User Experience Design and Careers. Join us to discuss getting into the field of UX and Digital Product Design. I'll be speaking with experts in the field who typically didn't start in this field. They'll tell you how to get started as a UX/UI and Product Designer, what you need to know, and how to land your first job.
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21 Lessons learned in 2021. My first year in podcasting
Season 1 · Episode 20
Wednesday, December 29, 2021 • Duration 20:20
One year into podcasting and it has been a journey. It’s been fun, enlightening, rewarding, difficult, and stress-inducing all at the same time. But overall, I’m a happier and better person for having done it.
My goal for this year was to record 12 good podcasts. I ended up creating more than that. Wether or not any of them have been “good” is for you to decide. This will however be the last blog post and podcast I’ll put out this year. I’m looking forward to spending some time reflecting and just doing nothing outside of my family life and day job for a couple of months. I plan to begin recording in the second quarter of 2022 and I can’t wait to share season 2 of the User Flows Podcast with you then.
So with that, I wanted to share the lessons I’ve learned in case you are interested in starting a podcast. Have a great 2022 everyone!
Podcasting is easier than you think.
Podcasting is a lot harder than you think.
Storytelling is important.
Hyperfocus.
Never stop learning.
Don't be afraid to share from wherever you are.
You don't need a crazy work set up.
You do need a quiet space.
You can make a big impact in your career.
Just get started.
Be transparent and open with your wants.
You don't have to comment on every post.
It's worth giving it a try. Even if you know it's going to fail.
You're going to have to dedicate way more time to this to craft something worth listening to.
It's a really great way to connect with people.
It's cool to have a side hustle, but make sure you get outside.
You'll need to make this about something your really interested in or passionate about or you'll never last.
It's okay to pivot.
Helping someone else achieve something is almost a good as achieving it yourself.
You can and should design your life.
It's time for a break.
Q&A on UX Design, Careers and Life
Season 1 · Episode 19
Tuesday, December 28, 2021 • Duration 33:29
Okay, so I wanted to record an episode answering all the questions I've received this year from listeners and students alike. These are all fantastic questions and by answering them, I hope you get you own questions answered. Feel free to reach out to me anytime with your questions at thomasmorrel.com
Questions answered on the show:
What was your journey into UX?
What does a day at work look like?
Have you worked with people who started out in a non-design field and transitioned over to UX/product design? What do you believe made them successful/stand out?
What are some aspects of design/UX that are often overlooked by beginners, especially when starting a portfolio?
Do you know of any good resources for learning more about UX/UI or for getting connected with others in the field?
How did you transition from graphic designer/art director to Product Designer/UX?
Do you see any shifts happening in the industry right now?
How did you manage to work as a designer abroad in London?
What advice would you give to someone looking to start working in UX/UI/Product Design?
What are some of the things that are a pain in the UX field but are rarely talked about?
EP10. Enterprise Design Sprints at scale with Caryn Gallis. Director of Experience Design, Culture & Training at Prudential Financial.
Season 1 · Episode 10
Tuesday, July 20, 2021 • Duration 38:07
Welcome back to UserFlows Podcast on July 20, my name is Thomas Morrell and I'll be your host. This is a show where we talk UX Design and Careers. I interview other designers about their journey into the field of User Experience Design and how they've thrived in their roles. Share some tips and information you can use to advance your own career in the field.
Today, I'm speaking with a past colleague, friend, and all-around amazing person. Caryn Gallis is a Director of Experience Design specializing in Culture & Training. Caryn is also a professor of design at Keen University in New Jersey. I first met Caryn in my first week working at Prudential Financial. A big project I was hired for hadn't kicked off yet, but Caryn and UserFlows podcast guest Brian Evans from episode #2 were working on putting together a training deck for the team at Prudential on how to Facilitate Design Sprints.
They presented me with the idea of creating a fake project in order to use as the training material source. It was a really fun project and ultimately an amazing way for me to be introduced to Design Sprints. An activity I use often in my own design process now.
For those of you who don't know, Design Sprints are a fantastic 3 - 5 day design workshop meant to take a companies ideas from zero to prototype within a very short timeframe. They are highly collaborative, fast-paced and are a great way of getting ideas in front of your audience without spending months or years building the wrong product first. They were started by ex-Google Ventures member Jake Knapp, John Zeratsky, and Braden Kowitz. They made their findings into a fantastic book. . For all the hype around design sprints, at least from my perspective, the hype is well deserved.
EP9. Defining Your Role as a UX Designer with Samuel Harper
Season 1 · Episode 9
Wednesday, June 30, 2021 • Duration 37:59
Welcome back to the UserFlows Podcast. A show where we talk about UX Design and Careers. I’m your host Thomas Morrell and I get to interview other designers about their journey’s into the field of UX and Product Design. Today I am speaking with Sam Harper, a former filmmaker and marine biologist turned passionate user experience designer, published Medium author, and frequent contributor to the UX Collective blog. Sam is also a UX career coach with some pretty great experience.
I was first introduced to Sam through his LinkedIn live shows. I found him extremely intriguing and I love how open, honest and helpful he has been for the UX community. Especially those just getting started in the field.
You can read Sam’s articles on Medium or join his biweekly live stream calls on LinkedIn.
EP8. Building UX Products with Impact! Interview with 4-time Entrepreneur Steven Cohn
Season 1 · Episode 8
Friday, June 18, 2021 • Duration 59:40
Steven Cohn is a father, husband, and serial entrepreneur and he tries hard to be great in all those areas. I can relate to that as I'm the father of two as well and husband to my wonderful wife of 10 years. I do hope to be an entrepreneur again in the future. Which is why I'm talking to Steven today. He has a marvelous track record of starting and selling fantastic digital companies.
For those of you in the UX space, many will know his venture, Validately which made it easy and affordable to conduct lean customer research on new digital products. Validately has since been acquired by UserZoom. Prior to launching Validately, Steven sold his first two startups to LivingSocial and TripAdvisor. He has also worked at DoubleClick, Quantcast, and IBM. He is a graduate of George Washington University and Harvard Business School.
I'm convinced that every designer dreams of starting their own product one day. I will not be shy about saying that I have this dream. So one of the great things about starting a podcast is that you get to talk to really cool people who do the things you want to do. So I'm really excited to talk to Steven today as he's 3 for 3 in creating useful, successful, and profitable products.
