3.4 million dollars in private financing, In her first year as a real estate investor...
The 10 rules to build a badass startup team by Alice ZaguryTheFamily
"Building a great team isn't enough, you need to build a cult."
There are many things that can determine the success or the failure of your startup, but no factor is more powerful and more in your control than how you build your team.
In a startup, execution is EVERYTHING.
You need the right people, and you need the right mindset.
Alice Zagury knows a little bit about this...
Alice Zagury is cofounder & CEO of TheFamily, a private investor (300+ startups, $100M+ raised for top companies). Previously, she created the first startup accelerator in France, Le Camping. She's had a lot of experience on hiring & culture, being around startups for many years and working on her own team at TheFamily.
My session from The Inbounder in Valencia May 2016. Successful Content Marketing for SEO - getting the big links and coverage by having the right mindset and focusing on the creative idea. Thinking like a 50s ad exec and executing like a geek!
We all have business user requirements that drive our data warehouse and business intelligence system implementation. Delivered in various formats, these documents, emails, chats, or meeting minutes can be interpreted many different ways, depending on the reader. An effective approach to end the miscommunication...draw a picture. When properly constructed, an architecture diagram, data model, or process model will have only a single meaning. That is why a picture can replace a thousand words.
Presented as a TED style talk at Rittman Mead BI Forum 2014.
Merrick Furst Explains Startup Engineering and Flashpoint GTHypepotamus
Merrick Furst (@merrickfurst), Founder of FlashpointGT (@FlashpointGT) and distinguished Professor at Georgia Tech, gave the opening keynote at the June 4 Startup Day ATL and introduced the concept of Startup Engineering. FlashpointGT is built upon this concept, which makes keeping founders connected to reality the top priority.
Furst’s keynote set the stage for the entire day and explored what it takes to build a startup, the difficulties you will face along the way and advice for startup founders and future entrepreneurs. The process of from ideation to creation of a startup is difficult and opaque, but in this keynote, Merrick provides clear and concise advice to help aid budding startup engineers.
This is my Deck for Robinsons Homes' Sales Rally for 2018. Their motto is 'Start the Good Life'. The talk is all about how to get people to listen to what you have to say. It's hard for people to hand out flyers and leaflets in the mall to people who are passing by. Often people just shrug it off. Selling is tough. There are real problems along the way. The secret to getting people to listen to you is simple but it takes a lot of hard work. Check out the deck and enjoy!
Striving for Success in 2017 for Remodeling Businesses with Mark RichardsonSurefire Local
Mark Richardson shows you the 3 key ingredients for success, how to position your business for future success, where most businesses fail and how to avoid the same mistakes, and how your business can plan for a prosperous 2017. This is one video you won't want to lose!
Lifecycle Marketing for Nonprofit organizations to drive donations and volunt...Infusionsoft
Creating a marketing strategy that attracts interest, educates benefactors and increase donations in your nonprofit is essential.This presentation reviews the Lifecycle Marketing framework specifically as it relates to nonprofit organizations. It includes the steps involved in each phase and benefits of implementation in your nonprofit. In the face-to-face presentation we dive deep into email structure including killer subject lines, effective copy and great calls to action. If you’re looking to transform your nonprofit and take it to the next level you need to treat it like a business and implement marketing practices that drive results.
I Second that Emotion - Using Emotional Intelligence to Drive Customer and Em...Mattersight
Diane Magers, chair of the Customer Experience Professionals Association. Diane built a 25-year career as a CX executive at such companies as Sysco Foods and AT&T by bringing a thoughtful perspective on how to reimagine customer interactions through the lens of emotion. At CXPA, she is dedicated to advancing the customer experience field through research, developing standards, networking and promoting the profession. At Call to Loyalty 2016, Diane speaks about the role emotion plays in the customer experience.
Find tips on enhancing your InMail messaging and how to make data-driven decisions to connect the right candidate with their next dream job.
Continue your talent acquisition transformation at Talent Connect 365: http://linkd.in/1z8YEaf
Presenter: Rand Fishkin, Co-Founder & CEO, SparkToro
In 2001, Rand Fishkin dropped out of college to start a company with his mom, Gillian. Over the next 17 years, that company, Moz, became one of the most high profile and high growth businesses in the marketing software world. In this transparent, vulnerable talk, Rand will walk through some of the biggest regrets, lessons learns, and things he'd do differently based on his experience. From management and hiring to marketing tactics to product strategy, self-awareness, and more, this presentation will help anyone who's starting or joining a new company avoid some big pitfalls, and feel less alone.
