Hustle: Recent Episodes
Funsize
The Hustle is a show dedicated to the evolution of the craft of digital product design. We chat with product design captains, inspiring designers, thought leaders, agency owners, and the Funsize team about life, leadership, design, and culture. Hosted by Funsize's Partner and Head of Design, Anthony Armendariz and new co-host Tony Sanchez, Funsize Design Lead.
Anthony and Tony take a trip down memory lane in this special retrospective episode of The Fold. Ten years ago, back in January 2015, Anthony recorded episode 14 of the Hustle podcast—a conversation with Adam Saint of Bench exploring what it meant to be a product designer at that time.
In this episode, Anthony and Tony reflect on the ideas, vocabulary, and culture that shaped early product design discussions—and how the discipline has evolved since. Then, they replay the original interview for viewers to experience firsthand.
To watch the video version of this podcast, head over to our YouTube channel here
Check out more exciting episodes on the Funsize Show Website.
Web: www.funsize.co. | Linkedin: Funsize Design | Instagram: @funsizeco | X: @funsize
Join us as Anthony and Stu hit pause on the ordinary workday and take “Out of Office” to the next level—exploring what it takes to lead design at Atlassian, connect remote teams, and build skills for the future.
The episode accelerates with an F1 racing simulator challenge at One Line Racing Center, then winds down with a whiskey tasting at Fierce Whiskers Distillery and open talk about career pivots, agency life, and balancing business with fatherhood. This conversation blends leadership lessons, personal stories, and a splash of racing excitement for anyone passionate about design and creativity.
To watch the video version of this podcast, head over to our YouTube channel here
Check out more exciting episodes on the Funsize Show Website.
Web: www.funsize.co. | Linkedin: Funsize Design | Instagram: @funsizeco
Explore Jen Aue's journey from graphic design to AI leadership with us on this episode of Honestly, Honesty. Jen shares candid reflections on navigating the challenges where personal ethics and the realities of working in AI sometimes collide. She also opens up about battling self-doubt, the importance of “energy hygiene,” and why staying true to yourself and trusting your instincts is essential—whether you’re leading innovative tech or just starting your journey.
If you’re passionate about creativity, technology, and authenticity in a rapidly changing world, this episode is for you!
To watch the video version of this podcast, head over to our YouTube channel here
Check out more exciting episodes on the Funsize Show Website.
Web: www.funsize.co. | Linkedin: Funsize Design | Instagram: @funsizeco
Their conversation begins with a discussion about how remote work is changing the rhythms of design teams and what it really means to connect intentionally and build culture across distance, diving into moments when collaboration drives creative breakthroughs—and when solo deep work reigns. Then they turn to tough questions: what does brand experience mean in a world where endless content and AI risk draining our creativity, and how much does a company’s personality shape purchasing decisions in this climate?
Don't miss the final hot debates: is Figma actually slowing design innovation and a rapid-fire round that challenges and redefines what design truly is.
To watch the video version of this podcast, head over to our YouTube channel here
Check out more exciting episodes on the Funsize Show Website.
Web: www.funsize.co. | Linkedin: Funsize Design | Instagram: @funsizeco
On this episode of The Fold, hosts Tony Sanchez and Anthony Armendariz are joined by Ben Hernandez. Ben shares his perspective on how designers can help drive real product elevation—not just polish—by collaborating more closely with product managers, whose evolving role now involves shaping vision and championing value across disciplines.
Ben also shares his personal philosophy on self-advocacy. He introduces the idea of a “user manual for working with me,” offering practical advice to anyone aiming for smoother collaboration in creative settings.
To watch the video version of this podcast, head over to our YouTube channel here
Check out more exciting episodes on the Funsize Show Website.
Web: www.funsize.co. | Linkedin: Funsize Design | Instagram: @funsizeco | X: @funsize
This special Currents episode pulls the Funsize crew into one room for a candid, off-the-cuff 2025 debrief with host Tony Sanchez. Instead of a polished case study reel, you get the kind of hallway and happy‑hour conversations that rarely make it into public recaps.
The team kicks things off with everyone’s Spotify “listening ages” using Wrapped as a jumping-off point. From there, they dig into Funsize’s &Friends division and how their flavor of staff augmentation really works in practice—being embedded with clients while still protecting the studio’s culture and craft. They share reflections on key projects without breaking NDAs, talk through what it was like to work more deeply with AI, and unpack the difference between living in abstract data sets versus actually testing physical products out in the world.
Stay to the end to catch everyone’s wins and “yeehaws” from the year, plus the one word they chose to sum up 2025 and the word they are carrying into 2026.
To watch the video version of this podcast, head over to our YouTube channel here
Check out more exciting episodes on the Funsize Show Website.
Web: www.funsize.co. | Linkedin: Funsize Design | Instagram: @funsizeco
Out of Office heads to Iceland to hang out with designer, Alli Metall. A longtime friend of host Anthony Armendariz, Alli gets deep on this episode, sharing a window into his life outside of design, including how he spends time with his family and what everyday Icelandic life looks like when he’s not at a desk.
Over drinks and Icelandic barbecue, Alli and Anthony discuss dream design projects, their secret ambitions to design craft beer cans, and why a design team is like a metal band. Tune in for a grounded, personal side of Alli that goes beyond portfolios and projects and into what really inspires him.
To watch the video version of this podcast, head over to our YouTube channel here
Check out Alli at the links below:
Web: https://www.metall.co/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/metalldotco/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/alli-metall-5a78a84b/
Check out more exciting episodes on the Funsize Show Website.
Web: www.funsize.co. | Linkedin: Funsize Design | Instagram: @funsizeco
Meet Lydia Froncek: musician, singer, songwriter, and producer. In this episode, Lydia takes us from the origins of her first band with her twin sister Maddie, through rocking out in an all-girl band in 6th grade, to her life on the road.
Lydia shares how growing up with a family that made language-learning a priority, immersing herself in diverse cultures, and living in other countries has shaped her unique sound. Go behind the scenes as she reveals her creative songwriting process, the moments when songs just “appear” as her own, and why amplifying non-male voices—and having mentors—matters in today’s music industry.
To watch the video version of this podcast, head over to our YouTube channel here
Check out more exciting episodes on the Funsize Show Website.
Web: www.funsize.co. | Linkedin: Funsize Design | Instagram: @funsizeco | X: @funsize
Linkedin: Funsize Design
Join hosts Anthony and Tony as they welcome designer extraordinaire Zach McNair. In this episode, Zach opens up about how his process has evolved, the power of a supportive team, and how the future of collaboration is shifting as AI becomes more integrated into creative workflows.
Zach encourages teams to embrace AI instead of fearing it—after all, it’s here to stay and can be a powerful ally.
To watch the video version of this podcast, head over to our YouTube channel here
Check out more exciting episodes on the Funsize Show Website.
Web: www.funsize.co. | Linkedin: Funsize Design | Instagram: @funsizeco | X: @funsize
It's Designer Yappy Hour time. If you've ever felt like inheriting a messy design file is more like becoming a digital archaeologist or a professional organizer, you’re not alone. In this edition, Tony Sanchez, Anthony Armendariz, and Lindsay Rife dive deep into all things design, from uncovering hidden quirks in supposedly perfect files, thriving in inherited chaos, and the surprising connections between creativity, long-term thinking, and the ways we keep in touch.
To watch the video version of this podcast, head over to our YouTube channel here
Check out more exciting episodes on the Funsize Show Website.
