Internal Tools: The Unsung Heroes of Daily Operations
Internal tools are like trusted friends. We use them in our daily tasks, often taking them for granted, expecting them to "just work". Like long-time friends, we put up with their quirks and idiosyncrasies, some of which even become endearing over time.
Internal tools are like trusted friends. We use them in our daily tasks, often taking them for granted, expecting them to "just work". Like long-time friends, we put up with their quirks and idiosyncrasies, some of which even become endearing over time.
The Unavoidable Quirks and the Fight for Better Design
These quirks arise from a variety of circumstances and environmental factors related to human nature and work nature traits. While we can't dictate how individuals process information at a fundamental level, we can help them navigate these tools more efficiently. Despite acknowledging these unavoidable "poor" user experiences, why do we often deprioritize good design decisions for internal tools?
Invisible Features: The Foundation of Intuitive Design
Truly elegant experiences are often invisible, yet expected. We anticipate a blinking cursor in a text input, a date selector to resemble a calendar, a mug to have a handle, and a fork to have curved edges. These are things we've come to expect because the patterns have been engrained over time.
Prioritizing Elegance: A Battle Against Competing Priorities
The development and maintenance of these features require a champion who controls budget, timelines, and delivery. They must care enough about these invisible features to invest in them and fight for their importance. However, prioritizing how people feel on a moment-to-moment basis is challenging in a world of competing priorities such as improving profitability or liquidity.
The Meta-Job: Advocacy for the User Experience
As User Experience (UX) designers, we often find ourselves in the role of a meta-job. We argue for the necessity of these invisible features, much like advocating for curved fork edges to prevent users from stabbing themselves. While letting users learn from their own mistakes is an approach, it's largely inefficient.
The Hidden Costs of Skepticism
The skepticism of "I need to see it to believe it" often has hidden costs. The process of finding the ideal curve for a fork, for example, has cascading effects on everything from the cost of manufacturing at scale to the structural integrity of the fork. All of these would be far less painful if we agreed from the onset that the edge of the fork should be curved.
The Long-term Savings of Invisible Features
While these design decisions may not directly generate revenue, they can lead to substantial cost savings in the long haul. That curve on the fork can become the next expected, invisible feature, saving the business from potential litigation or manufacturing inefficiencies. This is the power of intuition and discernment.
Trust us when we say the curve is important.
Fight for the curve.
Protect the curve.
Neuron: The Art of Storytelling
No matter what our profession, storytelling is central to our lives. It is one of the oldest forms of communication known to man. But for professionals who work in design, where our product is hard to quantify, it is integral to the success of our business. This can be in how we describe past case studies to a prospective client, a new concept or idea to a colleague or even how we explain what it is we do every day to our family and friends. Our February beer and UX Meetup was centered around the art of storytelling. We were joined by designers Joe Cahill, Sin Leung and Christian Tryller with nearly 60 years of design experience between them. The meetup took the format of an informal round circle discussion with questions and answers from our attendees and panel.
Future is Female Powerlifting #56: How to Implement 5thSet Principles as a System
I was thrilled to speak with Heidi Dehnel and Swede Burns at Future is Female Powerlifting once more! Tune in for an interesting conversation on the parallels between a strength training methodology transformed my perspective on design management.
In this episode we chat about:
How I prioritize tasks while allowing herself and her team “deloads” to avoid burnout and maximize efficiency.
How I am still training through the quarantine through some creative solutioning
Balancing long term initiatives and short term initiatives
What is 5th Set for Powerlifting?
What do most powerlifters have in common?
5 Principles of Competitive Strength Sports That Transferred to my Design Career
You learn a lot about yourself when you’re under the bar and in the hole (what we call the bottom of the squat). Strength sports has a way of exposing your vulnerability with a steady hand while building your confidence with a shaky one. In the spirit of focusing on the latter, let’s talk about the ways strength sports positively impacted my career.
UX Support Group #5: Leveraging past work experiences to get into UX
Honored to speak with Chris at UX Support Group. Listen along for details about how I like to lean into previous experiences (design, finance, fitness/wellness) to inform my work.
In this episode I will talk about:
My passion for holistic problem discovery, relationships, and driving impact at scale
How I transitioned from graphic design to product design
Balancing side projects with a 9 to 5
What prepared me for UX work?
Uncovering transferrable skills from one career to another
Advice for new designers: working with product management, developers
Workflows and support
Murphy’s Peaking Cycle
It all begins with an idea.
I’m a superstitious person. If you’ve known me for more than a handful of days, you have probably picked up on this. I don’t fuck with ghosts and cemeteries, I don’t wash my hair on my birthday, I never discuss attempts before a meet, and something always goes wrong with every single meet prep. If I ever experience one undisturbed meet prep, I will immediately be terrified it’s the end of my career.
That being said, there is no such thing as a smooth meet prep for me. Someone close to me gets sick, a breakup happens, a blowout with my best friend, or an injury comes out of nowhere.
You name it, it has probably happened.
On Powerlifting: Some things are more important than making weight
I was fidgeting. I always fidget as the preworkout kicks in. With the wind ripping through my hair, I uselessly tried to clumsily wrap it into a bun, only to have tendrils snake their way out again.
I squeeze his giant hand with my little fingers. The universal sign for “you’re fucking up my hair, slow down.” He drops his foot harder onto the accelerator.
Men.
My phone makes an unfamiliar chime. Shit, I forgot to turn off my ringer. In my distracted state I turn the slim object over, feeling the silky smooth metal under the pads of my fingertips. The flash across the screen screams 6 missed calls from my brother.
Strange. He never calls.
Brute Force Designing: How to Avoid Burning Out on Conceptual Work
Once upon a time I remember believing really brilliant work comes from brilliant concepts. Then I started working in the field and learned that is far from the truth.
Once upon a time I remember believing really brilliant work comes from brilliant concepts. Then I started working in the field and learned that is far from the truth.
As a matter of fact, really brilliant work relies on how big of a stomach you have for:
Tedious tasks
Returning to ideas
Ripping apart work that appeared to be 90% complete
Starting over (and over, and over again)
The Chase for Perfection (And being okay with not getting there)
I am a perfectionist at heart. Perhaps because I have been conditioned to be the very best at everything from such a young age. It is therefore, a surprise that I fell in love with powerlifting.