Social Media and Advertising agency presentation deck. Based out of Vancouver, BC, Junction uses digital marketing to deliver conversion-focused campaigns. The social media space, and the internet in general, needs more genuinely awesome content and less click-bait. We're working to make the internet a better place.
For the full deck, including services and pricing, contact Conner@Junctioncs.com
The 10 rules to build a badass startup team by Alice ZaguryTheFamily
"Building a great team isn't enough, you need to build a cult."
There are many things that can determine the success or the failure of your startup, but no factor is more powerful and more in your control than how you build your team.
In a startup, execution is EVERYTHING.
You need the right people, and you need the right mindset.
Alice Zagury knows a little bit about this...
Alice Zagury is cofounder & CEO of TheFamily, a private investor (300+ startups, $100M+ raised for top companies). Previously, she created the first startup accelerator in France, Le Camping. She's had a lot of experience on hiring & culture, being around startups for many years and working on her own team at TheFamily.
My session from The Inbounder in Valencia May 2016. Successful Content Marketing for SEO - getting the big links and coverage by having the right mindset and focusing on the creative idea. Thinking like a 50s ad exec and executing like a geek!
We all have business user requirements that drive our data warehouse and business intelligence system implementation. Delivered in various formats, these documents, emails, chats, or meeting minutes can be interpreted many different ways, depending on the reader. An effective approach to end the miscommunication...draw a picture. When properly constructed, an architecture diagram, data model, or process model will have only a single meaning. That is why a picture can replace a thousand words.
Presented as a TED style talk at Rittman Mead BI Forum 2014.
Merrick Furst Explains Startup Engineering and Flashpoint GTHypepotamus
Merrick Furst (@merrickfurst), Founder of FlashpointGT (@FlashpointGT) and distinguished Professor at Georgia Tech, gave the opening keynote at the June 4 Startup Day ATL and introduced the concept of Startup Engineering. FlashpointGT is built upon this concept, which makes keeping founders connected to reality the top priority.
Furst’s keynote set the stage for the entire day and explored what it takes to build a startup, the difficulties you will face along the way and advice for startup founders and future entrepreneurs. The process of from ideation to creation of a startup is difficult and opaque, but in this keynote, Merrick provides clear and concise advice to help aid budding startup engineers.
This is my Deck for Robinsons Homes' Sales Rally for 2018. Their motto is 'Start the Good Life'. The talk is all about how to get people to listen to what you have to say. It's hard for people to hand out flyers and leaflets in the mall to people who are passing by. Often people just shrug it off. Selling is tough. There are real problems along the way. The secret to getting people to listen to you is simple but it takes a lot of hard work. Check out the deck and enjoy!
Striving for Success in 2017 for Remodeling Businesses with Mark RichardsonSurefire Local
Mark Richardson shows you the 3 key ingredients for success, how to position your business for future success, where most businesses fail and how to avoid the same mistakes, and how your business can plan for a prosperous 2017. This is one video you won't want to lose!
Lifecycle Marketing for Nonprofit organizations to drive donations and volunt...Infusionsoft
Creating a marketing strategy that attracts interest, educates benefactors and increase donations in your nonprofit is essential.This presentation reviews the Lifecycle Marketing framework specifically as it relates to nonprofit organizations. It includes the steps involved in each phase and benefits of implementation in your nonprofit. In the face-to-face presentation we dive deep into email structure including killer subject lines, effective copy and great calls to action. If you’re looking to transform your nonprofit and take it to the next level you need to treat it like a business and implement marketing practices that drive results.
I Second that Emotion - Using Emotional Intelligence to Drive Customer and Em...Mattersight
Diane Magers, chair of the Customer Experience Professionals Association. Diane built a 25-year career as a CX executive at such companies as Sysco Foods and AT&T by bringing a thoughtful perspective on how to reimagine customer interactions through the lens of emotion. At CXPA, she is dedicated to advancing the customer experience field through research, developing standards, networking and promoting the profession. At Call to Loyalty 2016, Diane speaks about the role emotion plays in the customer experience.
Find tips on enhancing your InMail messaging and how to make data-driven decisions to connect the right candidate with their next dream job.
Continue your talent acquisition transformation at Talent Connect 365: http://linkd.in/1z8YEaf
Presenter: Rand Fishkin, Co-Founder & CEO, SparkToro
In 2001, Rand Fishkin dropped out of college to start a company with his mom, Gillian. Over the next 17 years, that company, Moz, became one of the most high profile and high growth businesses in the marketing software world. In this transparent, vulnerable talk, Rand will walk through some of the biggest regrets, lessons learns, and things he'd do differently based on his experience. From management and hiring to marketing tactics to product strategy, self-awareness, and more, this presentation will help anyone who's starting or joining a new company avoid some big pitfalls, and feel less alone.