Web: www.funsize.co. | Linkedin: Funsize Design | Instagram: @funsizeco | X: @funsize
Linkedin: Funsize Design
Tony and Esteban explore what it means to be a designer today—navigating shifting roles, evolving tools, and the tension between credibility and curiosity. It’s part reflection, part banter, and part therapy session for anyone trying to make sense of the ever-changing creative landscape. Expect honest takes, a few laughs, and some surprisingly deep thoughts sparked by everyday experiences.
To watch the video version of this podcast, head over to our YouTube channel here
Check out more exciting episodes on the Funsize Show Website.
Web: www.funsize.co. | Linkedin: Funsize Design | Instagram: @funsizeco | X: @funsize
Linkedin: Funsize Design
What started as a little idea turned into something much much much bigger. The Big Little Print Show brought together 30 Austin-based artists to create original work around food, community, and justice, all in support of Urban Roots. This is a behind-the-scenes look at how the Funsize team and friends turned an idea into a sold out art show that raised over $10,000 for a good cause.
Check out thebiglittleprintshow here
To watch the video version of this podcast, head over to our YouTube channel here
Check out more exciting episodes on the Funsize Show Website.
Web: www.funsize.co. | Linkedin: Funsize Design | Instagram: @funsizeco | X: @funsize
Linkedin: Funsize Design
Tony and Lee dive into what design really means: less about making things pretty and more about solving real problems and helping people connect. They talk creative frustration versus AI speed, why human quirks matter, and how diverse perspectives shape better work. Plus, a few laughs, some shared wisdom, and plans to keep the convo going.
To watch the video version of this podcast, head over to our YouTube channel here
Check out more exciting episodes on the Funsize Show Website.
Web: www.funsize.co. | Linkedin: Funsize Design | Instagram: @funsizeco | X: @funsize
Linkedin: Funsize Design
Tony, Anthony, and Brian have spent years in the trenches together, building products, solving tough problems, and growing as leaders who care deeply about people and craft. In this conversation, they unpack what it means to create moments of real delight for users and the teams behind the work. From early design sparks to final handoffs, it's a look at how trust, collaboration, and shared history can turn good ideas into unforgettable experiences.
Check out more exciting episodes on the Funsize Show Website.
Web: www.funsize.co. | Linkedin: Funsize Design | Instagram: @funsizeco | X: @funsize
Linkedin: Funsize Design
Artist Dawn Okoro shares her winding path from law school to Meow Wolf, blending art, identity, and mental wellness. We talk career pivots, creative blocks, dream sculptures, and how she’s redefining success—plus a quick-fire round of Texas pride and fun surprises.
To watch the video version of this podcast, head over to our YouTube channel here
Check out more exciting episodes on the Funsize Show Website.
Web: www.funsize.co. | Linkedin: Funsize Design | Instagram: @funsizeco | X: @funsize
Linkedin: Funsize Design
Anthony spends the day with Funsize Partner and Head of Design, Lee Brenner. Between a round of board games at Vigilante and drinks at Draught House, they talk about Lee’s life story—from his early days to his design career—and the things that bring him joy. It’s an honest, laid-back look at what fuels one of Funsize’s most imaginative minds.
To watch the video version of this podcast, head over to our YouTube channel here
Check out more exciting episodes on the Funsize Show Website.
Web: www.funsize.co. | Linkedin: Funsize Design | Instagram: @funsizeco | X: @funsize
Linkedin: Funsize Design
In this episode of Currents, the Funsize team takes a break from their usual client projects to bond and recharge during Method Week. The hosts and guests discuss the origins and evolution of Method Week, highlighting activities designed to foster creativity, teamwork, and self-development. From letterpress printing and game shows to laser cutting and chocolate-cheese tastings, the team shares fun anecdotes and insights from their time together. They also reflect on past Method Weeks, the benefits of taking time off, and plans for future immersive experiences.
To see the examples referenced during this conversation, head over to our YouTube channel to view the video version here
Check out more exciting episodes on the Funsize Show Website.
Web: www.funsize.co. | Linkedin: Funsize Design | Instagram: @funsizeco | X: @funsize
Linkedin: Funsize Design
In this episode of Currents Tony Sanchez discusses various design-related topics with guests Dina Williams, Tarica Phung Navarro, and Jack Willis. They explore their personal creative processes, the impact of AI on design, and the potential future of tools like Figma. The discussion includes anecdotes about past experiences, thoughts on the integration of AI in creative work, and how emerging technologies may shape the future of design. Key themes include the balance between human creativity and AI assistance, the importance of maintaining wonder and curiosity, and the evolving role of designers in an increasingly AI-driven world.
To watch the video version of this podcast, head over to our YouTube channel here
Check out more exciting episodes on the Funsize Show Website.
Web: www.funsize.co. | Linkedin: Funsize Design | Instagram: @funsizeco | X: @funsize
Linkedin: Funsize Design
Meet Natalie, Nicole, and Brooke, the hosts of Honestly, Honesty. In this first episode, they share their story, reflect on the inspiration behind the show, and offer a glimpse into the honest, unfiltered conversations ahead.
To watch the video version of this podcast, head over to our YouTube channel here
Check out more exciting episodes on the Funsize Show Website.
Web: www.funsize.co. | Linkedin: Funsize Design | Instagram: @funsizeco | X: @funsize
Linkedin: Funsize Design
What does it mean to lead with both vision and craft? In this episode, Lee Brenner—Partner and Head of Design at Funsize—shares how he navigates the complexities of leadership while staying rooted in hands-on design work. He reflects on the evolving role of a design leader, the balance between delegation and doing, and the responsibility of keeping a business creatively and operationally strong. From his early days as a computer science graduate and engineer to building a career in design, Lee opens up about the moments that shaped him, the challenges that keep him curious, and what it takes to keep growing in a fast-changing industry.
For the video version of this podcast, head over to our YouTube channel here
Check out more exciting episodes on the Funsize Show Website.
Web: www.funsize.co. | Linkedin: Funsize Design | Instagram: @funsizeco | X: @funsize
Linkedin: Funsize Design
Tony, Andre, Edgar, and Esteban break down 8 design trends and predictions for 2025. We’re talking about what’s gaining traction, why it’s exciting, and where we’re already seeing it in the industry and our work. From bold aesthetics to fresh takes on interaction and usability, we dive into what’s shaping the future of design. Expect hot takes, real-world examples, and maybe even a few debates. What trends are you seeing? Drop your thoughts in the comments!
To see the examples referenced during this conversation, head over to our YouTube channel to view the video version here
Check out more exciting episodes on the Funsize Show Website.
Web: www.funsize.co. | Linkedin: Funsize Design | Instagram: @funsizeco | X: @funsize
Linkedin: Funsize Design
In this episode of Currents, Tony Sanchez, Design Director at Funsize, gathers a team of designers to discuss their recent website redesign. Hear from Esteban Marquez, Natalie Armendariz, Andre Jurgensen, Lee Brenner, and Dina Williams as they walk through the project’s journey—from inception to completion.
They share:
- The motivations behind the redesign
- Challenges and how they overcame them
- The importance of collaboration across teams
- Unique interactive elements that bring Funsize’s personality to life
- Learnings and future plans for their digital presence
Links & Resources:
- Check out the redesigned Funsize website: www.funsize.co
- Learn more about Funsize: About Us
Don’t forget to subscribe, leave a review, and connect with us on social media!"
Follow Funsize at:
X: Funsize
Linkedin: Funsize Design
Check out more exciting episodes on the Funsize Show Website.
Web: www.funsize.co. | Instagram: @funsizeco | X: @funsize
In this episode of Currents, Tony Sanchez, Design Director at Funsize, leads a discussion reflecting on 2024 and looking ahead to 2025. Team members Brooke Pippins, Lee Brenner, and Mari Chamoun share personal highlights and professional insights, discussing challenges like stress management, client expectations, and the integration of AI in design. They explore emerging trends such as the need for designers to acquire PM skills, the rise of no-code platforms, and innovations in health tech and autonomous vehicles. The conversation emphasizes adaptability, the evolving role of AI, and the importance of maintaining a human touch in design.
