Design Better

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.

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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.

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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.

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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.

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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.

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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.

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The next season of the Design Better podcast is nearly here. Listen to a special preview of the upcoming season which focuses on the impact and challenges of the connected workflow. We sat down with some incredible design leaders from Facebook, Airbnb, Google, Wall Street Journal, Atlassian, and Intuit for honest conversations that will give you a fresh perspective on the way you work. Be sure to subscribe for the new season coming soon.

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Show notes: https://designbetterpodcast.com/p/jake-knapp-make-time

What if you could set aside a distraction-free space to accomplish one meaningful thing in your life each day? How might that change your relationships, hobbies, work, or mental wellbeing?

In a special episode of the Design Better Podcast, we talk to Jake Knapp, co-author of the New York Times bestseller Sprint, about his new book, Make Time. The book advocates for forgetting about being productive and focusing instead on being purposeful by using design sprints thinking to define a “highlight” for each day.

If you enjoy this episode, we hope you’ll leave a review on iTunes or Google Play to help others members of the design community discover the podcast.

Bio

Jake Knapp is the author of Make Time and the New York Times bestseller Sprint. Jake spent 10 years at Google and Google Ventures, where he created the Design Sprint. He has since coached teams like Slack, Uber, 23andMe, LEGO, and The New York Times on the method.

Previously, Jake helped build products like Gmail, Google Hangouts, and Microsoft Encarta. He is currently among the world’s tallest designers.

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Show notes: https://designbetterpodcast.com/p/margaret-gould-stewart

As organizations grow, they tend to think in terms of processes and data, and although those elements are vital to scale, teams sometimes lose sight of the why. Key to scaling is building an infrastructure that supports a company’s core mission.

In our final Season 2 episode of the Design Better Podcast, Facebook Vice President of Product Design Margaret Gould Stewart talks with Aarron and Eli about how storytelling, open communication, and keeping the focus on the customer help the company's design team scale.

“The most important thing you can do is have a story around what you're doing, for whom, and why.”

If you enjoy this episode, we hope you’ll leave a review on iTunes or Google Play to help others members of the design community discover the podcast.

Bio

Margaret is a seasoned UX executive with over 15 years experience leading design and research teams, including in her current role as Vice President of Product Design at Facebook. Over the course of her career, she's led user experience for six of the top 10 websites (Facebook, Tripod, Angelfire, Lycos, Google Search, YouTube). She has a proven track record of leadership in a variety of contexts, from startups to Fortune 500.

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Show notes: https://designbetterpodcast.com/p/kim-williams

A design system helps deliver a unified experience for the end user, no matter what the medium. But it also means a cohesive internal experience as well. Design systems unite teams across time and space, bring designers and engineers together through a shared language, and help designers focus on experience over style.

In our newest episode of the DesignBetter.Co Podcast, Indeed’s director of design experience, Kim Williams, talks with Aarron and Eli about the evolution of Indeed’s design system, and how collaboration across the company is key to any design system’s success.

“I think for us, the design system is one part of how people feel about the brand and the product itself. The design system is really this tool that can help you tell your best story.”

If you enjoy this episode, head over to iTunes to leave a review so other members of the design community can learn from Kim too.

Bio

Kim is the design director for Indeed’s Design Platform Studio, leading a team of copywriters, brand strategists, technologists, user researchers, interaction and visual designers, and illustrators defining Indeed’s product experiences. Before joining Indeed, Kim was head of brand systems at eBay and associate creative director at agency Ogilvy & Mather.

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