Social Media and Advertising agency presentation deck. Based out of Vancouver, BC, Junction uses digital marketing to deliver conversion-focused campaigns. The social media space, and the internet in general, needs more genuinely awesome content and less click-bait. We're working to make the internet a better place.
For the full deck, including services and pricing, contact Conner@Junctioncs.com
How to Build Trustworthy AI Products by Philosophie Dir. of AIProduct School
You can’t just ‘add AI’ to a project and expect it to work. It isn’t magic dust that can be sprinkled on a product. The key to building systems that are integrated into people’s lives is trust. If you don’t have the right amount of trust, you open the system up to disuse and misuse.
During this talk we went through the building blocks of AI from a UX Design perspective, what trust is, how trust is gained, and maybe more importantly lost, in UX/UI, how to effectively team humans/machines and techniques you can use day-to-day to build trusted AI products.
How a Design-Driven Company can Multiply its Business ValueAndrea Picchi
Throughout most of history, companies and business strategies have been shaped around quantitative types of values like functional and financial. Together we will analyze the common steps behind the transformation strategy of companies like Apple, Google, Samsung, Nokia, and Sony, and how these companies were able to create and nurture a design-driven group capable of delivering a rich and meaningful experience with the ultimate goal of building a long-lasting relationship with their customers.
"Stop making excuses a culture first approach to product centricity" by Jorda...Productized
Many companies understand the value / benefits of becoming a holistic, Design-driven, Product-centric organization
Jordan's PRODUCTIZED presentation outlines a playbook of culture development, helping leaders and teams to identify opportunities to LIVE these principles, to identify opportunities for their application and experience the benefits of their comprehension and use.
How To Create Content That Will Generate Mentions And PRPointvoucher
Advertising 2015 is about quality! Content that makes sense and creates value to people. This presentations takes you through the overall steps of creating great content that people will share and talk about. And if you're really good at it you might even get a lot of PR.
Smart Social Summit 2017 | Agents, Bots & Where They Meet: The Next Iteration...Spredfast
One of the hottest social marketing topics of 2017? Automation. But automation isn’t the only path to social customer care. Join us as we explore the full range of care—from automation to human--and discuss the various strategies, technologies, and stories that are driving greater efficiency, faster response times, and better organizational resourcing.
Presentation by Maaike Doyer and Doug Morwood of Business Models Inc. during workshop Practical Tools to Re-invent your Business (Model) at the Global Innovation Forum in London on November 20th 2014.
What Separates the Best From the Rest: What Makes Great Agencies GreatTim Williams
The truly great agencies share a set of principles and practices that distinguish them from the other 12,000 agencies in America and make them brands in demand.
BrightonSEO: How to Pitch and Idea Your Client/Boss Cannot Say No ToEight Moon Media Ltd.
You've been given the task to create an eye-catching campaign for your client or boss, but how do you persuade them it's right for them? I covered this in my speech at BrightonSEO. Discover more...
Product Leadership IRL: Things I wish I'd known a decade agoEsteban Contreras
Product leaders guide product strategy, empower teams, and ease go-to-market strategies. They have to be customer-obsessed. And data-informed. Definitely outcomes-oriented. Plus, they need to know who knows what. And be credible and sufficiently likeable. All while ensuring the product doesn’t go off a cliff and the team doesn’t quit for greener pastures. In this talk, Esteban will share candid insights and advice he would give his younger self - if only he could. Like being mission-driven, understanding ideas, and taking the time to lead well. His tips and stories may help you watch out for mistakes and identify areas to double down on.
This is Esteban Contreras' talk at INDUSTRY Virtual conference for software product managers on September 22, 2020. http://www.industryconference.com
Esteban is a Sr Director of Product at Hootsuite. http://www.hootsuite.com
Once, the way to an engineer’s heart was a fat salary, a fatter pile of stock and a sleek new laptop.
Today, a company’s culture, employer brand and product or service count just as much when recruiting this in-demand workforce.
In fact, a Glassdoor survey says 52% of engineers would accept lower compensation to work at a company with a cool reputation. That’s good news for companies in retail, manufacturing, healthcare and other industries not typically thought of as high-tech.