Follow Funsize at:
X: Funsize
Linkedin: Funsize Design
Check out more exciting episodes on the Funsize Show Website.
Web: www.funsize.co. | Instagram: @funsizeco | X: @funsize
On this episode throwback, we discuss:
- Eric's experience running and growing a startup called Perkville in the bay area
- Creating a culture of mentorship
- Being a Chief Design Officer of one, and how running a startup helped Eric refine his focus and purpose
- Eric walks us through the Facebook Groups team, their mission and how they work
- The importance of "north star" concepts and their ability to help you sell an idea and a vision to your team
- Why shorter (3 day) sprints can be more effective than 5 day design sprints
- The "People/Problem" framework at Facebook and how Facebook designers drive the products and determine what to ship
- The value of diverse job experiences and how working in an agency can help you learn skills to create and sell ideas
- Having a diverse team of designers gives you awesome collaboration and outcomes.
- Testing incremental changes get you incremental results, but when you test big bold ideas you can see huge angle changes in your metrics
- Designers need to get out of their bubbles (most of your users are not like you)
- Tips on user testing when you don't have real user testing support or funding
Check out more exciting episodes on the Funsize Show Website.
Web: www.funsize.co. | Instagram: @funsizeco | X: @funsize
In this episode, we sit down with Heather Korczynski, a dedicated pop-culture aficionado and UX Lead at IBM. Heather offers a deep dive into her life—discussing her role at IBM, her passion for Austin FC, and her aspirations of launching her own business. We explore her growth journey, covering the importance of community, the value of tackling new challenges, and how she balances her career with evolving interests. Heather also shares her excitement about recent pop culture highlights, like the buzz around the Barbenheimer double feature, and reveals her approach to continually learning new skills, from advanced design techniques to project management fundamentals. Wrapping up, Heather provides thoughtful advice for those aiming to embrace new opportunities, step out of their comfort zones, and confront anxieties head-on, all in the pursuit of authentic growth and self-discovery.
In this episode, Nina Sanchez, Tony Sanchez, Bobby Dixon, and Nhi Nguyen delve into the Big Little Poster Show, exploring its value for Austin's design community, sharing personal connections with food, and uncovering the inspiration behind Bobby and Nhi's desire to get involved. They discuss how the show brings together a diverse group of designers and creators, fostering a unique space for collaboration, creativity, and community. Each guest shares their perspective on the relationship between design and food culture, revealing how flavors, colors, and textures inspire their creative processes. Bobby and Nhi share their excitement about the works these artists will bring to life, anticipating how each piece will uniquely capture the theme and celebrate the spirit of Urban Roots. Tune in to hear why this event is more than just an art showcase—it's a celebration of design, community, and the connections that drive creativity forward.
Follow THe Big Little Poster Show, Bobby Dixon, Nhi Nguyen, and Nina at:
Web: biglittleprintshow
Instagram:
@thebiglittleprintshow
Bobby Dixon: @klctvefusion
Nhi Nguyen: @nhiii
Nina Sanchez: @chola.in.floral
Check out more exciting episodes on the Funsize Show Website.
Web: www.funsize.co. | Instagram: @funsizeco | X: @funsize
In this episode, Tony and Anthony explore the nuanced distinctions between good and beautiful design. They consider the subjectivity of beauty, influenced by cultural and individual preferences, and the importance of usability and business objectives and what constitutes “good” design. Citing a mobile game that succeeds commercially and the unconventional design of the Cybertruck, they underline the tension between aesthetics and functionality. The conversation shifts to natural phenomena like the Northern Lights and the balance between awe-inspiring visuals and the tendency to overlook everyday wonders.
Follow Tony and Anthony on
X: Tony Sanchez Anthony Armendariz
Linkedin: Tony Sanchez Anthony Armendariz
Check out more exciting episodes on the Funsize Show Website.
Web: www.funsize.co. | Instagram: @funsizeco | X: @funsize
In this episode, we chat with Brian Simpson, a creative professional who took the leap from Florida to Austin, Texas, back in 2008. Brian started in flash design and later co-founded an experiential design agency, showcasing incredible innovation and adaptability along the way. We’ll hear about his work on high-profile projects, including a groundbreaking app for Rupert Murdoch, and dive into the ups and downs of entrepreneurship. Things get personal as we discuss how parenthood and a pandemic-inspired move to small-town Wimberley have shaped his journey. We’ll also explore Brian’s latest passion project, Small Town Locals, which is all about supporting rural communities through commerce and storytelling. So join us for an inspiring conversation on risk-taking, continuous learning, and finding balance in the ever-evolving world of creative business.
Follow Brian and Small Town Locals on
Web: www.smalltownlocals.com
Instagram: @smalltownlocals @whatsupwithbrian
Check out more exciting episodes on the Funsize Show Website.
Web: www.funsize.co. | Instagram: @funsizeco | X: @funsize
Ten years ago, Funsize launched the Hustle Podcast. Since then, we have had nearly one hundred conversations with exciting people in the design industry.
Today, we're excited to announce and discuss the next generation of the Funsize podcasting, The Funsize Show!
This podcast, now rebranded as The Funsize Show, is a variety show with many exciting segments hosted by many brilliant people at Funsize. The content will span the gamut of design leadership to design expertise, conversations with our clients about our relationship and our work, taking risks and trying new things, fun and inspiring conversations with our team, and more.
We're about to launch a new website for the show and will be making that announcement on our social media and on future podcast episodes. Please stay tuned. We think you'll like it.
Check out more exciting episodes on the Funsize Show Website.
Web: www.funsize.co. | Instagram: @funsizeco | X: @funsize
Juliana Vislova is the VP of Design at Mercury, an all-in-one banking platform for startups. A former linguistics major, Juliana is career switcher who spent time as an art director for a digital marketing agency before her design career. After moving to the U.S., she stumbled upon product design and immediately loved its intersection of pscyhology, art, storytelling and problem-solving. Her design path has taken her from the founding designer at Mercury to now leading a team of 20.
In this episode we cover:
- Career Switching
- Burnout
- Personal agency in work
- Giving up control and trusting others
- Meetings as work
- And more!
Visit the Funsize website
Subscribe to The Funsize Digest
During our party for SXSW 2022, we interviewed designers and tech workers to understand how their careers were affected by the pandemic and what it means for their futures. We'd like to extend a huge thanks to Johnny Abowd, Carlos Menchaca, Dina Williams, Ali Metall, AC Cowart, Steven Parvaresh, Rick Messer, Isabelle Encela, Steven Ray and Katy Beightol for sharing their perspectives on this unique episode.
In this episode we cover:
- How people's work was affected by the pandemic
- The differences in team dynamics created over the last two years
- Where designers see their careers headed next
- And more!
Visit the Funsize website
Subscribe to The Funsize Digest
Brian Peterson is a a multidisciplinary creator supporting, connecting, and empowering organizations through strategic design. Brian’s background is in fine arts with a brief stint in animation/illustration. His path to design has taken him through freelance visual design, to a founding team startup, to the design studio at Funsize. Currently, he leads design teams at Affirm, where he works to bring honest financial products to the world.
Brian is a strong believer in collaboration and he sees design as a vehicle for connecting people and transforming organizations. When not thinking about design management, operations, methodologies, etc., Brian likes to build worlds through drawing.
In this episode we cover:
- Design management
- Individual contributors
- Growth
- Management
- Design operations
- Leveling up
- And more!
