Conscious Tech

Season 1 is complete! Join me for a review of the season, who the audience is, what we learned from each guest, and overall learnings.

Chapters:

(00:00:00) Story about launch

(00:02:40) Timeline of events

(00:04:13) About the audience and performance

(00:08:00) Learnings from each episode

(00:10:34) Overall season 1 learnings

___________________________________________________________

I'm Sera Tajima, Founder, Climate Tech Advisor & Investor. 🤙

I talk about:

→ Product Growth Strategy (Growth, Design, AI)

→ Climate Tech

→ Venture Capital

⁠⁠⁠Connect for more good energy⁠⁠⁠ ⚡️

Become a sponsor: [email protected]

Carlo Liquido is Founder of Lady Bandit Studios, a local product studio dedicated to shaping a more equitable future in Hawaii. Pi’iku, his internship program, provides career-building opportunities for aspiring Hawaii-connected designers.

Chapters

(00:00:00) Get to know Carlo

(00:02:10) Spotlighting Hawaii voices

(00:03:56) Carlo’s journey into design

(00:06:35) Moving home to Hawaii

(00:07:24) Economic Impact on Kanaka Maoli

(00:09:27) How tech companies calculate pay

(00:11:19) Carlos’ work at Shopify

(00:14:07) Circular Design Internship

(00:17:08) Bridging the gap between education and jobs

(00:19:08) Cohort 3 rebrand to Pi’iku

(00:23:34) The Craft’s Product Design Accelerator

(00:25:40) Companies don’t get value from interns

(00:28:55) Bias towards hiring seniors

(00:29:40) The future of design education

(00:31:54) Financial struggles with pursuing a business

(00:34:00) Building businesses that are not extractive

(00:34:21) The 6 categories in life

(00:35:30) Be local

Where to find Carlo Liquido:

• Pi`ikū Co: https://piiku.co

• Pi`ikū Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/piiku-co/

• Carlo LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/carloliquido/

• Carlo Website: https://www.carloliquido.com/

___________________________________________________________

I'm Sera Tajima, Founder, Climate Tech Advisor & Investor. 🤙

I talk about:

→ Product Growth Strategy (Growth, Design, AI)

→ Climate Tech

→ Venture Capital

⁠⁠⁠Connect for more good energy⁠⁠⁠ ⚡️

Become a sponsor: [email protected]

Many designers struggle to gain buy-in for their work, to communicate with stakeholders, or to measure their impact. Join Sera in this episode to understand how to design like a growth hacker. If this interests you, the Sustainable Growth Playbook is now available (linked below).

Chapters

(00:00:00) An Introduction to growth thinking

(00:02:00) Advance your design career with business thinking

(00:03:53) The intersection of growth hacking and product design

(00:05:28) Identifying the business lever

(00:07:38) How to think about the customer lifecycle and growth frameworks

(00:09:52) Risks associated with growth hacking

(00:10:36) A strong growth strategy starts with retention

(00:12:31) Good growth practitioners are humanity centered

(00:14:48) Where your power lies as a technologist

Recommended Resources:

• Sustainable Growth Playbook (The Craft)

• Decentering profit (referenced)

• Rethinking capitalism (referenced)

• Reforge

• Center for Humane Technology Design Guide

• Tristan Harris on Trevor Noah Podcast

___________________________________________________________

I'm Sera Tajima, Founder, Climate Tech Advisor & Investor. 🤙

I talk about:

→ Product Growth Strategy (Growth, Design, AI)

→ Climate Tech

→ Venture Capital

⁠⁠⁠Connect for more good energy⁠⁠⁠ ⚡️

Become a sponsor: [email protected]

Gabriela Lucía Lorenz is Director of UBS in Switzerland. She has an MBA in Sustainable Business, is originally from Argentina, and has worked in Switzerland for 10+ years. She is an advocate of ethical design practices, fostering sustainability and a change of paradigm — from user centric to humanity and planetary centered design.