Steven is going for his fourth startup success with his latest and greatest company, ImpactProduct. ImpactProduct helps designers and product people alike make data-informed design decisions. Uncover usability issues faster. All without developer support. The entire tool is offered as a chrome extension. I installed it on my personal site. It took all of seconds to install and seems super easy to use thus far.
Follow Steven on Twitter @spcohn or learn more about him on LinkedIn.
Here is a list of people and products we discuss in the show:
Hello and welcome back to the UserFlows Podcast. UserFlows is a show where we talk about UX Design and UX Careers. You should listen to this show if... You are a student of user experience or product design. You are a professional who is considering a transition to the field or if you're just someone who's interested in UX design and wants to learn a bit more about it. In each episode, I'll interview a successful, working designer in order to discover how they found the field and have managed to thrive in this highly competitive landscape. We'll break down the steps they took in order to land their first jobs, dive into the mistakes they've made while building their careers, and hopefully teach a bit about the processes, tools, and best practices that have helped them in their own design journey.
If you haven't already, please subscribe to the show on iTunes, Spotify or anywhere else you listen to podcasts. I'll be releasing a show about every other week or so. If you'd like to be a friend to the show. Leaving a review and comment on iTunes would be very much appreciated. Share a link to this show with your friends and those interested in UX design. Feel free to recommend topics you'd like to hear discussed and if you have any questions about Design, Design Careers, or anything else for that matter, you can DM me on Instagram @userflows.live.
Today I'm speaking with Ty Fujimura, CEO of Cantilever Web Design and Development. Ty is an extremely thoughtful designer and design leader. His career purpose (I mean, look at that, he actually has a career purpose) is to unite creativity and business. Cantilever is a mission-driven company and its mission is to harness the power of “Digital Hospitality". A term I absolutely love, it means they believe websites are spaces that users inhabit, not billboards they see from a distance. Ty is currently focused on building a great environment for Cantilever’s staff to thrive and deliver outstanding results for their clients.
In our conversation, we dive a little bit deeper into what Digital Hospitality means to Ty, his team, and their clients. Cantilever is a remote-first team so we talk a bit about remote working best practices for the rest of us just toying at remote working. How to make time to let designers design and some of his thoughts around building a successful design culture.
EP6. Did you even read the job description? UX interviewing with Mike Reed
Season 1 · Episode 6
Thursday, May 20, 2021 • Duration 37:04
Howdy and Hello! Welcome back to the UserFlows Podcast. My name is Thomas Morrell and I'll be your host. It's been a couple of weeks since we last spoke. In the last episode we got to speak with someone totally fresh to the industry, right out of the UX boot camp, and this week we get to speak with someone with a number of years of experience. So I think this will give us a really well-rounded view of interviewing for UX design roles both from the interviewee and the interviewer perspectives.
You can go back and listen to the last episode where I interview freelance UX/UI designer Ivan Crego where he talks about landing his first UX role. That is episode 5. This week we'll be speaking with Mike Reed. Mike is now Principle UX designer for a company called Infromatica in Ontario, Canada.
Mike is an experienced product designer (UX/UI) and manager who has led numerous successful consumer apps, eCommerce platforms, SaaS products, and analytics and management consultant tools to market - with proven business results.
Mike provides leadership, guidance, and insights for large-scale platform changes and long-term product decisions and strategies. Mike has implemented human-centered design processes, UI change management processes and tracking, business-driven quantitative testing, product acceleration sessions, and more.
EP5. Landing your first UX/UI Design role with Ivan Crego
Wednesday, April 28, 2021 • Duration 37:58
Hello and welcome back to the UserFlows Podcast. My name is Thomas Morrell and I'll be your host. It's been a crazy month for myself and my family. We packed up and sold our home in New Jersey and moved to Savannah, GA. We've been debating this move for many years, so we've finally pulled the trigger. It's been a dream so far, but of course, it's still the honeymoon phase. Continuing the podcast throughout the move though. We'll be bouncing around from rental to rental as we build our dream home on the coast here.
A little update of the podcast for those of you who continue to listen. We have listeners. This is really exciting and I can't thank you all enough. Of course, it's not thousands, but it is in the hundreds which for me is really exciting. I started this podcast to help those of you who may be considering the journey or career transition into the field of UX design. I did this not only to help people grow and learn but also selfishly to help myself grow and learn and my gosh it's been quite a learning curve. I had a slight snafu with recording this podcast so you'll notice the audio is a little off, but that's the only way to learn, isn't it. Trial and error.
Thank you all so much for continuing to listen. If you'd like to be a friend to the show, please share this with anyone you know who may be interested in the field of UX design. Subscribe and leave a rating on iTunes, Spotify, or anywhere you listen to podcasts. If you have any specific topics you'd like to discuss or hear discussed. Feel free to reach out with any topic requests, questions, or ideas. I'm all ears and I'm here for you.
Very excited for this episode, today you'll be listening to a conversation I had with Freelance UX/UI designer Ivan Crego. Ivan recently started his career after attending a UX boot camp offered through Career Foundry. Previously, Ivan had an amazing job as a University Recruiter for the New Jersey Institute of Technology where he got paid to travel the world. Nice work if you can get it, huh!
After the realities of Covid set in, Ivan realized he would need to look into a new career. Luckily a friend introduced him to UX design and got him pointed in the right direction. A big shout out to Brian Evans for introducing me to Ivan. You can listen to my in UserFlows Episode 2.
EP4. What is UX and what does a UX designer do all day?
Season 1 · Episode 4
Sunday, April 11, 2021 • Duration 25:16
Before you dive into anything. It's important to define what it REALLY is, what it means to you, and what it means to the people it will effect. I dove into this question "What is UX design? Really?" about 10 years ago.
"What is UX design?" is a question I’ve been asked a lot of times in job interviews, from family members, and from prospective clients. If it is a field you wish to participate in as well. It will be essential for you to establish an answer in your own words that means something to you and translates easily enough to the listener.
Wikipedia explains it as: "User experience design (UXD, UED, or XD) is the process of supporting user behavior through usability, usefulness, and desirability provided in the interaction with a product. User experience design encompasses traditional human–computer interaction (HCI) design and extends it by addressing all aspects of a product or service as perceived by users."