Looking for a few good engineers? Join us for “How to Recruit Tech When You’re Not a Tech Company,” where we’ll explore:
Best and worst recruiter tactics revealed by engineers themselves
The importance of company reviews, social media outreach, friends and meet-ups in winning the hearts and minds of engineers
Recruiting and hiring engineers in a competitive landscape
Similar to BDLA16 Unpacking UX - Understanding how your skill sets fit together (20)
The problems we set out to solve aren’t always the ones that need solving. Adam Polansky will talk about some different ways that you can get under the hood with problems and investigate ways to help real problems present themselves and the criteria you can use to go after them.
IAS18 Fit and Finish: The Importance of Presentation Value to Your DeliverablesAdam Polansky
Revised for IAS18. Discussion about gauging your audience and your deliverables in terms of fidelity. Working lo-fi to hi-fi and doing it publicly. Breaking free from the standard canon of UX deliverables and the best tools you can use.
Speaking to Small Rooms - UX Australia 2017Adam Polansky
Workshop slides from UX Australia - 7 August 2017
Public speaking isn’t just for big rooms with a podium and microphone.
Sometimes it’s just you and 5,10 maybe 20 people. They might be your clients or stakeholders or your project team. Any time you address a group, you need to get your message across and know you’ll be understood. Prep and practice are always important but when you’re speaking close-up there are different things to think about and opportunities you don’t have in a conference hall.
In this half-day workshop, Adam Polansky will cover:
Preparation with long or short notice
Delivery and room dynamics
What to consider when you speak to executives
Keeping the conversation alive after the meeting
We’ll even talk about giving a pitch.
This session will set you up to own the room the next time you have to present.
Fit & Finish: The Importance of Presentation Value in UX DeliverablesAdam Polansky
The most important UX deliverables are your thoughts and observations. Wireframes, Journey Maps, Personae, and slide decks are just the vehicles we use to communicate our ideas. Your content is critical but style plays a role in getting to express your thoughts. Style adds to the context.
- Let’s talk about:
- Deliverables from low-fi to high-fi
- Tools and technique
- Non-traditional deliverables
- How to gauge what’s appropriate for different circumstances
We’ll add some good stuff to your toolbox and give you options the next time you deliver your great ideas.
CanUX16 - Blurred Lines - Considering Physicality in Digital DesignAdam Polansky
Long gone are the days when digital design meant creating apps for someone sitting upright, 18-24 inches away from a screen. Our phones are our computers. We wear our notification systems. We move through a world that plots our position and responds in different ways depending on whether we’re in a restaurant, at a bus stop, near a retailer or at home.
Join Adam as he talks about conceptualizing applications that not only take-in a screen presence but must extend to the unique ways we use technologies and the physical environments that go beyond the screen.
I got my first Design job in 1983 with a small ad agency working for a remarkable man. 30 years later, I talk about the lessons I learned and tell stories about how I learned them.
Ideas & Innovation: Simple Premise - Small StartsAdam Polansky
Ideas & Innovation: Simple Premise - Small Starts Innovation is a word that is commonly used and seldom defined.
Ideas occur all the time but do they all deserve the time and effort necessary to realize them?
There is a startlingly simple definition for innovation because innovation, by itself, is simple. It’s also a form of the creative process and can’t be obtained on demand. But when you do come upon something innovative, the real work begins: You have to examine and justify a new idea. You have to convince others that your idea is worthwhile.
Adam Polansky will give you that simple definition and show you how to gauge the merit of an idea along with a short case study about a grass-roots idea that didn’t turn out as planned – it turned out better! He’ll also show you how to frame the discussions you’ll need to have in order to get your ideas off the ground and suggest some other avenues available to move from concept to concrete.
Presentations - It Ain't All About The PowerPointAdam Polansky
This presentation was given at the Big (D)esign Conference in Dallas. Someone titled the session "Presenting in Politically Charged Environments" I don't know who did that but it sounded kind of dangerous so I didn't complain to anyone.
Travelocity staged an infomration and training week for the employees in the Curtomer Experience Group. This presentation is a high-level primer about IA, its origins and its practice
A Process By Any Other Name...: Applying Information Architecture with bridge...Adam Polansky
This is my presentation from the 2006 IA Summit in Vancouver, BC. The summary is that the practice of IA is not about artifacts but the thinking that goes into them and the way you assess which artifacts to use.
Information Architecture & Why you care about it as a designerAdam Polansky
The Art Institute of Dallas recently added IA courses to their design and multimedia degree plans. I worked with the instructors to revise the curriculum to make it more relevant to actual practice. I also give the introduction lecture.
