There are two goals that designers almost always group together:

1. Make a useful product
2. Make it easy to understand

But my interview with Sam Stephenson changed my thinking completely 👀

So this episode breaks down Granola’s go-to-market strategy and why I’m copying it for my own startup.

• Sam Stephenson (Co-founder of Granola)
• Colin Dunn (Co-founder of Visual Electric)

Jack Brody joined Snapchat as one of the early designers where he spent 10 years and eventually became Head of Product.

So this week’s episode features a lot of lessons learned from the early design team at Snap and an inside look at what makes their culture so special.

But we also go deep into Jack’s new role as the Chief Product Officer at Suno where he’s helping design the future of music. So we end up having quite the discussion on creative launchpads and the impact of AI.

Some highlights:

• Suno’s vision for the future of music
• How AI flips the design process on its head
• Jack’s viral Kim Kardashian moment at Snap
• How Jack grew his strategy muscles at Snap
• The 3 types of competitive advantages with AI
• The big unlock while designing Suno’s creation UX
• a lot more

Suno is hiring!

I’ve interviewed a lot of designers who have landed some pretty high profile roles and I’m starting to notice some trends 👀

So this video breaks down 6 portfolio tips that you can use to stand out.

Lovable has quickly become the go-to way I build my ideas with AI and this week we get to hear from their first designer Nad Chishtie.

We go deep into what it takes to succeed as a founding designer and all of the ways AI is shaping modern product teams.

Some highlights:

• Nad’s tips for collaborating creatively with AI tools
• How designers can be enablers instead of bottlenecks
• How Nad balances Figma with new AI tools like Lovable
• Why Lovable built and deleted a Figma-like layers panel
• What it’s like at the fastest growing startup in European history
• a lot more

• Nad mentions one of his favorite AI tools Granola
• I talked about Unicorn Studio

My #1 source of imposter syndrome is when I see designers prototyping beautiful interactions like this or even this.

It’s one thing to create gorgeous interfaces, but crafting complex interactions from first principles is designing on expert mode. And it’s a big reason why Linear lists interactions as a requirement three separate times in their job description for principal designer.

So this week’s episode is all about how to unlock the skill of interaction design 👇

• Gavin Nelson (Mobile designer for Linear)
• Janum Trivedi (Prototyping specialist at Airbnb)
• Alex Cornell (Gen-AI designer at Meta)
• Dennis Muller (Founder + designer at Amie)
• Dan LaCivita (Co-founder of Play)

I use Granola every single day and it’s quickly become a beloved product in the tech community.

But it was a winding journey to get there…

So in this episode their co-founder and designer, Sam Stephenson, gives a behind-the-scenes of what it was like going 0 → 1 with Granola:

• How to navigate the idea maze for an AI product
• What Sam has learned about prompt engineering
• What it takes to succeed as an early stage startup designer
• How they arrived at Granola’s breakthrough interaction pattern
• A glimpse of Granola’s future product roadmap and teams strategy
• The piece of advice that reshaped how they think about onboarding
• a lot more

• ⭐ Granola is offering 3 months free for you and anyone on your team(!!) using this link
• They’re also hiring a founding designer
• Sam mentions Soleio who was their first investor
• Daniel Kahneman is the psychologist Sam mentions
• The Science of Managing our Digital Stuff
• David Lee is the YC Partner who gave them onboarding advice

If you liked this episode then you’ll enjoy the interview with Colin Dunn (co-founder and designer of Visual Electric)

I’ve spent a lot of time studying how the best design teams operate and two of my favorites are Ramp and Plaid.

So this episode shines a light on specific practices they put in place to create a culture of craft 👇

What do Raycast, Daylight, Amo, The Browser Co, and Mainframe all have in common?

They all hired Ellis Hamburger to help tell their story.

So this episode is a bit different...

We're going to get away from the pixels and go deep into how you can use language to tell a compelling story about your product.

Some highlights:

• How to tell a story that people care about
• Lessons from the Language team at Snapchat
• Breaking down specific copywriting strategies
• Questions to help you figure out your product’s story
• What we can learn from the CEOs of Snapchat vs. Browser Co.
• How to make your product onboarding unforgettable
• a lot more

• Ellis talks about the Browser Company’s “Peek” video
• Jordan Singer’s Mainframe website
• Daylight computer website
• Ellis mentions the 222 onboarding
• The Permanent website (”design is how its made”)
• Ellis quotes the Build book
• Amo’s “Where did our friends go?” manifesto
• Raycast’s “Why” page and Focus mode

AI introduces an opportunity for all kinds of novel interaction patterns.

But it creates a whole new category of design challenges too…

And this episode breaks down the biggest challenge of all.

• Colin Dunn (Founder and Designer of Visual Electric)
• Maheen Sohail (Gen-AI designer at Meta)
• Tyler Angert (Founder of Patina Systems)
• Maggie Appleton (Design engineer at Normally)
• Ammaar Reshi (Head of Design at ElevenLabs)

This week’s episode is with Alejandro Matamala Ortiz, the cofounder and Chief Design Officer at Runway—one of the leading generative AI companies in the world today.

The way they work is incredibly unique. So a big focus of this interview is digging into how AI is shifting the way products get built and what it all means for designers:

• How the lines are blurring between roles
• How AI flips the order of building new features
• What it means to “carve” AI products vs. build them
• How Alejandro believes the role of design will change
• Why the embed frontend engineers on the design team
• Where the film and video industry might be headed next
• a lot more