Don Norman who coined the term User Experience in 1993 while working at apple Defines it this way: "'User experience'" encompasses all aspects of the end-users interaction with the company, its services, and its products." You can also hear him talk about it in this quick video.
In my humble opinion I define UX design in a couple ways:
From the perspective of the designer.
UX design is the iterative refinement of a product or service to bring value to a user. It focuses on the desirability, feasibility and usability of a product.
Essentially to me, UX design is about improving the human experience. Even it means you're just making someone’s day that much easier. It balances organizational objectives with human nature and needs. If your intent is to improve someone’s experience and you can achieve that, your organization could be successful. If you don't improve someone’s experience, then it will probably fail.The iterative design of digital products and services to improve human interaction.So what does a UX designer do all day?DesigningYou should be prototyping and learning almost every dayStrategic ThinkingDivergent ThinkingConvergent ThinkingFacilitating and participating in workshopsTypical?
EP3. Passion meets Design Operations with Evan Tyerman
Season 1 · Episode 3
Monday, March 15, 2021 • Duration 44:40
So excited to connect with an old colleague Evan Tyerman. Evan is the Director of Design Operations at Prudential Financial and an all-around great human. Evan has a very interesting background that led him to User Experience Design.
Previously he was in the biomedical engineering field, Evan has always been passionate about helping people. His background in engineering drives him to discover the unknown, while his empathy and compassion in helping people helps him to understand the wonder of people. Ultimately, his understanding of users, along with his creativity, inspires Evan to create experiences to change the world. To Evan, User Experience is more than a job or a skill set; it is a passion.
Evan and I talk about his experience in discovering UX design, telling his parents he was leaving the Biomedical Engineering field. How passion fuels a great designer and his experience with General Assembly. I'm very excited for Evan and his new role and I can't wait to share his story with you.
Howdy, welcome to the user flows podcast, it's great to have you back. This week, we're gonna be talking with Evan Tyerman, who is the director of design operations at Prudential financial, Evan and I worked together for some time, he was a really fun guy to work with. And I'm really excited about his new position and new role. And I can't wait to dig into that with him. Evan previously comes from the biomedical engineering field. And he's always been very passionate about helping people, which is what led him to UX design. And his background in engineering really drives him to discover the unknown, while his empathy and compassion and helping people help them to understand the wonder of people.
And ultimately, his understanding of users, along with his creativity, inspires Evan to create experiences to change the world. And to Evan user experience is more than a job or a skill set. It's about passion. And that's what we're going to talk about today. So welcome, Evan, it's great to have you here tonight. I'm really excited to talk to you. It's been a while since we've seen each other. So for everybody listening, Evan and I work together at Prudential financial, and Evan has just been named design operations director. Is that correct?
“Design Sprints, How to Solve Big Problems and Test New Ideas in Just Five Days”
Since helping Brian and Caryn create the training material for sprinting at Prudential. I was fortunate enough to go through their training program and facilitate six design sprints while at Prudential. All were hugely beneficial to the projects I was working on and a transformational moment in my own career. Having tools like this to help your team navigate through or break up continuous cycles of non-decision are a fantastic way to help your team push past where so many others get stuck.
Caryn is an integrative thinker who thrives on solving the big picture while remaining focused on relevant details through every stage of the assignment. She seeks to understand the user's needs while keeping the business goals in alignment.
Caryn and I discuss her career and transition from designing children's toys to UX design. What are design sprints? When to use a design sprint and possibly more importantly when not to use a design sprint. She'll take us through her process of selling Design Sprints in a large enterprise organization and how she went from a comment in an interview to scaling design sprint training to well over 500 members of her organization.
She shares some great tips around keeping a Design Sprint best practices wiki. Connecting with the decider of your sprint beforehand in order to ground them in their role. She also shares some great tips and advice for new designers looking to get into the field.
If you are new to the show or if you haven't already. Please subscribe to User Flows wherever you listen to Podcasts. Share this show or any of the others with your audience, friends, family, or anyone you know who's interested in a career in the field.
Thank you so much for listening or reading :) and I hope you enjoy the show.
If you haven't already, please subscribe to the show on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or anywhere else you listen to podcasts. I'll be releasing a show about every other week or so. If you'd like to be a friend to the show. Leaving a review and comment on Apple would be very much appreciated. Share a link to this show with your friends and anyone else you know who's interested in UX design. Feel free to recommend topics you'd like to hear discussed and if you have any questions about Design, Design Careers, or anything else for that matter, you can DM me on Instagram @userflows.live
Now let's go create!
I can not thank Ty enough for sharing his time and ideas. If you'd like to learn more about Ty and Cantilever. You can connect with Ty on Twitter @tyfuji or by visiting cantilever.co. If you're a soccer fan, Ty also hosts a fantastic podcast We The Peeps focused on US Soccer, USMNT the World Cup and is an irreverent take on US Soccer. USMNT Gold Cup, CONCACAF Nations League, and World Cup Qualifying. Give it a listen.
Ivan and I talk about a number of his experiences throughout his journey to becoming a UX designer and for those of you considering that same journey. I think you'll find what he has to share enlightening. I hope you enjoy it.
If you'd like to be a friend of the show, please remember to share this with anyone you know interested in User Experience design. Like, share, comment, etc... on all the social media channels. You can find me on Instagram @userflows.live
If you've enjoyed this show, a five-star rating, comment on Spotify or Apple podcasts would go a long, long way.
Thank you and I hope you enjoy the conversation.
TM
From the perspective of the user.
UX is the perception I have when using a product or service. Do I find it useful, desirable and can it be implemented easily into my life?
When I boil it down, this is what I come up with.
Therefore I now define UX design as:
A big disclaimer to this one. Not every designer works the same, has the same responsibilities or roles to fill. This can look different depending on who you are, where your focus lies, and what your company, team, or clients expect from you. Also, it has a lot to do with the individual designer, where their strengths are, where they tend to focus their attention and how their team divides responsibilities.
Yes! A good portion of your day will be spent heads down in Sketch, InVision, XD, Figma, or any other prototyping tool you choose to use. This can be high-fidelity designs or low, but you should be prototyping and learning almost every day.
By prototyping, I mean creating mock-ups that are as close to an interactive experience as possible. This allows not only the designer but the rest of the team as well to interact with an experience like an app that's similar to what it would be like for a customer to use the actual product.