This presentation is not intended to make converts but rather to expose designers to the role of IA, help them understand the value and be able to identify them in the wild.
Faceted Feature Analysis: Increasing Integrity Through Needs AnalysisAdam Polansky
This article will explain a process called “Faceted Feature Analysis”. The facets refer to the three characterizing facets within any project those being; User Value, Business Value and Ease of Implementation. It also refers to the three constraints that govern every project, those being; Quality, Cost and Time. The process involves characterizing facets and crossing them with the constraints.
IA and RIA: You know more than you think you doAdam Polansky
I’ve been working as an Information Architect for nearly ten years but it wasn’t until recently that I had the opportunity to work on the development of a rich internet application or RIA. While I had made some effort to get an understanding of what an effort like that might involve, like many things, you can’t really get a clear idea what it’s like to do something until you actually do it.
This presentation describes my recent involvement in the development of an enterprise-level rich Internet application. It outlines the things I think are the same, different as well as a few pitfalls to avoid.
White wonder, Work developed by Eva TschoppMansi Shah
White Wonder by Eva Tschopp
A tale about our culture around the use of fertilizers and pesticides visiting small farms around Ahmedabad in Matar and Shilaj.
Dive into the innovative world of smart garages with our insightful presentation, "Exploring the Future of Smart Garages." This comprehensive guide covers the latest advancements in garage technology, including automated systems, smart security features, energy efficiency solutions, and seamless integration with smart home ecosystems. Learn how these technologies are transforming traditional garages into high-tech, efficient spaces that enhance convenience, safety, and sustainability.
Ideal for homeowners, tech enthusiasts, and industry professionals, this presentation provides valuable insights into the trends, benefits, and future developments in smart garage technology. Stay ahead of the curve with our expert analysis and practical tips on implementing smart garage solutions.
Book Formatting: Quality Control Checks for DesignersConfidence Ago
This presentation was made to help designers who work in publishing houses or format books for printing ensure quality.
Quality control is vital to every industry. This is why every department in a company need create a method they use in ensuring quality. This, perhaps, will not only improve the quality of products and bring errors to the barest minimum, but take it to a near perfect finish.
It is beyond a moot point that a good book will somewhat be judged by its cover, but the content of the book remains king. No matter how beautiful the cover, if the quality of writing or presentation is off, that will be a reason for readers not to come back to the book or recommend it.
So, this presentation points designers to some important things that may be missed by an editor that they could eventually discover and call the attention of the editor.
Transforming Brand Perception and Boosting Profitabilityaaryangarg12
In today's digital era, the dynamics of brand perception, consumer behavior, and profitability have been profoundly reshaped by the synergy of branding, social media, and website design. This research paper investigates the transformative power of these elements in influencing how individuals perceive brands and products and how this transformation can be harnessed to drive sales and profitability for businesses.
Through an exploration of brand psychology and consumer behavior, this study sheds light on the intricate ways in which effective branding strategies, strategic social media engagement, and user-centric website design contribute to altering consumers' perceptions. We delve into the principles that underlie successful brand transformations, examining how visual identity, messaging, and storytelling can captivate and resonate with target audiences.
Methodologically, this research employs a comprehensive approach, combining qualitative and quantitative analyses. Real-world case studies illustrate the impact of branding, social media campaigns, and website redesigns on consumer perception, sales figures, and profitability. We assess the various metrics, including brand awareness, customer engagement, conversion rates, and revenue growth, to measure the effectiveness of these strategies.
The results underscore the pivotal role of cohesive branding, social media influence, and website usability in shaping positive brand perceptions, influencing consumer decisions, and ultimately bolstering sales and profitability. This paper provides actionable insights and strategic recommendations for businesses seeking to leverage branding, social media, and website design as potent tools to enhance their market position and financial success.
Between Filth and Fortune- Urban Cattle Foraging Realities by Devi S Nair, An...Mansi Shah
This study examines cattle rearing in urban and rural settings, focusing on milk production and consumption. By exploring a case in Ahmedabad, it highlights the challenges and processes in dairy farming across different environments, emphasising the need for sustainable practices and the essential role of milk in daily consumption.
4. @AdamtheI
TITLES
WHEN DO THEY MATTER?