Visit the Funsize website
Subscribe to The Funsize Digest
Kevin Hawkins is thedirector of product design at BookClub—an online platform that brings authors and readers together. He is also an award-winning, multi-disciplinary design leader and educator with over 12 years of experience building communities and launching products.
Kevin is a self-taught front-end developer and started his career doing freelance web design for local businesses and science NGOs in his home town: Washington D.C. He transitioned to his first full-time job in UX at 16. Since then, he's been a UX leader for Booking.com, PwC, EY, Gap Inc., and more.
Kevin now resides in Amsterdam where he teaches UX and directs the production and launch of innovative products. In his spare time, he likes to travel, learn new perspectives, and desires to be challenged while doing good work.
In this episode we cover:
- Outcome vs. intent
- Workaholism
- Cultural inspiration
- 20% time
- Sofas & interior design
- Hygge
- And more!
Visit the Funsize website
Subscribe to The Funsize Digest
Michael Holzer is the director of UX at Google Payments and has been at Google for over eight years. He is a passionate, entrepreneurial design leader currently focused on building and operating large-scale creative teams working on new mediums and technologies.
Michael grew up in Silicon Valley and started his career studying mechanical engineering and industrial design by prototyping bicycle helmets for Bell Sports. After dropping out, he pivoted to designing irrigation systems for a landscape architecture firm and soon found himself exploring and learning more about web design while working on the company's first website.
When not "working" in the traditional sense, Michael is passionate about biking and building his athletic cred.
In this episode we cover:
- Technology & security
- POS systems
- Government incentives
- Society at large
- Building teams
- Autonomous teams
- And more!
Visit the Funsize website
Subscribe to The Funsize Digest
Alli Metall is a husband, father, and designer living in Reykjavík, Iceland. He was born in Húsavík, Iceland--a small town on the northern coast (also famed as the setting of Netflix's Eurovision Song Contest). He began his career playing guitar in death metal and jazz bands and soon combined his interests in music and computer games to a career in design. After a brief agency stint as an intern in New York City, he returned home to work at a game company, a fin-tech startup, and an airline. Nowadays, Alli is the owner, founder, and creator of his own studio: Metall.
Alli shares his fears (running out of $$$) and dreams (surfing in Hawaii before turning 80) and what he's seen as the silver lining of the COVID-19 pandemic.
In this episode we cover:
- Job switching
- Agency formation
- Ego vs. teamwork
- The pandemic & the future of work
- Designing for screens
- What we're looking forward to
- And more!
Visit the Funsize website
Subscribe to The Funsize Digest
Aaron “Ron” Irizarry, is the Sr. Director, Servicing Platforms Design at Capital One. He loves all things user experience, problem-solving, and design process. Having worked for Fox/IGN, HP, Nasdaq, and now Capital One, Aaron loves sinking his teeth into complex problems. In addition to his day job, Aaron speaks at events and provides training for companies on design team structure, communication, and collaboration. He is also the co-author of Discussing Design.
Most importantly, Aaron is a master of the BBQ arts, a lover and player of heavy metal music, and a lifelong Dodgers fan.
In this episode we cover:
- Design systems
- The critiquing process
- Collaboration between levels
- Facilitation techniques and frameworks
- Establishing ground rules
- Identifying emotional responses
- Feedback vs. critique
Visit the Funsize website
Subscribe to The Funsize Digest
In this first episode with Tony Sanchez as an official co-host, we were honored to be joined by a design legend.
Toke Nygaard is the Chief Creative Officer at Zendesk. With more than 20 years of experience designing digital experiences, Toke Nygaard oversees Zendesk’s brand and product UX/UI. In this role, he is constantly developing and building the Zendesk brand with his global team of passionate creatives, keeping the product experience true to its origins of being simple and easy to use.
Before joining Zendesk, Toke was a founding partner of one of the largest pioneering design communities, K10k. He was also the founder and creative director at Cuban Council, a digital-design company, where he helped design the original Facebook identity, and worked with a range of clients from Tyra Banks and Francis Coppola, to Apple and NASA. Previously, he worked for Danish web-design frontrunner Araneum and later helped start the Oven Digital offices in London.
Outside of the office, Toke enjoys spending quality time with his family and is a table tennis aficionado.
@tokenygaard
In this episode we cover:
- The intersection of design and art
- Fantasy illustrations
- Visual design education
- Moving from a startup to IPO
- Transitioning from designer to manager
- In-house vs. agency
- Balancing quality and production
- And more!
Visit the Funsize website
Subscribe to The Funsize Digest
For the last episode recorded in 2020, we flip the spotlight onto our founders, Anthony and Natalie Armendariz, to walk us through the challenging, chaotic and — at times — exciting journey that was 2020. In a year that provided surprises and obstacles for just about every human being on the planet, we wanted to tell our agency's part of the story. We hope you enjoy.
We cover:
- Our mindset going into 2020
- Business and culture goals entering 2020
- Q1 happenings at the beginning of the pandemic
- Surprising new client relationships in 2020
- How/why did Funsize actually grow in 2020?
- The "staff augmentation" niche during the pandemic
- The pandemic's effect on team culture
- Team perspectives during the pandemic
- Expectations when starting Funsize years ago
- The launch of Funsize Ventures and what it means
- Work differences between designers and developers
- What will 2021 bring?
Visit the Funsize website
Subscribe to The Funsize Digest
Ted Boda is currently a Product Design Manager on the Well-Being team at Instagram. He is also a former Director of Design at Udacity, former Senior Designer at Nest Labs, former Lead Mobile Designer at Netflix and a former Lead UI Designer for Keynote at Apple (where, interestingly enough, he worked on some of the slides used for Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth). With all that experience to draw on, we loved having Ted on the show — for a second time — to hear what he's been up to and gain some insight into how design management is done at one of the largest social media platforms on earth.
We cover:
- Guesswork at the beginning of design leadership
- Design leadership at Instagram
- Design tools at Instagram and Facebook
- The Well-being team at Instagram and what they do
- What an average week looks like for Ted.
- His "cameo" on Netflix
- Qualities to look for in Design Managers
- Ted's childhood interests
Margaret Lee is the Director of UX Community & Culture at Google. A self-described "reluctant leader," she heads up programs that unite departments across the company and create Google career opportunities for those who might not typically have access. Margaret created this role for herself a few years ago when she noticed there was an opportunity to put more intention behind efforts of inclusion and community within Google. After a manger's encouragement, she took a leap of faith and began sharing her passions on-stage. She hasn't looked back since.
We cover:
- Her path to design
- Google's shift to a design focus
- How Margaret created her own niche career
- The differences intentionality can create
- How Google is improving access to UX jobs
- The complex challenge of inclusion
- Reluctant leadership
- How her role at Google has changed her personally
- Connecting with new team members during the pandemic
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Braden Kowitz is a former design partner at Google Ventures, where he had the opportunity to work with startups like ClassPass, Gusto, Slack, Medium, Flatiron Health, TuneIn, BlueBottle Coffee, 23andMe, One Medical Group, HubSpot, RetailMeNot, Nest and more. He is the co-author of NY Times Best Seller, Sprint, and the co-founder of Range, a tool that keeps teams connected and productive. We're extremely grateful to Braden for sharing his wealth of knowledge and experience with us. Get your notepads out for this one!
We cover:
- Some of the differences in Google design from when he entered and left
- How he got into Google Ventures and why
- His experience watching the explosion of the Design Sprint
- What Range does and who it serves
- The agency challenge of working with multiple cultures
- Working the way clients want to work during COVID-19
- Testing and validating new work methodologies
- Vulnerability and connection for teams
- The challenge of jumping responsibilities as a business owner
- Personal manuals
- More!