By learning, I mean using the prototype to test with the business team to ensure it meets requirements. Test with the development team to ensure the feasibility of building this design and test with the folks who in the end will be using the app to make sure it's actually something they'll want to use.
Designers need to help the business connect with users to gain insights into their needs and wants. This is an essential part of the designer's role. Also helping them develop the requirements of what you will be building is a good skill set to acquire. The designer's role in this phase is to really connect with the business team to build trust and establish goals, vision, and the desired outcome the team will be driving towards.
Actual day-to-day work may include crafting and participating in user or customer interviews. Analyzing customer pain points and highlighting opportunities. Crafting competitive research, creating user personas, collecting inspiration, journey map creation and again, the list goes on. The important part is that you and the team are forming a bond and a connection around who your customer is, what your strategy is to help them, plus how and on what time frame you'll do it in.
Ideating, iterating, and collaborating are key to this phase. Design, Test, Repeat! You'll be sketching, wire-framing, card-sorting, plotting the Information Architecture, prototyping, testing, etc..., etc...
So you've helped the team gather enough information to know who your customer is and roughly how you'll go about helping them. Now it's time for the pen to hit the paper. Or marker to hit whiteboard, or sharpie to hit post it or mouse to click the screen. You get the point, now is the time to generate as many ideas as possible. Now could be a great time to walk the team through an idea-generating workshop.
Developers need your final typography, spacing, grids, icons, and artwork ready to go. Also, you'll need to work closely with the product team to design for almost every imaginable scenario a user may encounter while using your app. So a designer needs to be good and fast at whichever design tool they'll be using. It's incredible how much time can be spent designing error states and messages to help your user when things break down. Get faster so it doesn't break you down.
There are meetings, lots of meetings. Workshops are better, and if you can't get that. A meeting with a purpose and action will have to do. As a designer, you have to present you're work a lot! Designers need to get comfortable facilitating activities and presentations that don't suck.
So as you can see. A typical day as a UX designer is not very typical at all. It is fun though 😉
What's your favorite part of the day?
Evan 1:50
That is correct. Yeah. Well, thank you for having me.
Thomas 1:52
Yeah, no problem, man. So I wanted to talk to you a bit about it because you have a very interesting kind of background. And also, you were one of those people that I was, you know, very blown away by when I started working with you, because you kind of welcomed me into Prudential, I think you're the first person that kinda, you know, showed up at my desk, you had a whole kind of care package of Prudential gear and stuff, which was really cool. And you got me set up with my machine and everything going. And so very nice cards from everybody. And I think once you stopped doing that role, onboarding the people that came in after me was just terrible. So it was a very nice welcome.
Evan 2:31
It's funny bringing up because you were actually the first person that I did that to, as well. You were pretty much the first person we brought in, I think, after I started kind of revamping our onboarding system, and I think it worked well, on the first shot.
Thomas 2:45
Yeah. When great. It went great. That's great. Yeah, but you were definitely, you know, wise beyond your ears. I, I figured you had been working in UX for a number of years. And then I found out that this was like your first big role, which, in UX design, kind of blew me away. So if you don't mind, would you kind of dive into, you know, how you ended up at Prudential and how you went from biomedical engineering?
Evan 3:10
Yeah, biomedical engineering. Yeah, I mean, definitely a crazy journey. Over the past. I graduated college, and dirty as a biomedical engineer in 2017. So past, let's say, four years. Yeah, that's definitely a wild wild ride. I don't know how far you want me to go back. But you know, I could go back kind of, like what I started hearing about, about the world of UX and my kind of emergence into that. So you know, towards kind of the end of my college career, and you know, I went to NJIT. Thinking that I really wanted to be into like, problem-solving, and really kind of taking on critical problems, and putting, you know, my eyes on it and trying to solve in ways that other people wouldn't think about solving it. And that's just kind of how who I was as a person, you know, growing up, I really love complicated problems.
Both my parents were engineers, so, you know, more or less, I was kind of destined to go to an engineering school and kind of fall in their footsteps. But as I was kind of going through that, I did realize that, um, you know, the problems that I was solving weren't fulfilling, you know, I was doing kind of, you know, I went into the area of biomedical engineering because I wanted to help people to that was another motivation for me. But I feel like the problems we're so we're solving, we're solving at such a slow pace, and I wasn't really fulfilling to be, you know, on a project, I would see fruition in five to 10 years. I wanted to see, you know, immediate change, and I wanted to really work at a fast pace. And that's really what kind of made me step away from the world of biomedical engineering and look towards other avenues I can use like those same kinds of problem-solving techniques, but also in the same way, you know, try to really help people and get to know and learn about people. And a lot of my close friends, one of the previous ones you had on your podcast, Brian, good, good college friend of mine, he really, you know, opened me up to the world of UX and what it is, and he showed me, you know, you got to involve the users in creating these designs.
Actually, for college, I was very kind of design was a little bit of my hobby. So I like to, you know, I worked as like, you know, PR managers for certain organizations, you know, doing flyers and learning Photoshop. So like, I still have, you know, a little bit of love for design, I never really like kind of dove into it. But, you know, he showed me that like, UX was a crossroad of, you know, design and problem-solving. And also, you know, involving your users at the end of the day. And I saw that, and I don't know what it was like a light bulb kind of hit. Yeah. And, you know, that's when I realized, like, oh, wow, this might be like, more of a career for me than engineering. So, you know, by the time I made that decision, it was kind of towards the end of my college career. So I was like, Okay, let me suck it up. Let me finish college, and we get a degree, let me make my parents happy.
Hopefully, they don't hear this. But let me finish off college strong. And let me look into this career path. And I was actually very surprised to find that I wasn't, I wasn't alone, there were a lot of people that really came from very non-traditional backgrounds in UX design, and found their way into this field. And a lot of them did go through courses. So a lot of them weren't really coming out of right out of college. A lot of them were coming through these kinds of pipelines of I went to General Assembly, but there was a lot of other kinds of programs like that, that people were just kind of going doing a quick course, you know, over, you know, a couple of months, and having some sort of design document. And that's why I really, like really brought me into the design as I can, you know, for a very minimal amount of time, I can really kind of changed my career trajectory, and really find a way into this field, that I didn't need to redo college at all. And that, that was another big thing that really likes, made it worth it.
Thomas 7:19
Yeah. Yeah, it's a huge time and cost savings, right?
