Ep. #8: Mentoring is one of the most powerful tools for developing talent and leadership… it’s also often taken for granted as something anyone who’s been working for awhile can do. So we end up with senior practitioners going into a managerial track with no management training, and no real mentoring experience. And yet, think about how important managers have been in the jobs you've had, whether they've been good, or bad. Mentorship is part of management, but it's also a practice unto itself.

Being a good mentor doesn’t just happen — it takes intention & thoughtfulness, empathy and self-awareness. In this episode I'm talking with Kim Crayton, who is a business coach and a champion for many issues in tech, including diversity, inclusion, and also an expert on mentoring among many other topics in education and technology. I saw a talk Kim gave on overcoming the challenges of mentoring and asked her to talk with me about how we can become better mentors.

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Ep #7: How people interface with technology is constantly evolving, but we’re seeing big changes in the technolgy platforms themselves, and that means big changes in the UX field. This week is the beginning of an occasional series on UX careers in transition, starting with voice design, talking with Cheryl Platz, a principal designer at Microsoft. Cheryl has worked on high profile voice platforms including Cortana and Alexa, and she has also moved between voice-based design and visual-based design throughout her career. 

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Ep #6: Technology is changing the way we perceive reality — whether you have some kind of headset on or not… and it’s much more than pokeman go. In this episode we hear from Galit Ariel, self-proclaimed ‘digital hippy’ and author of Augmenting Alice, and Chirryl-Lee Ryan, a trans-disciplanary design leader,  two brilliant multi-disciplinary UX experts, on two different sides of the globe, about augmented reality, the minister of loneliness, and experience design as the ‘muse’ of product development.

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Ep #5: Generating, sustaining, and selling creative ideas requires a lot more than inspiration.There is process and structure - which doesn't sound or even always 'feel' creative. It isn’t always easy or straightforward. As author Scott Berkun says, it’s a dance, which he talks about in his latest book, The Dance of The Possible. In this episode we talk about some of the tools you can use for staying creative, selling creative ideas, or motivating your teams' creativity. Which may or may not include getting locked in a closet. And which Scott definitely does not recommend that you do, just to be clear.

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When you're designing products for people, having empathy for those specific people (aka users) is critical. Yep, you know that, but how can you increase empathy for the users from the entire team, and stakeholders too? In this episode, Karen Reilly, UX Director at Iterate in Dublin, Ireland, shares insights and techniques inspired by her work in improv for developing more empathy, not only for users but within our teams as well. Karen is an expert both at creating user-centered products, and at improv, not to mention being an advocate for cows who do yoga. You’ll get great ideas for all of those things after listening in on this fun and insightful episode of UX Cake. 

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Episode #3: Collaborating across teams is hard, and it doesn't happen without intention, and some structure. But the benefits for your product, wow - it's like the difference between a beautiful chocolate soufflé and... just a mess on your kitchen counter. (Guess which one has a better UX.) David and Mary Sherwin are experts in teamwork (and design & innovation) and, as they put it, 'helping teams make better cake.' They joined me for a fun and informative conversation about how to make a better cake... er, better teams (sorry, we really like cake metaphors!). 

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We know showing the business value of UX is the way to any MBA's heart/wallet, but it's often still a struggle. In this episode we get practical advice and techniques from former Amazon executive and UX champion, Eva Manolis.

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Exploring the benefits of being a UX mentor with Rachelle Kauffman, UX Designer at Zillow. The benefits can be surprising, including improving your own design and research skills, increasing confidence, and upleveling your career in user experience or product design.

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Learn a little about Leigh and Laura who make Amplify Alliance, the producer of UX Cake, and hear about what this podcast is about, why we're making it, and what's in store.

UX Cake is a podcast for user experience professionals who want to be more effective and happy in their career. Every week we talk to experienced UX pros and industry insiders for practical advise on building skills to get the best outcomes for our selves, our teams, our users, and our UX careers. We'll hear stories from the trenches and hear from experienced pros how they handle the issues and obstacles that can frustrate and even sabotage the best UX work and careers, and learn techniques for increasing the value of our design and research. Our aim is to help our UX community become stronger and more effective, by sharing the experience and expertise from leaders in the field.

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