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Douglas Ferguson is an entrepreneur and human-centered technologist with over 20 years of experience. He is the founder and president of Voltage Control, an Austin-based facilitation agency that specializes in helping teams work better together through participatory decision making and design inspired facilitation techniques. He has helped transform teams from U.S. SOCOM, the Air Force, Adobe, Dropbox, Fidelity, Vrbo, Liberty Mutual, Humana, and SAIC. We really appreciated hearing Douglas's thoughts on facilitation in the era of COVID and are excited to see what's next for Voltage Control.
We cover:
- Starting out in development
- How his career in facilitation has changed
- Building a facilitation community
- Adaptability vs Dogma
- Prescribing different workshops
- Knowing when it's time for a design sprint
- What happens after a design sprint
- The differences in remote sprints
- A lot more!
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In a first for The Hustle, we're tackling important subject matter outside the realm of design. In a conversation led by our Guest Host, Tony Sanchez, a Design Lead at Funsize, Chas Moore joined us to discuss the public outcry and wave of activism in the wake of George Floyd's murder. Chas is the Executive Director of Austin Justice Coalition, an activist-led organization that educates and builds community power for people of color who live in Austin, Texas. We're extremely grateful to have him on the show to provide insight into this important time in American history.
We cover:
- Austin Justice Coalition's mission
- Why George Floyd's murder was so impactful
- What it's like to be in the local spotlight during this important movement
- Resulting change from increased attention on racial violence
- What liberation looks like
- Being authentically engaged with the cause
- The current undertakings of Austin Justice Coalition
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Note: We apologize for the audio quality. There was an issue with the microphone.
Justin is a multi-faceted, multi-pierced, multi-tattooed designer, author, and speaker. He wrote the book "Cultivating a Creative Culture", is the Vice President of Human-Centered Design and Development at bswift, the founder of The Dead Pixel Society, and a contributor to A List Apart. Justin had some really intuitive viewpoints on culture that were awesome to dig into and it was a pleasure having him on the show.
We cover:
- Working in the healthcare system
- Why he gravitates to roles that aren't tee'd up and ready to go
- Creative culture and the golden rule
- Creative Inspiration Wednesdays
- How designers have an advantage in creating a good culture
- Transitioning from getting fulfillment from design to getting fulfillment from others' evolution
- Leading with action
- The challenges of remote working
Funsize friend, Chad Engle, is the Product Design Director at GoDaddy, a company that is rapidly expanding its product offerings and leaning into design with a focus on in-house talent. He stopped by to share his experience growing design orgs, explain what he looks for in applicants, and provide some insight into how he approaches leadership.
We cover:
- Growing a design practice at GoDaddy
- Transitioning from designer to Design Manager
- Using a different set of design skills to create a design org
- The value of pier-to-pier conversations and mentoring
- "Steering the bull" of culture
- Hiring for aptitude vs. craft
- Growing as an IC
- Designing design ladders
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Note: We recorded this one before COVID began, so some references (like to our SXSW party) did not come to fruition.
Theo Strauss is an 18-year-old product designer out of NYC who's already making waves in the community through his involvement with companies like Apple, Postmates, and Figma. As someone on the bleeding edge of a new generation of designers, we loved having him on the show to share some of his thoughts on where the industry is heading and how young people are getting involved.
We cover:
- Creating an entire portfolio in Figma
- Growing up in New York City
- Childhood career dreams
- The evolution of design tools
- Going to college vs. entering the workforce
- The ambiguity of "designer"
- The democratization of design
- Cold emails and personal networks
- A lot more
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Note: We apologize for the audio quality. There was an issue with the microphone.
Ash Huang is a designer, illustrator, author, speaker, artist and parent who currently works at Adobe. After finding design at a young age, Ash's career has spanned a wide variety of well-known companies and different pursuits that have left her with some fascinating views on accomplishment, progress, staying curious and more. It took us a while to get this one on the books but the conversation was totally worth it.
We cover:
- Working on the Adobe XD product team
- How to choose what you will devote time to
- Tracking progress
- How having kids changes things within your career
- Specialization vs. generalization
- Staying curious
- Management vs Individual Contributor tracks
- Alone time as a parent
- Legacy
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Helen Tran is a designer, CEO, hobbyist writer, traveler and macaroon connoisseur (amongst other things). In this wide-ranging episode, we discuss everything from software design, business ownership and bodybuilding, to wealth and weird Texan habits.
We cover:
- Growing with Shopify
- Paying dues before taking big career risks
- Figuring out what to pursue and deciding to start Jupiter
- Why there's no such thing as "business vs. personal"
- Living someone else's life for a year
- How bodybuilding affects discipline and goal setting
- Defining "wealth"
- The knowledge gap between CEO generations
- Business as more than a way to make money
- Toronto vs. Texas
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Guigo Sanchez is the Creative Director at THIRD EAR — previously known as LatinWorks — an agency that specializes in creating advertising for the U.S. Hispanic audience. Born and raised in Mayagüez, Puerto Rico, he is the husband of Mari Chamoun (Managing Director at Funsize), and father to Julia Elena Sánchez Chamoun. After completing his psychology degree in Puerto Rico, Guigo moved to Austin to study advertising and decided to stay forever (for now). He enjoys dad life, music, computers, food and personal finance.
In this episode, we discuss:
- How studying psychology affects advertising
- Speaking to different audiences and cultures in advertising
- The top skills needed for creative directing
- Imagination as a skill
- Hispanic marketing and advertising
- Maintaining belief in the value of creativity
- The temporary nature of advertising and design
- What does "partner" mean in the advertising world
- Commitment in professional relationships
- The emotional operations of an organization
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Thomas Ewart is an Associate Product Designer at Funsize, where he works with startups and enterprise design teams to craft thoughtful digital experiences. With a non-traditional career path that spans accounting, tattoos and electronic music, Thomas brings a unique perspective to his work and enjoys helping others find their place in the design world.
- Non-traditional paths to design
- The decision to spend the money on General Assembly's design intensive
- Year one as a product designer
- Enterprise vs. startup design work
- Collaboration
- The three stages of design in an organization
- Figma and the future of design tools
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Desiree Garcia is a senior designer at Automattic, the company behind WordPress.com and most recently, Tumblr. Their goal is to democratize publishing so that anyone with a story can tell it, regardless of income, gender, politics, language, or where they live in the world. She's also an editor at A List Apart, a webzine that explores the design, development, and meaning of web content, with a special focus on web standards and best practices.
In this episode, we discuss:
- How a psychology degree can influence design and teamwork
- What we miss about the old web
- Star Trek's Kobayashi Maru and how it applies to design
- How to respond to situations that can't be won
- The challenges of talking about your work
- Designing things that "aren't real"
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Mike Trozzo is the EVP at Tide University Laundry, a service business disrupting the laundry-norm on campuses around the country. His career trajectory took him from dreams of being an astronaut and doctor, to studying finance in college, pursuing acting in LA and eventually leading design and engineering teams in Waco, Texas.
In this episode, we discuss:
- Connecting the dots between design and P&L
- Budgeting for design
- Staffing projects
- Design roles and responsibilities
- Balancing the skillsets and goals of team members
- The shifting need for generalists and specialists
- Childhood career dreams vs. adult career reality
- Personal values and work values
- How Funsize's values emerged
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Brian Peterson is a former Funsize Associate Design Director with a passion for collaboration and intentional design. He's a close friend and talented designer whose career saw a lot of growth during his time with us. Brian is making the move back home to Chicago, but before he left, he graced us with a send-off podcast to discuss goal-setting — a subject he's particularly passionate about.
In this episode, we discuss:
- The characteristics of a good goal.
- What it means to work with intent.