Evan 7:23
Oh, yeah, for sure. You know, and that was also a big seller for my parents to you know, it was pretty crazy for them, you know, they paid a good majority of my college to say, like, I'm not gonna use that degree anymore. I'm gonna go find something else. Yeah, and then I was, you know, sitting there ready to foot the bill. And I was like, Oh, wait, now I really need to think about how I'm going to afford this. And that actually made it you know, going to a school where it was just a few months really made it worth it. And then coming out of that, you know, I really did have at least the skill set to do what, what was needed to get kind of an entry-level into the job.
I didn't, you know, I didn't have like a full sense to be like a full, mid-level designer, but I did have the kind of the skill set needed. And the rest of it was kind of my drive and determination. Yeah, we got to get over the finish line and find that like, really kind of start to your career. So yeah, going through General Assembly definitely was the right choice. It definitely wouldn't have changed it to the world. And I met a lot of great people along the way to a lot of like I said, a lot of people came from non-traditional backgrounds, there were architects in our class, there was fashion designers, photographers, even a geologist was in our class learning to be a UX designer.
Yeah, she, you know, studied rocks, and then decided to shoot on this many people. And I thought that that was really like, you know, not to get too deep, like, I thought that was really beautiful that people were coming from all different walks of life, yeah, into this path. And people brought their, their different nuances. You know, people that still came from a creative field back in came into UX had more of a creative mindset versus people like me. And the geologists came from a more scientific background, and they came with more of a research-focused mindset. So like, it's, it's, that I want to really what I'm getting at is there's like, there's a spot for everyone, I think, in this field, no matter what kind of walk of life you come from, I really, you know, there is always a place somewhere within this crazy world, that you can kind of really fall into and fall into that nation. That's kind of where I fell into. And that's kind of what guided me down this path of, you know, I still use my engineering mindset.
You know, even though I, you know, I say I don't use the degree, I very much do very much didn't go through an engineering course where I can I use that to create my design processes and kind of lead what I'm doing throughout that design process. And that's kind of what guided me Towards operations in a way, yeah, really, you know, I'm a very kind of methodical person I want, you know, certain things to happen, and they need to happen for a certain reason. And yeah, that's ultimately what kind of guided me towards this kind of career set. And it's not like I chose to be an operations manager, it's just, I think that my skills kind of naturally tended me to be towards that. Yeah. And I think, you know, I very much do, thank the people that I've worked with, especially at Prudential, who kind of empowered me to take these kinds of roles and positions. And see kind of the potential in me, even though I couldn't see it, you know, I was just kind of like, doing my designs, and just trying to get through and get projects out as fast as I could. And one of the funniest was, Lorraine, you remember,
Thomas 10:52
I remember.
Evan 10:54
She was the greatest, but when I, when we were in, project planning, they were like, Okay, well, like, how long do you think it will take to get this done? Lorraine was about to say, like, you know, maybe two or three weeks, and I was like, Oh, yeah, like four days. I mean, look, to me, she's like, Don't over-promise. Like, you know, you don't want to over-promise I'm like, but that's, you know, that's, I think about efficiency, and I want to make sure that these things can happen. Because that means we can do more with our time and provide more value for our customers with their time. So you know, I always left to think, you know, Lorraine was saying I was being too efficient.
Thomas 11:30
That's good advice, I'll never over-promise. But um, no, and I remember you would, you would take on certain things like you know, managing the kind of usertesting.com kind of platform. And also, you kind of took over the whole running of the usability testing lab that we had there, and kind of got that back up and running. And also, like, you know, the work that you did finally led us to actually getting people in the door to test with and everything, which was great, and, you know, just in time for COVID, to kick in and for all of us to get kicked out. Well, hopefully, you'll be back soon. And you can use it again. But yeah,
Evan 12:06
yeah, no, I've definitely found new that kind of, that I kind of fell into more out of necessity. I think, you know, we all know, research is definitely a big part of this, you know, this process, and I, myself take that very much are going back to my background and, and science and being very analytical. You know, I think research is really at the core of what we do, you know, the design has its part, but I think research really does, does really shine in the kind of the designs we were able to produce at the end of the day, you know, I feel like we weren't really fully activating our kind of research arm. And that's what I really wanted to take on like, Okay, well, we have this beautiful, shining new lab, that's probably you didn't use as many times as I can count on my hand. No, it was great. And I thought it was such a shame that we weren't, you know, utilizing it to its fullest potential. And that's really what made me kind of take that on to really push that that initiative and they're definitely wasn't easy, you know, especially know, Prudential has a lot of kind of guidelines and restrictions. And they're not really used to a field like ours, where we're like, oh, let's bring in a bunch of random people and talk to them. Like, like, No, don't do that.
Thomas 13:25
You can't bring anybody in here.
Evan 13:27
Yeah. Like, why not? But, you know, that's, that's one of the big things is breaking down those kinds of silos, and really kind of trying to change the traditional landscape of corporate design. Yeah. And that's definitely one of the challenges we had to deal with day in day out. Is Yeah, really breaking those down?
Thomas 13:51
Yeah. And it's the last conference I went to before, you know, COVID took over everything. There was a really good talk by two guys at Johnson and Johnson. Funny enough, now, they're very much involved in this whole COVID thing. And one of the guys talking, it was all about design operations. And he had a great quote, which I really liked that, you know, he said, design operations is all about clearing the roadblocks so that designers can design. And his whole point behind that was that you know, designers, UX developers, all that it's a highly specialized skill set. And so companies pay a premium, you know, for these people's talents. And if, you know, anytime that they're not spending, designing or building, then the company is wasting a gigantic amount of money. So do you got it like, feel like that's kind of part of what your role is going to be? Or?
Evan 14:43
Oh, for sure. I mean, you know, operations, even a design team of one needs operations. They're just kind of built into how we work. You know, there's a very specific process and design methodology that we like to follow and Even though you're one person, you're still, you know, doing project planning and, and working on your tools and making sure that you're communicating with the right people. Well, if you scale that up to a design team of 60 to 100, what does that look like you can't have every single person design or doing design operations, it would be a catastrophic nightmare. And that's, that's where I come in, you know, I take that load off of these people, I take that mostly off of these managers and VPS, that have been kind of running these teams. And I kind of standardize it. And I also make it kind of, you know, just putting my business cap on and make it cheaper for them to, you know, they're spending so many hours of their day or week, doing operations, let's time they're not spending designing, and at the end of the day, providing value for our customers, and potential. So I take that, and I consolidate that, and I, you know, whatever overlap there is, I can take that on. And now that all that cost has kind of been eaten up by me, and they can focus mostly on what they're there to do, which, as you said, is to design. Yeah.