COMMERCIAL ILLUSTRATOR
ART DIRECTOR
INFORMATION ARCHITECT
SENIOR IA
LEAD IA
PRINCIPAL IA
IA MANAGER
PRODUCT DELIVERY MANAGER
IA + USABILITY MANAGER
IA + USABILITY DIRECTOR
UX DIRECTOR
INTERACTION DESIGNER
PRODUCT MANAGER
UX STRATEGIST
SENIOR PRODUCER
5. @AdamtheI
TITLES PROJECT TEAM
Tells your team what they
can expect from you
COMPANY
A way to describe the role
externally and possibly a
rate of pay
COMMUNITY
A way to compare similar
roles
THE REST OF THE WORLD
A way not get funny looks at
cocktail parties
18. @AdamtheI
TRUSTWORTHY PEOPLE…
Tell the truth
Do what they say they’ll do
Communicate in a timely way
Bring unexpected value
Are on time
Are friendly
Are sincere
Are genuinely gracious
Are consistent
Trust others
There’s a guy, let’s call him Luis. He has a food cart. He get’s up early in the morning to get the ingredients he uses every day. He has a good relationship with the guy at the market so he knows he’s getting the best quality. He keeps his cart clean organized and working properly. When he greets a customer, he’s always polite and friendly. He has skills, he doesn’t just prepare the food, he’s turned it into a show. He has flair, he asks questions to make sure he serves his creations-up exactly the way people want them and makes sure they have napkins and everything else they need to enjoy their meal. Luis is a UX professional. He doesn’t know what that is and would laugh if you compared him to some of the people sitting in this room but he is a UX professional.
Luis fits this description, he has researched the best ingredients and how to get them. He deliberately designed what happens from the moment someone comes-up to his cart. He creates something that people not only expect but enjoy. How closely do you compare to Luis? No he isn’t designing web-sites or mobile applications but he does offer a product. So do you. Even if you’re offering thoughts.
This is you isn’t it? Within the life of a project, somewhere along the way , you are researching, designing or developing aspects of a product that result in an experience. If you can do a good job, it’s a good experience, if you can do a great job, it’s a great experience. Notice I say “can”. Sometimes it’s not up to you but we’ll talk about that later.
Let’s get to this first. People spend a lot of time worrying about titles. I don’t. I’ve had too many to count. The funny thing is, my job never really changed that much. I’m okay with most titles I’ve been given. A title can be important but within limits. Let me explain…
A title is most important when it communicates an expectation about what you do. Who needs to know that the most? Your project team. It really doesn’t matter what that title is as long as it carries meaning for the people you work with most closely. Strategist, Information Architect, Interaction Designer, UX Designer, Art Director all have general meanings but they are worn differently from company to company and even project to project. You may even need to establish those expectations at the beginning of every project. Next is the company. What you actually do may not matter as long as the HR department has a description and they can hire for the position and determine the rate of pay that can come with it. Community. Your title gives you a way to make broad comparisons between roles and activities that help determine who participates in the community. That decision may be your own. The rest of the world doesn’t matter. We’d like to be able to explain it to our parents. We’d like to tell someone what we do and get the same recognition as, say a teacher or doctor or even a software developer but does it really matter if people don’t recognize it?
As I mentioned before, there are challenges when it comes to getting a business to understand that you do more than just make pretty pictures or wireframes but UX defies titles in a way because there are so many things that happen between an idea and the things necessary to make that idea real. The truth is, your title doesn’t make it any easier.
Everyone take a single index card.
Look at this topic: Employee Training and Education.
Write one idea you have for that topic.
Pass your card to a person next to you.
Write another idea.
Repeat 2-3 times
Tape the cards on the wall and have everyone put a mark on the ideas they like the best.
My purpose for this is to give everyone a chance to see how the others in the room think about the same thing. What did you observe?
This is a good tool for brainstorming because it gives everyone an equal chance to voice their ideas.
Before you try to establish your place in a company, you have to establish a place with yourself. In the simplest terms, whether you use an Agile or Lean process of doing just enough to keep a project moving in the right direction, if you follow a waterfall method of finishing each piece of work before it’s handed-off to the next person, every project goes through some continuum between an idea and reality. Your contributions take place somewhere along that continuum. You have to figure-out where.
Where does your best work happen – when ideas are being formed? Where they are expanded and qualified? Where they are matched-up with the laws of physics? Or, where are they put into production? You probably work across most of these areas to some degree but there’s always a place where you are most at-home.
This is a matrix created by Nathanial Davis. Rather than worrying about what a title says you do. Take a look at what you actually do. Where are you an expert? Where are you proficient? Where do you have a basic understanding and what is completely foreign to you? Using this graphic will help you see where you are best positioned to solve problems.