- Goal-setting for teams.
- The importance of clear communication with clients.
- Understanding different stakeholders in an organization.
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Joel Beukelman is a Senior Interaction Designer at Google where he works on Chrome. He's also a prolific content creator with a popular YouTube channel and vlog. In this episode, Anthony and Joel cover everything from family life and time prioritization, to health, jacuzzis and — of course – design.
On this episode we discuss:
- Juggling family, travel, a high-level design job at Google and content creation
- Prioritizing for life satisfaction
- The importance of health for designers
- Joel's experience transitioning from startup life back to Google
- The need for support in your career and personal life
- The challenges of investing in personal time as a creative
- The consequences of too much hustling
- Chasing titles vs. doing work you love
- What it’s like to work on a product used by 1 billion people.
- Finding what’s next after you’ve reached your career goals
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Jen Dary is the founder of Plucky, a company that specializes in creating healthy dynamics at work through coaching, consulting, workshops, and education. On this episode of the Hustle she chats with Anthony about how to know if management is right for you, what challenges new and established leaders face every day, and strategies to help along the way.
On this episode we discuss:
- What questions to ask before accepting a management role
- The most common challenges facing both high-level and new leaders
- Understanding how management might fit in your career path
- How to create and communicate vision to your team
- Dealing with creator grief: not making things anymore
- The role of trust in management relationships
- How to gauge and improve employee experience
- Giving yourself permission to experiment, learn, and find new tools
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Read the article
Katie Dill is the VP of Design at Lyft. Her team includes about one hundred creatives who are part of everything Lyft makes for drivers, passengers, users, and in-house teams. Katie discusses the importance of believing in your mission, how diverse teams benefit companies in multiple ways, staying in touch with users, and how creating and empowering a great design team is, in itself, an amazing design task.
On this episode we discuss:
- Making sure a team is happy, healthy, productive, and doing the best work of their lives
- Seeing beyond the pixels to the offline experience of users
- Managing a design team and being farther from the work, but closer to the people who make it happen
- Defining design beyond a product or object. We design teams, design strategies, we design the way we work
- Empowering diversity in hiring and beyond and the far-reaching benefits of a diverse team
- Lyft’s multidimensional goals to improve transportation, environmental issues, and accessibility to make every city more about the people who live there
- Empathy for users and how Lyft designs for drivers, passengers, and the unique attributes of every city that impacts their experience
- Advantages and disadvantages of working for an in-house team or an agency
- Making a positive impact, mentoring, and stepping forward to empower others
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Read the article
Banter is a brand new and exciting social podcast platform for sharing and discussing podcasts, and discovering amazing new content and shows with your friends. Banter's Co-Founders Steve Krenzel and James Reggio join me on this episode to discuss the product's recent launch, their origin story, what makes Banter great, and their vision of the podcasting space.
Download Banter for iOS, or Android.
“There are more Americans listening to podcasts than being on
Twitter... It’s really about connecting people to stories, and
connecting stories to people.”
On this episode we discuss:
- The Banter origin story
- How James and Steve run the company and develop product from opposite sites of the United States
- How Banter helps people discover new podcast episodes and shows through their friends and social connections
- Banter's cool Recast feature for sharing awesome content with the community and on social networks
- The importance of being cross-platform
- Banter's experience working with Funsize to design the brand, product design, and design system
- The value of design in the early days, the present, and the future
- Advise for designers who work with startups, and advise for startups who work with designers
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Eric Bollman is a Design Lead on the Facebook Groups team. Today he stopped by the Funsize studio to discuss his team's approach creating their missions, how they design and evolving the product, and methodologies they leverage to test and validating their design decisions.
On this episode we discuss:
- Eric's experience running and growing a startup called Perkville in
the bay area * Creating a culture of mentorship * Being a Chief Design Officer of one, and how running a startup helped Eric refine his focus and purpose * Eric walks us through the Facebook Groups team, their mission and how they work * The importance of "north star" concepts and their ability to help you sell an idea and a vision to your team * Why shorter (3 day) sprints can be more effective than 5 day design sprints * The "People/Problem" framework at Facebook and how Facebook designers drive the products and determine what to ship * The value of diverse job experiences and how working in an agency can help you learn skills to create and sell ideas * Having a diverse team of designers gives you awesome collaboration and outcomes. * Testing incremental changes get you incremental results, but when you test big bold ideas you can see huge angle changes in your metrics * Designers need to get out of their bubbles (most of your users are not like you) * Tips on user testing when you don't have real user testing support or funding
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Ryan Wilson is a Product Designer on the Day of Travel Team at Alaska Airlines in Seattle Washington. Ryan stopped by the Funsize studio to talk about how Alaska gets people from point A to point B, designing a holistic experience, building trust in your design team, and why he's adamant about being a lifelong learner.
On this episode we discuss:
- Design in the airline industry and at Alaska Airlines
- Complex service design, ecosystems and designing for consistency in digital and analog experiences
- User research and advocating for your customers in all you do
- How context should inform your product, design, and the user experience
- Why developing trust is critical for success, and how good trust leads to opportunities for your team
- Why process is more important than product, and why invalidating your ideas is as essential as validating them
- The role of passion in getting work done and doing it well
- The importance of lifelong learning, and choosing who you learn from
- Staying mindful of the people that helped you get to where you are now
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Esteban Marquez is a Product Designer on the Funsize team. He's also a very talented graphic designer and artist. Esteban and I discuss his experience in the various design fields that led to his recent transition to digital product design, the importance of personal branding and differentiating yourself, and much more.
On this episode we discuss:
- Esteban's design career experience and journey
- Art direction vs. product design
- The value of both deep focus and variety
- Onboarding designers and what it feels like joining a new design team
- What it's like hustling when you're first getting started
- Creating a personal brand, a persona, and a story that differentiates yourself
- The value of working in a team setting
- Managing ego and empathy
- Designing your life
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“Until designers can speak the language of business (and to some
degree talk their talk), we’re just going to be the people that make
things look good."
An apology: I had some unknown issues with my gear during this recording so the quality suffered a bit. However, it was such a great conversation I just had to post it!
Greg Storey is an Executive Director of Design at USAA, captain of industry, and an all around badass designer and leader of designers. It’s been a while since Greg and I caught up and so we covered a bunch of important design business topics in this extra long episode of Hustle. I hope you enjoy it.
Also check out Greg's podcast Sprints and Milestones where he and Brett Harned share war stories, tips, tactics, and anecdotes on navigating the sometimes rough waters of getting digital projects done.
On this episode, we discuss:
- The team that Greg leads at USAA, which focuses on investment
products * What it was like using Iomega zips and Jaz drives * The biggest challenges that design organizations at large companies face * Design has it’s seat at the table but we don’t realize that we have to push the campaign further * Why designers should look to the IT industry for inspiration for communicating our value, how we impact business, and how to engage * The impact of modeling your team and pace after the Bay Area “move fast” culture and failing cheap vs. failing fast * Why designers needs to be good at business and be put on the hook and share responsibility for the performance of the things we make * How agencies can be more involved in all of the hard design work that's needed after the initial design is delivered * Why organizational empathy is just as important as user empathy * Developing the skill of asking and understanding the “Why, What, and How” * The book “Extreme Ownership: How U.S. Navy SEALs Lead and Win”
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“Many designers don’t realize the challenges their leader faces.”
Peter Merholz is the VP of Design at Snagajob and co-author of “Org Design for Design Orgs”. He previously co-founded Adaptive Path, which is now part of the Capital One Design. In between all of this, Peter was also Funsize’s first client during his time at Groupon.
