Welcome to Design Kaffé, a podcast where we have mindful, candid conversations for designers in tech. In our fortnightly episodes, we discuss a wide range of topics to explore what it means to be a designer, the challenges we face in the tech industry and share thoughts about our craft.

Our first episode this season will come out on the 15th November.

Happy listening!

In our last episode of season 4, we ask ourselves: do we need product managers? Can people in other disciplines, like designers and engineers, do product management, or is it essential that there is a dedicated PM on every team? When does it make sense to have PMs and when does it not?

This week we're talking about delivery speed and the fine balance to find with delivering quality. We explore why it matters, the impact delivery speed can have on the quality of the team's outputs and how we as designers can face this challenge.

We talk about money. How transparent should we be about salaries with our peers, recruiters, and companies? How should salary negotiations be handled or not handled? What about raises and promotions?

Follow us on Twitter @designkaffe and check out our website designkaffe.com.

We're back this week with a heavy topic on discrimination. We're trying to unpack how being discriminated feels like, what discrimination looks like and why it occurs in the workplace. We also explore how we can be better allies and improve our work environments.

Follow us on Twitter @designkaffe and check out our website designkaffe.com.

We talk about nepotism and other signs of toxicity in the workplace. We discuss why it’s so damaging to individuals and teams when there’s systemic toxicity at work, and share thoughts on what to do when you find yourself in these situations.

Follow us on Twitter @designkaffe and check out our website designkaffe.com. New episode every other Friday!

We explore the challenges and difficult feelings of taking time off from work due to mental health. We discuss why it is tricky to be honest and upfront about it, and fears we may have about the perception others have of us and our reliability at work.

Follow us on Twitter ⁠@designkaffe⁠ and check out our website ⁠designkaffe.com⁠. New episode every two weeks on Friday

This week Tiia Meuronen and Tom Kerwin guest our podcast to share their experiences with redundancies and having their hours and pay cut. We talk about how you can look after yourself while going through such challenging experiences, how companies handle redundancies and pay cuts well and not so well, and what the wider design community can do to look after each other.

Find Tom on LinkedIn, his Innovation Tactics deck on Pip Decks, his Pivot Triggers on Maven, and his consulting services on Trigger Strategy Group.

Follow Tiia on LinkedIn and check out her company Béa Fertility.

Follow us on Twitter @designkaffe and check out our website designkaffe.com. New episode every other Friday!

Today we’re discussing feedback and how it can sometimes be delivered poorly. We explore in what contexts or situations poor feedback tends to occur and how we can best react to it. 

Follow us on Twitter @designkaffe and check out our website designkaffe.com. New episode every two weeks on Friday

We talk about mediocrity and low standards where design over time doesn’t deliver impact or meet the standards set by ourselves and others. We discuss what might cause mediocre design, how experience as leaders and designers can affect our standards, and what we can do to improve our design standards.

Follow us on Twitter @designkaffe and check out our website designkaffe.com.