Chapters

(00:00:00) Gabriela Introduction

(00:03:34) Design Director at UBS Zurich

(00:05:50) MBA in Sustainable Business

(00:09:38) Ethics and Sustainability

(00:12:39) Moral values for individuals and companies

(00:18:01) Talking about DEI in Europe

(00:19:00) Getting started with ethics

(00:23:41) Frameworks for design and business

(00:30:03) How to approach projects for sustainability and ethics

(00:34:14) Growth, power, and money unregulated isn’t working

(00:35:58) The definition of success

(00:36:57) Work life balance

Recommended Resources:

Don Norman, Design a Better World

Kelly Small, The Conscious Creative

Ruben Paten, Politics of design

The Center for Humane Technology

Mariana Salgado Podcast ⁠https://disenoydiaspora.org/Uxía⁠

Arias García ⁠https://universomeraki.com/⁠

Where to find Gabriela:

LinkedIn: ⁠https://www.linkedin.com/in/gllorenz/⁠

___________________________________________________________

I'm Sera Tajima, Founder, Climate Tech Advisor & Investor. 🤙

I talk about:

→ Product Growth Strategy (Growth, Design, AI)

→ Climate Tech

→ Venture Capital

⁠⁠⁠Connect for more good energy⁠⁠⁠ ⚡️

Become a sponsor: [email protected]

Chapters

(00:00:00) Thijs Introduction

(00:02:15) Internship with Albert Heijn

(00:06:39) Internship with medical center

(00:07:25) Why Thijs didn't pursue a 9-5

(00:10:21) Design content writing

(00:13:46) Thijs' approach to Linkedin

(00:15:58) Thijs' system for notes

(00:18:09) Writing topics

(00:20:44) Linkedin as a business model

(00:26:26) Using LI to land clients

(00:29:22) Design teams need marketing

(00:31:22) Building a business that reflects your ideal life

(00:34:48) What's the direction of Linkedin

(00:37:52) Evangelizing design

(00:40:45) Everyone is a designer

(00:41:28) The value of writing

Recommended Resources:

Where to find Thijs Kraan:

___________________________________________________________

I'm Sera Tajima, Founder, Climate Tech Advisor & Investor. 🤙

I talk about:

→ Product Growth Strategy (Growth, Design, AI)

→ Climate Tech

→ Venture Capital

⁠⁠⁠Connect for more good energy⁠⁠⁠ ⚡️

Become a sponsor: [email protected]

In this episode, Leanne Waldal, Principal at ADP, shares her expertise with us on how to measure the value of design, perspectives on layoffs, career growth, and more.

Chapters

(00:00:00) Introduction

(00:03:10) How to navigate politics

(00:05:05) Set up your own board

(00:06:08) Learn from sales

(00:09:57) Find a coach

(00:11:54) Working styles

(00:13:17) Manager Training

(00:14:36) Layoffs

(00:17:00) A typical week

(00:18:25) The value is in the hands of the customer

(00:24:32) Who and how to research

(00:30:45) Is research valued?

(00:33:28) Sell yourself using data

(00:37:33) Balancing work and personal life

(00:42:44) Observe how humans operate

(00:43:26) Resources

Recommended Resources:

⁠Follow Leanne on Linkedin

Design X

ResearchOps Community

Steve Portigal

___________________________________________________________

I'm Sera Tajima, Founder, Climate Tech Advisor & Investor. 🤙

I talk about:

→ Product Growth Strategy (Growth, Design, AI)

→ Climate Tech

→ Venture Capital

⁠⁠⁠Connect for more good energy⁠⁠⁠ ⚡️

Become a sponsor: [email protected]

In this episode Sera shares an excerpt from the Conscious Tech newsletter exploring the limitations of capitalism.

Chapters

(00:00:00) Why capitalism?

(00:03:39) Capitalism is not inherently bad

(00:05:41) Where does capitalism fall short?

(00:06:16) 1. Business is about the maximization of profit

(00:07:34) 2. Companies lacks an ethical foundation

(00:08:18) 3. Companies operate with a low level of consciousness

(00:09:20) 4. Money buys influence

(00:10:43) Rethinking Capitalism

(00:13:10) What does change look like?

For full access, ⁠⁠subscribe to the newsletter⁠⁠.

___________________________________________________________

I'm Sera Tajima, Climate Tech Advisor & Investor. 🤙

I talk about:

→ Product Growth Strategy (Growth, Design, AI)

→ Climate Tech

→ Venture Capital

⁠⁠Connect for more good energy⁠⁠ ⚡️

Become a sponsor: [email protected]

Dan Mall is the Founder of Design Systems University. He's an expert in helping companies scale design systems. In this episode Dan and Sera talk design systems, why they matter, and how to implement them.