So yeah, I'm very much, you know, trying to clear the roadblocks. also trying to make sure the machines still running, we're still moving forward. Yeah. But also, on the other end, I see a different way, you know, design operations also really tries to make sure that, you know, in its core, you know, the design provides value, like I said to our customers and potential, but how can we kind of take the value that they preside, provide, and kind of amplify that or grow that, and make sure that you've got one designer can provide 10 times the value that they would without a design operations manager. And that's really what I also do is try to kind of champion the team, make sure the team has not just the tools necessary to do their job, but also the means necessary to grow. As designers in our company. That's another big kind of aspect is, you know, making sure focusing on our people focusing on our talent, making sure that, you know, if you want to be focused on research, we have a place for you, and we can, you know, find ways to, to include those talents and also grow those talents to, you know, conferences, through, you know, training that we've put together, if you don't want to focus on visual, like, we have a place for you. And my whole methodology and thought behind this is, you know, let's not mold our designers and what we need done to me, let's make them let's let them grow into what they want to be. And let's find a place for them.
Thomas 17:28
Oh, that's really cool.
Evan 17:30
Yeah, having that kind of methodology of thought really gives you designers I want to stay, you know, know that you're there to invest in their future. They want to be a part of the potential future.
Thomas 17:44
Oh, that's fantastic. And that's, um, that's especially important, I would say in this kind of market is right now, as a UX designer, if you have any kind of experience under your belt, you can almost go anywhere. And so it is really hard for companies to attract and to, you know, keep talent, if you throw any kind of unnecessary, you know, nuisances in their way. And they're just gonna bounce. That's kind of Yeah,
Evan 18:09
I've seen it so many times here. And you've definitely seen it too. Yes. It's hard to keep designers, especially in this market, where, you know, there are so many design jobs, and there are so many opportunities for designers, you know, how do we really keep them? And it really comes down to, you know, what, how do you value your designers, you know, what are you doing to make sure that they're, they're, they're, they're valued at the end of the day? Yeah. And that's ultimately, you know, how you how we can keep our designers.
Thomas 18:38
Yeah, absolutely. Everyone, everybody wants to work in a place where they feel not only welcome, but you know, valued. And also just a place with that they feel comfortable, they feel allowed to express themselves allowed to try new things allowed to grow like you're doing now, which is fantastic. So yeah, I know, a big part of what you're doing now is also kind of helping manage to bring in a number of new people and new roles. So I guess, if you could, from the perspective of the hiring manager, so somebody who might be looking for their first job might be looking for their second job. What's the process kind of look like from your perspective? So they get a little bit of insight, you know, what happens after they send that resume in or, you know, have that first phone call?
Evan 19:25
Yeah, of course. Yeah, a lot of my role is focused on our talent and making sure that we have the right people where we need them. And, you know, coming from kind of the other end of the table, you know, I went through, you know, so many different job applications when I was looking for work for the first time. And it's, it's hard. Oh, yeah, you know, she's known for nothing you feel awful when you get so many kinds of rejections and you don't know why and no one's really kind of explaining it to you. But you know, now in the Under the Table, you know, looking at resumes and looking for what I'm looking for. Now I see, you know, there's a lot of resumes that people go through from a hiring manager's perspective, and you really need to kind of figure a way to stand out. What I really look for, you know, is not kind of like, and products, you know, anyone could produce maybe a really high, you know, sexy looking mock-up, you know, follow certain design guidelines or put it a couple of like, you know, zinger words. But what I'm really looking for is kind of process-driven, you know, I really want to know, what is Tom thinking as he's designing this product? How is the kind of going across it? Not that like, Oh, he's just going to use a user interviewer contextual inquiry, I want to know why he's using a contextual interview or contextual inquiry, that kind of puts me in the designer seat, and really gets to know Okay, well, this is how they're going to drive our projects. This is how they're going to lead these kinds of initiatives with this design process.
So it's definitely one of the things I'm looking for the kind of just on a surface level, you know, just looking at portfolios and resumes. And then when it gets to like interviews, I've already kind of see what you can produce and design, what at that point, what I really want to know is, you know, who you Who are you as a designer, what really drives you and motivates you, at the end of the day, because really, what I'm trying to look for in those interviews is, are you going to fit into this team? And are you going to give us and produce value for this team, you know, what, what kind of drive and passion that you have towards design and towards users at the end of the day, that's gonna produce value, because like I said, anyone could go through a process XYZ, and produce some sort of outcome. Yeah, but what that outcome really depends on how they go through that, and how in quote, how they actually decide not what they desire.
Thomas 22:00
Yeah. And I'm sure you know, with everybody being remote right now, just the added difficulties of conducting online interviews with the extra yard, this is a lot of fun.
Evan 22:13
Yeah, it's definitely been a challenge for all of us to figure out. And also, you know, just the whole online aspect of running a team too, it's very hard to kind of socialize, and, you know, per se, have those kinds of those coffee room breaks, break chats, and all that that we always loved. So it's definitely been I've been a challenge just to, you know, have the thing that make teams teams, yeah, those little kinds of moments here. And
Thomas 22:42
that's excellent. I do like the idea of the coffee chats much more than the happy hours. Like if I'm going to be having a drink, I don't want to be looking at my computer.
Evan 22:50
Yeah, we've actually been doing that a lot more, you know, we're trying to be going away from the typical happy hour where like one person's talking, and it's really awkward to do a more of like, you know, small little coffee chats, let's, let's pull in like three or four people here. And let's just talk for like, 30 minutes. That's one of the things that we've kind of found a lot of success in lately. Yeah. Oh, that's great. Yeah, just pulling in like a few people here and there.
Thomas 23:11
Yeah, that's a lot of fun. And so, obviously, you kind of talked through, you know, your time at General Assembly, which How long is the course at General Assembly? I'm not too familiar.
Evan 23:24
Yeah. So there, I took the UX design immersive course, which is kind of they're kind of like, top of the line, they have part times and boot camps. And those are good. People are kind of already in the field, but the immersive is about a 10. week course. It's a Monday through Friday, and they say you know, nine to five, but when they really mean is like nine to like 10 or 11 o'clock at night.
