Design Life – Details, episodes & analysis

This episode is sponsored by Playbook, which is a collaborative platform for creatives to store, organize, and share their work. It features AI-powered search and integrates seamlessly with design tools, making it a great space to manage all your files and projects. Join the "30 Days of 30 Projects" Challenge with Playbook to elevate your creative skills and unlock your full potential!

In this episode, Femke and Charli delve into the journey of transitioning from an individual contributor to a design manager, including distinct responsibilities and skills required for effective management in the creative industry. They talk about their training experiences, essential books, and learning opportunities that contribute to the development of successful management careers.

Timestamps:

0:34 - Intro

01:16 - Catch-Up

03:31 - Playbook sponsorship

04:52 - Training for Management Skills

06:38 - Charli's Current Management Training at Kit

08:24 - Femke’s Training Overview

16:15 - Book Recommendations

• The Making of a Manager: What to Do When Everyone Looks to You by Julie Zhuo
• Radical Candor by Kim Scott
• The Manager's Path by Camille Fournier

19:23 - At what point of your career did you get the coach?

21:08 - How to balance the relationship between external coaching and internal management?

23:37 - Did you have a chance to coach others in management?

25:16 - Is there anything Charli would like to pursue in management training, specifically in design leadership?

Big thanks to our sponsor for this episode, Playbook! Be sure to check them out and see how they can elevate your workflow

Femke’s course “Product strategy for designers”

Share your topic suggestions for the show with us at hello@designlife.fm

This episode is sponsored by Playbook, which is a collaborative platform for creatives to store, organize, and share their work. It features AI-powered search and integrates seamlessly with design tools, making it a great space to manage all your files and projects. Join the "30 Days of 30 Projects" Challenge with Playbook to elevate your creative skills and unlock your full potential!

In this live Q&A session, Femke and Charli dive into key topics for designers, including staying relevant in the industry, navigating stakeholder misalignment, making career moves, and the challenges and rewards of building a design culture as a founding designer.

0:38 Episode start and catch up

04:39 Playbook sponsorship

06:43 Q1: How do you stay cool and relevant for 9 years in the design industry?

08:30 Q2: When stakeholders are misaligned in product leadership, should a designer check in with the project manager to ensure alignment at the team level? Should designers step beyond the technical scope of their role to address misalignment?

13:22 Q3: What does it feel like to be a founding designer and how can you create a design culture?

15:48 Q4: How do you start a new role after ending on a low note at a previous company?

18:04 Q5: What’s the difference between a visual designer and a UI designer?

22:20 Q6: What were your sources of inspiration for shaping the new creative direction for Kit?

24:04 Follow up on the founding designer question

25:17 Q7: How do you view the current job market? Is it important to base career moves on company name recognition, or should you prioritize skills and experience over past employers?

30:08 Q8: How can you make your growth plan more actionable and trackable, especially when discussing career progression with your manager?

33:40 Q9: What advice do you have for someone hiring and leading a design team for the first time?

38:38 Q10: What are the main lessons you’ve learned from doing the podcast and sharing your career journey? Has the podcast contributed to your design thinking and overall creative self-development?

Big thanks to our sponsor for this episode, Playbook! Be sure to check them out and see how they can elevate your workflow

Femke’s course “Product strategy for designers”

Share your topic suggestions for the show with us at hello@designlife.fm

‍

Femke and Charli delve into the difficulties of managing a side project that isn't going well. Charli shares her personal experience of trying to organize a live workshop in New Zealand and not managing to attract enough participants. The hosts discuss what Charli learned from this experience and how the situation could have been handled better.

Show Timestamps:

2:03 Update from Femke’s side

4:14 Update from Charli’s side

6:23 Background of the situation

12:18 What is your reflection on this situation?

13:44 What are some lessons learned from this situation? Why do you think you did not sell as many tickets as you thought you would?

17:12 If you were to do it again, what would you do differently?

19:02 Are there any interesting reasons why the people who bought the tickets decided to do so?

21:28 Another idea for improvement

Show links:

Femke’s course “Product strategy for designers”

Share your topic suggestions for the show with us at hello@designlife.fm

Get 10% off any new annual Webflow plan using the code “designlife” at http://wfl.io/designlife

Join the design life community

Support the show by buying a Pin!

Submit a topic

Thanks to Webflow for sponsoring this episode! Webflow gives designers the power of code in a visual interface, and both of your Design Life hosts love using it for their personal sites.

Get 10% off any new annual Webflow plan using the code “designlife” at http://wfl.io/designlife

Thanks to Webflow for sponsoring this episode! Webflow gives designers the power of code in a visual interface, and both of your Design Life hosts love using it for their personal sites.

Get 10% off any new annual Webflow plan using the code “designlife” at http://wfl.io/designlife

Join the design life community

Support the show by buying a Pin!

Submit a topic

Thanks to Webflow for sponsoring this episode! Webflow gives designers the power of code in a visual interface, and both of your Design Life hosts love using it for their personal sites.

Get 10% off any new annual Webflow plan using the code “designlife” at http://wfl.io/designlife

Join the design life community

Support the show by buying a Pin!

Submit a topic

Join the design life community

Support the show by buying a Pin!

Submit a topic

The inspiration for this topic came from Charli’s new series ‘Inside Marketing Design’ where she speaks with marketing designers working with the biggest Tech brands from around the world. A listener noticed a theme that many designers mentioned working with freelancers and we wanted to dive deeper into this topic and share our own experiences and insights of how to establish the freelancer/client relationship and the benefits or possible pitfalls of working with freelancers. 

Support the show on Patreon!