It’s been a couple of years since Peter’s been on the Hustle Podcast and we’re really excited to have him back. On this episode, Anthony and Peter chat about designing design teams, Peter’s new talk “The Four Archetypes of The Complete Design Leader”, design job titles, why Product Management is the new User Experience, and more.
More on Peter’s Four Archetypes of Design Leadership:
As designers become design leaders, they need to leave behind what made them successful and embrace new approaches to their work. And when they realize just how much there is to do, it can feel overwhelming. In this talk, Peter draws upon 20 years of leading design teams to provide a memorable framework for understanding all aspects of the role. As a Coach, you manage down to get the most out of your team. The Diplomat manages across, developing relationships with functional peers. The Advocate manages up, championing their team's work to executives and other stakeholders. And the Architect figures out the tools and frameworks necessary to support the design organization as it scales.
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Last year was a really big year for Funsize. Because the agency was growing, we focused 2017 towards designing our design team, hiring, developing employee growth plans, launching new cultural endeavors, developing new services, and investing in our future.
Tony Sanchez joins Funsize’s Partners Anthony and Natalie Armendariz to talk about all of this and a recent interview on the InVision blog called “Designing a Design Team”.
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The intersection of passions is at the center of this talk with designer Greyson. She discusses her journey to learn skills enough to shift from graphic design to product design. After finding employment and working in that field in the bay area for a while she's now pushing herself again. Striking out on her own, she’s established a freelance collective full of designers with varied skill sets called Wild and Grey.
Greyson’s work in photography, and specifically portraiture, is a reflection of her passion for people-centered design. Considering her audience as individuals, rather than as generic users, enables Greyson to have deeper connection to the things she’s making. One of the keys to this is cognitive empathy, which relies on understanding, rather than absorbing, someone else’s experience.
Greyson discusses her journey and the importance, and challenges, of both finding and facilitating mentorship. Whether looking to gain a new skill, navigating freelance life, or feeling comfortable speaking at conferences, Greyson’s philosophy is: say yes, grab any opportunity you have to learn, and, ultimately, just make shit.
“Just make sh*t.”
On this episode we discuss :
- Diversity on design teams
- Designing for real life
- Importance of mentorship
- Human-centered design
- Advantages and challenges of freelance work
- Role of empathy and psychology in design
- Responses to criticism and building relationships with clients
You can see more of Greyson’s work, and learn about her freelance collective at her website: www.greysonmacalpine.com
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Many people lavish in immersive experiences when they hear VR, but companies like Facebook strive to push the boundaries of how people can and will interact with their social network, businesses around them and places around the globe. Gabriel Valdivia talks about his work exploring the possibilities of VR technology for Facebook and the importance of the tools to work in and on VR will be.
Coming from a background of product design and visual storytelling, Gabe discusses making the leap to VR, a field that is still being defined.
“I am wired this way. I’m excited by new problems that haven't been figured out yet and that’s kind of where I thrive. There’s a lot of people like that in VR today.”
In the episode of Hustle, Gabriel Valdivia and Anthony Armendariz talk about his work exploring the possibilities of VR technology for Facebook and how they are seeing an opportunity to introduce the technology in media already familiar to their users.
On this episode we discuss:
- The intersection of design and VR
- Spectrum of VR and AR technology
- Rapid growth of VR startups
- Business challenges of developing new technologies
- Resources for learning about VR technology
- Facebook offers resources for design and VR at http://facebook.design/vr
You can learn more about Gabe Valdivia and his current projects and podcasts at http://www.gabrielvaldivia.com
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We don't usually talk about business on the show, but the head of BASIC was willing to talk about how he runs his and we were happy to listen (and take notes).
Matt Faulk is BASIC's CEO and executive creative director. He always knew he wanted to do something big and is not surprised he ended up leading a company that does award-winning work brands like Apple / Beats by Dre, Nixon Watches, and BB Dakota.
"I had this idea of never settling... I just wanted to do good work — but I don’t mean good work as in creative work, I mean really solving client’s business issues, aligning ourselves as partners..."
His career has taken him all over the place, from basketball and professional BMX riding to bartending and graphic design. He says his goal with BASIC was to build a company where everyone involved had a stake in it, a say in it, and helped decide its direction moving forward.
Today, BASIC leads creative efforts across traditional and digital initiatives for some of the world's biggest lifestyle brands. Matt says they got there by engulfing themselves in their clients' businesses, becoming experts at doing small things well, and by putting people in the right spot. He also credits his network and the relationships he has built over the years.
“I wish in my younger years I would’ve focused more time on networking, which is why I’m trying to do it now. Because your network is everything. You never know when opportunities are gonna come....Just help people out, it always comes back.”
On this episode we discuss:
- Matt’s background and original vision for BASIC.
- Finding the ideal team size.
- Investing in growth and following your gut.
- Constant learning and networking.
- Finding your competitive edge.
- The commoditization of design.
- Focusing on production vs. ideation.
- Adapting to client needs.
- How to influence change and growth from within.
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If you've ever used the hashtag, you've used a Chris Messina creation.
For over a decade, Chris Messina has worked to transform and reimagine the way we look at the world and the way we interact with technology. A self-proclaimed “master of none,” Chris focuses on improving behavioral technology and the social web. Chris has worked in large and small operations, from owning Citizen Agency to being a part of large-scale enterprise companies like Google and Uber where he's worked to expand, cultivate, and advocate for the developer community.
Chris just parted ways with Uber, where he was the developer experience lead. He is currently focusing on conversational products and, specifically, how the use of artificial intelligence (IA) and bots can profoundly affect self-driving and automated vehicles. He believes that conversational technology is the new wave of contextual design and that speech-based user interface can provide a shift into simpler technologies.
"Imagine an army of bots that are your friends, or are essentially extensions of your friends, that allow you to tap into their extensive contextual knowledge about the subjects that you need information about. The biggest question and task is devising a way to bring all this information together and in a form that gives us more power and control over that experience, and can make the most interesting and useful knowledge available to those people into the right times and moments."
On this episode we discuss:
- The hashtag: the idea, the reception, and what it's like today.
- The early days of the Internet.
- The cyclical nature of design and how success sometimes comes from defeat.
- The power of the Internet.
- Open source and how the idea came about.
- The ethics of creating bots.
- Conversational UI
- Automated vehicles
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For over 20 years, Marc has been a designer. From working at startups like Designed by Humans, TeeFury to Co-Founding Flick where he worked to redesign Youtube in 2011 after being acquired by Google. When Marc was at Google, he was a very valuable asset and collaborator with teams across Google to design the Google X self-driving car project and Chromecast. After spending 4 years with Google Marc left and started North, then went on to become the CEO and Founder of Design, Inc.
"We should all be finding out what is going to make you happy and how are you going to figure out what's going to make you happy. How are you going to figure out how to truly be happy? and be self-aware enough to change things in your life to be grateful and have gratitude.."
A designer's work is a direct representation of how they think the world should look and feel and their work is a story of how they were raised, where they grew up, the music they listen to and every piece of who they are. Designers are passionate and emotional about what they do because of the type of person they. To a designer, design is more than just a business.
On this episode we discuss:
- Transparency in client relationships.
- Self-awareness in the approach of a proposal to a client.
- Be willing to help people even if it seems shaky because being good to people will usually yield positive results for everyone involved.
- Be willing to take risks to get a project.
- Do good work with good people and you'll succeed.
- Make an agreement on the relationship and how it will work.
- If it feels fishy, get out!
- Look inside yourself for the answer.
- Stop judging each other and stop pattern matching each other.
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Dan Mall lives in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and is the CEO of Superfriendly, a design collaborative that seeks to connect talented and passionate people with design and development projects all around the globe. Since 2012, he and his company have worked with companies like: Google, Apple New York Times, Carnegie Mellon, About.com, Oreilly, TechCrunch, Entertainment Weekly and many more to produce delightful products and user experiences.