Thomas 23:47
And that's, yeah, yeah.
Evan 23:50
Whenever you whenever you're not in a class, you're doing projects with your group, or you're sleeping while you're eating. Yeah, and even when you don't really have much time to eat.
Thomas 23:59
Yeah, when I did the Coursera course I remember I was doing many late nights and long weekends. And it was all worth it, though. But that's really cool. And I've interviewed a number of people who came out of General Assembly, I think we've hired a few. It's, I've heard people rag on like these kinds of boot camps and things like that. And I don't see it because a lot of the people who come through have been absolutely exceptional. And, you know, brought really kind of great energy to our team. And we're kind of instantly on the ground running. So a lot of people obviously coming out of these boot camps kind of failed to do obviously what you did. What do you think made the different kind of in your career going from General Assembly to now design Director of Operations at like a huge financial institution. It's pretty cool. Yeah,
Evan 24:50
I mean, if you told me three or four years ago when I was doing this general assembly, that'd be a director in four years, I'd be like back up. But, you know, I would definitely say these courses are great for people that are really looking to make a change in their career and take make a shift. But you really need to have kind of the drive and passion and dedication for it. You know, as I said, These courses are nine to five, nine to 10 o'clock at night, every night. That's just the course itself.
You need to also be thinking about what are you doing after the course, you know, how are you really going to push yourself to become a better designer at the end of the day, to kind of walk headfirst into adversity? And no, you know, maybe not know exactly what to do, but no, you know, have a good sense of how to kind of adapt to these kinds of situations. And, and that's something I think General Assembly really taught me and it's not something that you can really teach them on paper, or in a classroom, it's really something that you got to teach by doing. And they you know, they put you through these very tight timelines where you really need to be adaptable, and learn how to kind of bend and not snap. certain points.
So the course where I was ready to snap, people in our course that did snap, and it was not pretty. Yeah. But at the end of the day, you really, you know, you need to get into the mindset of why am I here? What am I doing? Why am I doing this, and at the end of the day, you know, I really was passionate about this is, this is what I want to do for the rest of my life. And this is what I really feel like I have a calling for. And I really feel, you know, like, like, this is me. And that kind of really got me good. Got me going through the program. And, you know, definitely getting into the, into the field after these programs, it's not easy to, you know, you, you come out of these programs, you know what to do you know, the process, it's drilled into your work projects, and you've, you know, luckily, with General Assembly, you get to work with an actual client, like a real so you actually have some industry experience, but I'm not gonna say it's like a guaranteed job for you, you know, you're not coming out of, you know, you're competing with people that are coming out of college with you have four years of experience on their belt.
So like, you do have to have some differentiating qualities from those people, but also the people that just came out of General Assembly to, you know, they are also kind of, you know, as much as they are your colleagues, they are competing against you for these jobs that are out there. And luckily, you know, there are enough jobs out there for all of us. But, you know, you still need to differentiate yourself. And that's really kind of what I focused on coming out of General Assembly.
My first I wouldn't say, I mean, it was definitely was a real job, but it wasn't my first kind of full-time job. Coming out of General Assembly, I was working with the client I worked with, at the end of our last project, so I was able to get close with that close with it was small, like a three-person startup based in New Jersey, but I was able to get really close with them and talk them into a contract deal. And that, you know, that contract deal for a lot, you know, it was only for like three or four months and creating this one kind of system for them. But that really set me apart set me apart from the rest of my general assembly colleagues is like I had something else on the right by my belt. Yeah. And that really is what kind of gave me the kind of edge over, over a lot of my other colleagues coming out and coming into potential is like, Okay, I have this one project that I did kind of by myself, that I can really speak to.
But again, you know, the skill set, and the demeanor is a lot of it's a big chunk of it. But really what brought me over the edge was kind of my network, you know, working with people, like Brian, or another good friend that is all through college without with me and into the film mirage. But also a lot of the friends I made going to meetups, and, you know, immersing myself into the field, not just the courses, but going to actual meeting other designers and really kind of diving headfirst into UX design. That's what really sent me out here. That's how I found Prudential. And that's how, you know, I was referred into this position. It was through my network that you know, that gave me the foot in the door I needed. And then everything else, all my coursework, all my projects, all my kind of passion towards it. That's what took it home.
Thomas 29:20
Right? Yeah. And no, it is.
Evan 29:23
It's a mix of all these different aspects that you know, will get you and land you that first job. And then from there, there's no you know, there's no end goal. You got to keep going. You got to keep pushing. And, you know, through kind of hard work and determination and a lot of passion for what I do. I was able to work my way up through the ranks. Still unbelievable to me.
Thomas 29:46
Yeah. But well, it's well deserved. Well deserved. Don't believe it. You deserve it. So. Oh, yeah. So yeah. And the networking thing is, I was hugely important. My first job in UX. I mean, I had worked in design for a long time, but the person who first hired me for, actual full-time UX role, hired me because we were old friends who'd done a ton of design projects, you know, together. And so keeping those contacts is hugely important. That's actually, we talked a little bit about why I'm doing this show earlier. But another reason is not only to, you know, strengthen relationships already have with people like you who I know but also get out and meet other people. Like right now we're all stuck in our homes like you can't go out to meet up so, but why not, like meet the people I see on LinkedIn and other places, Instagram, and just say, hey, you want to come on the show, and we'll talk about design with me. So it kind of helps me build my own network as well.
Evan 30:43
And yeah, I mean, your network is super important. You know, this is, you know, a very small community, per se, of designers that we have, and, you know, everyone really kind of knows each other, we have kind of the people, the thought leaders on top, and I know people that are hanging out with those thought leaders, and they're like, just one kind of network away from like, a really big opportunity. So like, those are the things that you kind of want to bank on, you know, if you're looking for the next role or next opportunity is, you know, get in with those, those kinds of those networks. Yeah, either only just kind of a pretty much a phone call away, or just a name drop away from you to really be, you know, in contact with the VP, one of the big, you know, firms or big Fortune companies. So, yeah, your network is like, super, super important. And I am very thankful for like, getting to know, so many people at Prudential coming in and out. And really seeing and meeting a lot of people and getting to know them. Especially like, like, you are a very no good part of my network, where I can count on you for like, Hey, you know, is there an opportunity for this person? Or is there Do you have many opportunities for me moving forward? And we really kind of share that kind of connection with each other, which is super important.