Chapters

(00:00:00) Dan intro

(00:01:58) How Dan got into design

(00:04:17) Starting his agency

(00:07:10) Find equilibrium as a business owner

(00:08:40) Design Systems

(00:10:16) The spectrum of design systems

(00:13:50) What organizations Dan works with

(00:15:15) Get buy-in to scale something that's working

(00:16:29) Dan's approach  — "Piloting"

(00:18:57) Designers need to learn the language of business

(00:22:36) We are not a great representation of users

(00:23:47) Design Politics

(00:27:14) Have your own opinions

(00:32:36) Templates, patterns, and packages

(00:36:06) How to get started

(00:43:37) No parity between design and code

(00:47:15) Get people to spend less time in Figma

(00:49:15) Build a tool that people use

(00:51:50) Publicize your Design System

(00:53:20) Design Systems democratize design

For Sera's highlights, ⁠subscribe to the newsletter⁠.

Where to find Dan Mall:

Design Systems: https://designsystem.university/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/danmall/

Twitter / X: https://twitter.com/danmall

Website: https://danmall.com/

___________________________________________________________

I'm Sera Tajima, Founder, Climate Tech Advisor & Investor. 🤙

I talk about:

→ Product Growth Strategy (Growth, Design, AI)

→ Climate Tech

→ Venture Capital

⁠⁠⁠Connect for more good energy⁠⁠⁠ ⚡️

Become a sponsor: [email protected]

Redona Dida is Founder of The Sofire, a design agency. She went from 0 to over 100,000 followers on Instagram in the span of a year. In this episode, Redona shares her career growth with us, the journey of becoming a mom, approach to social media, and how she started her agency.

Chapters

(00:00:00) Redona Introduction

(00:01:25) How she got into design

(00:03:15) The starving artist

(00:07:39) How Redona got her first job as a web designer

(00:10:00) A strong social profile creates trust

(00:11:25) Getting pregnant while working

(00:13:20) How her company started

(00:14:25) Redona's Instagram journey

(00:17:15) Using human psychology

(00:23:18) What makes Redona successful on Instagram

(00:25:20) Hateful comments

(00:29:10) How are we caring for people

(00:30:35) What to do when you don't have data

(00:34:20) Don't just follow design steps blindly

(00:38:36) Supporting female designers

(00:46:50) Redona's agency is fully booked

(00:49:00) Get Inspired

Where to find Redona Dida:

Community: https://www.skool.com/cro-growth-academy/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/redona-dida-growth-designer/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/redonadida/

Threads: https://www.threads.net/@redonadida

Visual Voice Substack: https://redona.substack.com/

___________________________________________________________

I'm Sera Tajima, Founder, Climate Tech Advisor & Investor. 🤙

I talk about:

→ Product Growth Strategy (Growth, Design, AI)

→ Climate Tech

→ Venture Capital

⁠⁠⁠Connect for more good energy⁠⁠⁠ ⚡️

Become a sponsor: [email protected]

Tommy Geoco is Founder and author of UX Tools. 

Chapters

(00:00:00) Tommy Introduction

(00:01:21) Making design education better with UX Tools

(00:02:01) The design industry is competitive

(00:02:50) The bootcamp business model

(00:04:10) The best way to learn is on the job

(00:07:14) Ditch the cynicism of the way things evolve

(00:09:09) All companies have dysfunction

(00:10:10) Tommy's journey into design

(00:15:35) Learning online and the shapes of work

(00:26:20) How to attract the right fit

(00:30:00) Make time for play

(00:46:39) Have a growth mindset

(00:51:41) Build real relationships

(00:55:13) Newsletter & Micro Courses

Get Sera's podcast highlights & resources.

Where to find Tommy:

UX Tools: ⁠https://uxtools.co/⁠

Tiktok: https://www.tiktok.com/@designertom

LinkedIn: ⁠https://www.linkedin.com/in/tommygeoco/⁠

Website: https://www.designertom.io/

___________________________________________________________

I'm Sera Tajima, Founder, Climate Tech Advisor & Investor. 🤙

I talk about:

→ Product Growth Strategy (Growth, Design, AI)

→ Climate Tech

→ Venture Capital

⁠⁠⁠⁠Connect for more good energy⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⚡️

Become a sponsor: [email protected]