Show notes: https://designbetterpodcast.com/p/che-douglas

Che Douglas led the transformation of the design team at The Wall Street Journal, from a service-based organization to a strategic component of an embedded Engineering, Product and Design (EPD) structure. We chat with Che, who is now VP of Design at Booking.com, about how he got the right people involved to transform their design organization and spread design throughout the company. Che discusses the use of design sprints and how he showed the value of design to the organization through some of the team's key initiatives.

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Show notes: https://designbetterpodcast.com/p/lori-kaplan

Lori Kaplan is a veteran design leader, whose pioneering work includes authorship of the original Macintosh Human Interface Guidelines in the 1980s. In this episode we speak with Lori about how the Atlassian playbook helps both internal and external teams address design challenges, the deep roots of cross-functional collaboration at the company, as well as Lori’s perspective on how attitudes towards design have shifted in recent years across industries.

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Show notes: https://designbetterpodcast.com/p/quinton-larson

Quinton Larson is a design leader who has consistently brought thoughtful leadership into the companies where he works. In this episode we speak with Quinton about his prior work at IDEO and eBay, his involvement with Indeed’s Job Seeker Journey team, how he makes sure the right people are involved in project kickoffs, and how design systems help create a more connected workflow between designers and developers.

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Show notes: https://designbetterpodcast.com/p/bob-baxley

What do Yahoo, Apple, and Pinterest have in common? Silicon Valley design vet Bob Baxley. With extensive design leadership experience under his belt, Bob knows a thing or two about bridging the gaps between teams to help champion a connected workflow. In this episode, Aarron and Eli tap Bob’s insights on productive design reviews, getting in sync with engineers, and what it takes to build key relationships with executives—all in the name of making products people can’t imagine living without.

Show notes: https://designbetterpodcast.com/p/josh-ulm

Josh Ulm has quite the CV—Adobe Design Lead, Vodafone Head of UX, Oracle VP of Design, and now Wells Fargo SVP of Strategic Design and Insights. One thing he’s learned along the way is that “the most valuable role for design to play is influencing the business—not just the product." In this episode of the Design Better Podcast, Aarron and Eli covered subjects ranging from where the connected workflow is most broken, to the one critical question to ask executive sponsors when starting a project.

Show notes: https://designbetterpodcast.com/p/brad-frost-dan-mall

Enter design system pros Brad Frost and Dan Mall, long-time collaborators known for their expertise in bridging the gap between designers and developers. In this episode of the Design Better Podcast, Aarron and Eli talk with Dan and Brad about reducing friction between these two very different disciplines. They explore a few misconceptions around agile methodology, the risks of the creative technologist role, and breaking the design process to fix it. This is a conversation you don’t want to miss.

Show notes: https://designbetterpodcast.com/p/benjamin-evans

Benjamin Evans, Inclusive Design Lead for Airbnb, is part of a new kind of problem solvers tackling issues like racism, sexism, and bias in digital product design. In this episode of the Design Better Podcast, Eli and Aarron chat with Benjamin about using techniques like design thinking, research, and storytelling to ensure a more inclusive experience for all your users.

Show notes: https://designbetterpodcast.com/p/abigail-gray

Abigail Hart Gray, Director of UX at Google, is one of the most inspiring design leaders we know. A self-proclaimed analytics nerd, Abigail uses numbers to deftly communicate the value of design to her colleagues, giving her team the runway to do great work. In this episode of the Design Better Podcast, Eli and Aarron get Abigail’s take on measuring design’s impact on business, how parenthood has changed her approach to problem solving, and more.

Show notes: https://designbetterpodcast.com/p/julie-zhuo

Listen as Julie Zhuo, VP of Product Design at Facebook and author of The Making of a Manager, recalls some of her earliest professional experiences at one of the fastest growing companies on the planet. She reveals how she got her start and grew to be a highly influential design leader renowned for building top-notch teams. Julie talks about the difference between leading and managing, and shares personal examples that can help you advance your career.

Bio

Julie Zhuo is one of Silicon Valley’s top product design executives and author of The Making of a Manager. Aside from her day job as VP of Product Design at Facebook, Julie writes about technology, design, and leadership on her popular blog The Year of the Looking Glass and in The New York Times and Fast Company.

What if you could unlock the full potential for business impact in design? On today's episode we are joined by Leah Buley, InVision's Director of Design Education and author of the new report on design in business, The New Design Frontier. Leah shares the insights she's learned from surveying thousands of companies to explore the relationship between design practices and business performance. We chat with Leah about how teams are measuring success in design, the dimensions of design maturity, and debunk myths around team size and designer to engineer ratios. Check out the full report at http://invisionapp.com/designmaturity.