Thomas 32:00
Absolutely. Yeah, actually just totally made me just realize it. But the reason I'm at the job I'm at now is because of somebody I've met at Prudential, actually, a couple of people I met at Prudential. And so obviously, everybody listening, networking, obviously, a huge part of finding that first, second, third 20th role.
Evan 32:22
So always continue never know, you never know, you're gonna need to, you know, go into your network, 20 years down the line, but it's still. Absolutely. Well, that's really cool. So, you've obviously, you've been doing this now, for four years, or more. Out of all the things you learned, you know, at General Assembly, is there anything? Like, what's the biggest surprise, like, maybe you thought, like, I'm gonna do so much of this, but you don't actually do any of that? Or, like, what's been kind of the biggest surprise of, you know, actually working in UX and opinions, lots, and lots of opinions? Yeah. You know, General Assembly, you are with a bunch of people that are learning to be designers being taught by people that are designers.
You don't really, and you do this and kind of a bubble, I will say, you don't kind of deal with all the nuances of UX design that come with it, you know, all the crazy stakeholders that you're gonna have a say it needs to be this way, and it needs to be this done, done this way. Or all the developers are like, yeah, we can't build that or, you know, that doesn't mean meet our guidelines, or that that's gonna take too long to build. Those are the things that they don't really prepare you for. But you definitely need to be aware that there is a real-world outside of this perfect world that is General Assembly, oh, no, no, no ragging on them.
But I, you know, I do wish there was a way to kind of, you know, teach or prepare those kinds of things. But there isn't, there is no way to really teach how to rope in a straight developer or, you know, deal with an angry stakeholder. You have to break to them that their projects not going to meet their deadline. But you know, those are things that you know, you hopefully will gain as you move in and move through your career and move up. It's just the soft skills you get to learn and I'm very glad that Prudential did have a bunch of those characters, for better or for worse yet, but you know, I definitely feel like I learned a lot. And I feel like I'd become very adaptable to those different situations. Just because, you know, I've seen quite a bit.
Thomas 34:37
Yeah, yeah, no, fair enough. That's kind of one of those are one of the many skills you have to learn to kind of outside of design in order to make design happen in a lot of ways managing people's opinions and all the different kinds of feedback you get. And also as a UX designer, it's maybe it's different for something Like being an accountant, where, you know, the numbers kind of Don't lie. But when it comes to design, I mean, everything is kind of up to somebody's opinion. And since what we do is visual, everybody has the ability to comment on it and talk about why they don't like it. And why Yeah.
Evan 35:20
Yeah, one of my good friends is like, has a great saying it's, you know, everyone can be a designer, but not everyone can be a great designer. And I think that at the end of the day, you know, everyone in this in this conference room is trying to be a designer right now. who's actually, you know, how do we find the good designers that we need to get this done? Right. But also, you know, how do we listen to those different opinions? Because they are, they're very valid opinions. We need to, you know, take those into account today. But yeah, it's been a challenge to know who to listen to. And why.
Thomas 35:53
Yeah. Oh, that's very cool. I think you kind of hit on, I was gonna ask a bunch of questions, but you kind of went through everything. I can't imagine what you're, blah, blah, no, no. Wonderful. It allows me not to because I don't, I wasn't born with the gift of gab. But no, I can't this can't imagine your parent's face when you said I'm gonna leave biomedical engineering to go into the design is actually my wife did something similar where she was in med school. And she told her parents that she was going to go into interior design. And they about this owner, but luckily, in the, in the end, it all worked out. But and obviously, it's worked out for you as well. Evan 36:39 So yeah, you should have seen their faces when I told them, I was leaving the design role to become a director. Yeah, they were, they were very kind of dumbfounded at that, you know, oh, my God, Thomas 36:52 that's awesome. For
Evan 36:54
four years and becoming a director. That's, that's crazy. And I don't think they ever expected something like that, you know, design was very new to them. I think my dad used to call it Unix design, not even UX. That's really funny. It took him like maybe two or three years for me to be in the industry for him to actually understand what actually you x men, but, uh, you know, they've been, I mean, they've definitely been great supporters of me. And that decision moving forward, you know, definitely wasn't an easy pill for them as well. But having that support network did want me to be successful, really kind of drove, drove a lot of my passion, design, passion for design, and wanted me to really be kind of the best that I could be, no matter what field I was in, I think my parents really instilled that in May, yeah, to take whatever you're doing. And, you know, do it with a passion, do it with a very fervent fire. And I do that today. Tomorrow when I wake up, and I'll keep doing that,
Thomas 37:57
that's wonderful. So I guess the end is kind of what would your advice be to, you know, the person either considering General Assembly or one of the other boot camps or possibly about to finish it up? And maybe having trouble finding that first role? Kind of give them the pep talk too, you know, keep going?
Evan 38:18
Yeah, um, you know, I think one of the biggest things that really came, kept me going in this is really understanding, you know, why do you really want to be here, you know, what is your why at the end of the day, and for me, it was, you know, I had a passion for helping people and I wanted to really, you know, get to get to the bottom and really make a difference in people's lives. And, you know, that's why I was very focused on making designs that really helped, you know, helped our end user, you know, talking to users through user interviews, and, and doing usability testing, like actually talking to the people who we designed for, and why we're here that, that gave me you know, joy and happiness and really gave me a passion towards us.
So really, you know, get an understanding of why, why you want to be in this field. You know, anyone can get sit in a classroom and learn a course, but not many people can really, you know, understand passion. And, and once you kind of honor that, and figure out what that passion is, and maybe it's people, maybe it's designing, maybe it's you know, some other thing, but figuring out what your y is, at the end of the day, is really going to set you on the right path to completing these kinds of courses. And not just the courses but whatever comes after that, you know, anything else in your career.
There have been so many times where I've been so frustrated with a, you know, a meeting at the end of the day, but then I sit down and I'm like, Okay, this is why I'm here. This is why I'm doing this. This is really, this is really what I believe in at the moment. is creating great designs that help good people. Yeah. And, you know, really finding that passion is what drives me, you know, it gets me to wake up in the morning makes me happy. It makes me excited to see what's next.
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