UX work is usually what we call front-loaded; most of the work happens in the early stages. You may be very active when people are trying to figure-out the best concepts to use, You may be more involved in making those concepts understandable or testing them to see if they work with users. You may work very closely with developers to make sure that they can build the concepts or refactoring if they can’t.
Where is that place? You know where you are happiest. Does it match the area where you have the most skill? If so, go deep. Become the best you can be at that.
I get asked this question a lot. It usually begins with someone telling me they’re a designer and they want to know what code platform they should learn. I ask them if being a developer is what interests them and they say not really but it seems like I have to know how to code to get a job. NOT TRUE! Let me explain something about companies. When there’s a project that requires more skills than there are employees, a manager requests to hire people to do different jobs – let’s say 2; a graphic designer and a front-end developer. The company only gives the manager enough funding for one person so she smashes the two job descriptions together. It seeks a person who can come-up with a concept, plan the organization of all the content, design the final artwork and develop the code. There are a few people who can do that. They are called unicorns because they are rarely seen and thought to be mythological.
Here’s the truth. You don’t have to be a unicorn because the job requirements say so. That’s just business being tight with the funding. I once had both the budget and the instructions to hire unicorns. I found a couple of people claiming to be able to do “all the things” but it became obvious that they had specific areas where they were experts and other areas where they were adequate. I eventually reclassified them both. You want to know something, They were happier. Because their more specialized roles concentrated on the areas they enjoyed the most. They went from being adequate generalists to being outstanding specialists. I hired great people to fill the gaps they couldn’t cover so I got much better results from the collaboration of talented, happy people than I did from a single stressed-out one.
There are some challenges with being a UX professional. For one thing, businesses don’t always get the value of UX which isn’t hard to understand since many people in UX have trouble explaining it. Don’t talk about UX. Talk about Quality because that’s where the UX has the greatest impact. That doesn’t make it easy though. Quality has to fight with time and money for attention from product owners. Time and money cause them immediate pain. Poor quality is a pain for later so quality is often the first thing to go when product owners start to cut scope in order to make better time or save money. That simply means that people in charge will push quality away when time or money is causing them pain. When I still considered myself an artist, people would look at my work. If they understood anything about creativity or design, they would ask questions like “What was your inspiration?” or “Why did you choose that perspective?”. If they weren’t visually creative, they would always ask one question – the same question. “How long did that take?” I USED TO HATE THOSE PEOPLE!! For one thing, some of my best work took no time at all while some of worst stuff took forever probably because I just wasn’t inspired so I was trying to force a concept. Time was irrelevant to how good or bad a piece was. I would roll my eyes and disregard whatever that person had to say after that until…I realized something. People who aren’t considered creative often look at the world through spreadsheets – this is a vicious generalization but think of the finance people you know. When they are looking at things through that lens of Time, Cost and Quality, they can’t see the qualitative or creative aspects of a project but they can see how the money is being spent. So... Show them a piece of artwork and what are they faced with? They want to say something nice. They don’t get the creative part so they’re left with time and money. It’s probably rude to ask how much it costs so they’re only left with time. If it took a long time it must be good right? I realized they weren’t trying to insult me or be stupid, They were trying their best to be polite. Misguided, yes, but still polite. When you’re talking with these people who are often in charge of the budget, you have to frame what you’re doing in terms of time saved or money saved or earned. One technique is to look down the road and use that fact that they don’t know what the costs of re-design wil lbe if the product doesn’t perform well over quality issues or usability issues but here will be a cost and it will be higher later than it will be today.
Sometimes the objectives are set without being informed; 6-8 weeks! Why? It sounds good? It’s even worse for UX if the time is determined by developers who aren’t yet sure what they’re beung asked to do. 6-8 Weeks? We’ll take 7 please and it took them a week to decide that. You have to magically produce all the thinking and the deliverables a week before they asked for them because we all know “Real work isn’t happening until someone is writing code” right? You may be in for some ugly conversations because regardless of what the timeline says, the laws of physics will win every time and they’re still being enforced. You can either try to get the time-line altered or start working and have that talk when people start asking for your work. Sometimes even if you can see the train-wreck coming, you have to step aside and let it crash before anyone will understand. Even then, you never say “I told you so. That’s your cue to offer solutions not to point or wag your finger. Always offer a way forward.
Challenges also exist within other disciplines, Marketing may feel like they know their customers better than they know themselves. They don’t need you telling them what will work best. Product owners may only see you as the wireframe person and if you really want to help, shut-up and color like a good designer. A project manager may see you as just adding more time to the project plan. If the people who work on projects every day don’t believe in your value, you’ll just be annoying to them. Again, position yourself as someone who is there to make them into a hero or make pain go away.
The last time I was on a job search, I heard from many companies that said, “We need UX!” “We want you to build a UX practice here.” I only had two questions: “Are the executives behind this?” “Do the project leads believe this is necessary?” Often, I got responses that were not very precise about how they hoped I could make that change. Or I could get them to believe; in other words – No. If the answer was no to either question, I was finished with the interview. Because the third question has to do with having the freedom to make the decisions on projects. IF I had no cover on the first two requirements, then the answer to number 3 was already no.
Do you have a champion?
Do you have peer support?
Do you have the freedom to make decisions?
You may have a resume that will give you credibility but it’s trust that gives you the freedom to work the way you need to. My dad used to say Trust is like a bank account, you have to invest in it over time. You can withdraw from that account too and lose trust. You may be lucky and someone will give it to you to lose but that’s like an audition. The benefit of the doubt. It doesn’t usually survive under pressure. Lasting trust shows itself when the pressure is on; when there’s no evidence that you can deliver other than your track record and the trust you’ve built in those around you. There’s no quick way to build lasting trust.
Start with yourself. How would you rate your trustworthiness? You should look back through your annual/bi-annual reviews, look for anything that suggests people trust you especially if they are higher in the organization than you and more especially if they are people of influence in the company. The broader their influence the more they can empower you.
Having trust means that people are giving you something they value, something that needs protection. What do stakeholders have that you can protect for them? Usually it’s their ass. You can keep them out of trouble. It’s their reputation, you can make them heroes given the opportunity
Your stakeholders. It doesn’t matter if it’s the CEO or the product manager, Everyone considered to “own” a project is going to have to answer to someone from the board of directors, public shareholders, the Executive VP of something or other. They usually are being measured against Key Productivity Indicators that were established the previous year or quarter. It may be a dollar amount - either revenue or profitability. It may be a C-Sat score, market share or some measurement of cost savings. Those KPIs may be reasonable or not. Often, you may not know what they are. Ask. There might be a way for you to influence those measurements.
The designer may be you or it may be someone levels above you. How do they feel about their impact. Are they in the same boat you are: “just shut-up and make stuff pretty”? Or, are they responsible for design across channels; print, video, events and digital. What’s their digital IQ and how well are you supported? Do they place any value on internal applications that are both functional and elegant? How is their success measured and how can you contribute?
Bless their hearts! These folks carry to world on their backs. On one hand, they have the kind of skillset that doesn’t breed the kind of back-seat driving that UX does on the other hand, they are often asked how long it takes to develop something without knowledge of the systems they have to use or outcomes they have to meet. Tell them the project will last 9 weeks and they will tell you they’ll need eight of them. Maybe they do have the systems understanding but maybe that system is flawed and they’re reluctant to open the hood. Let’s face it, when the project runs over, they’re the ones who take the beating not you. Can you convince someone that front-loading, due-diligence and UX will lighten the load for Dev and more importantly, mitigate potential costs of re-development?
Remember them? At an enterprise level they can be an interesting bunch. You could be working on an app that will be used by 5 experts or 2000 suppliers. What do you know about the environment they occupy, what drives them, what work-arounds are they using? How is their success measured can you talk to them – maybe even sit with them for a day?
Make a list with three columns
In the first column list the people or positions that have the most influence over what you do. Start with yourself.
In the second column write down the thing they do, need to understand or do differently to realize success.
In the third column write down if you can influence the second column, if not, who can?
As a group you are employees of a expensive restaurant. Owner, Chef, Bartenders, Waiters, Maitre’D. The restaurant once had a great reputation but something has changed. What is it? Location? Food Quality? Service? Pricing?
What big idea would set things on the path to success?
Decide on one big idea.
Create a map to show how you’ll get from here to there.
Choose one spokesperson to explain it to the room.
You may not have ever worked in UX but you may have been doing UX all along because that’s how you solve problems. You may be hearing about certain concepts and terms for the first time this week but you might understand them perfectly because that’s how you think. Take a look at the problems you have solved in the past. Apply the context of UX to the solutions you found and you’ll find it easy to hold yourself out as a UX professional.
UX is how you think. It’s not your title. It’s not your deliverables. It’s what you do to inform those things
You don’t have to be a unicorn. A team of happy very skilled specialists can do more than one stressed-out generalist
Trust is the the thing that gives you room to work. Earn it. Protect it.