Before Superfriendly, Dan was at Big Spaceship, Happy Cog and a Technical Editor at A List Apart. Dan is dedicated to elevating our industry and training designers.
Right now, Dan is pushing the needle in the way large organizations connect with their users and their devices. From Insurance transparency to understandable and usable weather data to diminishing the barrier to a new career, Superfriendly and Dan Mall are working to widen the perspective of what design means to real people and how real people can impact the future of design.
*"I think that my mission,
at least when it comes to work, is connecting people to opportunities,
they wouldn’t have had otherwise. I feel like that’s the thing I’m
good at and that’s the thing I can do for people and so that’s kind of
what’s been on my mind lately."*
Dan has a unique perspective on the design community and the industry as a whole and has made it his personal mission to make a difference to improve: diversity in technology, mentorship career transitions and the overall training and building of design team to name a few. As a personal belief, Dan created the Superfriendly Academy to create an apprenticeship program that helps people in the process of making a career transition. He works to not only provide the opportunity for someone to gain a new career skill but the professionalism that goes along with that skill for that person to greatly succeed.
On this episode we discuss:
- The concept and success of a non-traditional design collaborative, Superfriendly.
- Superbooked and how this product could help him and users like you maintain your professional network.
- The idea of the human connection and that working together is a good way to get to know each other better.
- How finding the right project for the right person can produce great results.
- The lack of diversity in the tech industry.
- The Superfriendly Academy and their apprenticeship program.
- The differences between and apprenticeship and an internship.
- Career transitions and the value of mentorship.
- The success story of Greg the apprentice.
Follow Dan here:
@danmall
www.superfriend.ly
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Mike Buzzard is a Design Manager on the UX Community and Culture team at Google where he works on shaping, resourcing, supporting, and guiding a range of programs and projects that are designed to ensure the health and success of UX at Google. He also recently helped design the first of its kind undergraduate degree in User Experience Design at Savannah College of Art and Design (SCAD). He’s currently working with other design leaders to elevate the craft of design in emerging design cities and is an investor and advisor to many awesome companies.
Previously, Mike co-founded the design agency Cuban Council with his friends and collaborators, Toke Nygaard and Michael Schmidt. They created a company that could focus on making great things the way they thought it should be made. In their 10 year run, they were able to design cutting edge digital product design solutions for companies like Facebook, Google, Zendesk, Rdio, Quora, Evernote, and Epitaph Records.
"It's hugely important to understand what you're capable of
contributing and being surprised with the outcome when you partner
with someone that brings a different aspect to the work.... When you
collaborate with people and get their input and perspective it can be
extraordinary and that's what gets me out of bed every day."
Back in day as a “Creative Developer”, he helped usher in early generations of web designers and digital product designers through his commitment and contributions to sites like k10k.net, newstoday.com, designiskinky.net, and many more.
On this episode we discuss:
- How Mike helps evangelize, elevate, and grow design at Google by
working with a wide array of design teams, design leadership,
business units, partners, and agencies. * What it was like doing web design back in the old school days when folks were hacking art and code to make unique web site and
discovering the vast opportunities. Remember pixel fonts? * The story of building Newstoday.com. * His experience being hired by Brett Gurewitz from Bad Religion (one of his personal heros) to redesign Epitaph Record’s. * How Cuban Council was started, how they grew, and why they eventually closed the doors. * Why collaboration and a perspective of value is important to doing great work, and why it's important to always be sharing. * Why designers needing to trust and believe that we’re “doing what’s right for people most of the time” and that before being
able to deliver a argument that's convincing and compelling, you
have to be confident. * The story about a time when a young Mark Zuckerberg asked him to define design while they were working on the Facebook Logo.
Follow Mike here:
@mbuzzard
www.zopilote.co
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Mae Reed is an interaction designer at Rackspace, part-time development instructor with Girl Code It and a pillar in the Austin design community.
She has a talent for understanding the value of designing through open lines of communication due to her first-hand experiences with designing and developing and feels that both designers and developers should be working together from the onset of the project to consider affordances and constraints. Mae is also an active and organizational member of an Austin meetup group, Fresh2Design, where she seeks to make connections with new designers and help them find their place in the Austin design community.
In this episode, Anthony sits down with Mae Reed to talk about how the way communication can not only be the champion of success in a smaller agency but also create a pathway for designers, developers, and clients to accomplish enterprise goals, together.
Follow Mae here:
Twitter:
@maebees
web: maekr.co
maereed@me.com
Rackspace:
Twitter: @rackspace
web: rackspace.com
Fresh2Design:
Twitter: @fresh2design
web: fresh2design.com
Girl Develop It
@girldevelopit
web: girldevelopit.com
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As Interaction Design Lead for 3M's Health Care Business Group, Andy Vitale is excited about making an impact in the healthcare space and designing meaningful healthcare solutions at the enterprise level.
Andy believes that being proactive in the enterprise environment is the best way to get the conversation started about designing successful solutions for enterprise problems. He also knows that it's important to always inform and educate people on what exactly it is that you do because it's more valuable when other people buy into and support what you do than simply speaking for yourself, especially on the enterprise level.
In this episode, Andy sits down with Anthony to discuss his perspective on ways to measure the impact of user experience, UX processes with his team and 3M, and how to grow user experience competency within a large organization like 3M.
Follow Andy here:
Twitter:
@andyvitale
3M:
Twitter: @3mdesign
Web: 3M Design & Careers
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Being able to juggle an overwhelming amount of tasks, responsibilities and day to day activities comes down to how well you're able to carve out enough time to do the things that matter most to you each and every day.
Charlie Waite started his career with Focus Labs in Savannah, Georgia and learned the value of the hustle and how to make an impact in fast paced high demand, agile environment. After living and breathing the agency world Charlie sought to find a company, role, and environment that he identified with and work with disciplines that he hadn't had a lot of interaction with. Charlie found that opportunity with GoPro as their UX/UI Design Manger for their software team and was able to dig in and work with teams to design consumer facing products and be a part of creating a universal design language that spans the entire company
In this episode, Charlie sits down with Anthony to discuss what it meant for Charlie to make the transition from client services to more product focused design, what it means for Charlie to work directly with people, and how what you do outside of work can make a huge impact on your productivity, success, and overall level of happiness.
Follow Charlie here:
Twitter: @charliecwaite
Dribbble: charliewaite
Web: charliewaite.me
Gopro
Twitter: @gopro
Focus Lab
Twitter: @focusLabLLC
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From designing things to designing educational training, Travis has a passion for project management and digital solutions.
Partnering with his wife Rachel to create louderthanten to instruct a project management curriculum to help improve the way teams work together, streamline their creative design processes and allow insight into how project managers solidify the client relationship; Travis is passionate about creating a culture of education on the web.
In this episode, Anthony and Travis get down to the details of dynamic thinking and what it means to Travis to find better ways for teams to work together and pull from different design methodologies to design better solutions to create lasting client relationships.
Follow Travis here:
@travisgertz
@louderthanten
travisgertz.com
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If you've ever shopped online with Nike or booked a cruise with Norweigan Cruise lines you might have used a product that Ben Peck was part of Designing. Ben is a busy guy and he spends a lot of time working with Needle.com to design e-commerce chat interfaces and paradigms that help people feel confident in purchases they make. In addition to his full-time, job Ben has been pivotal in the creation and growth of Frontutah.com and a creator of The Product Design Association.
Ben has a passion for elevating his local design ecosystem by providing networking opportunities, educational events and enabling ways for people to share what they're doing, how they're doing it and how they've become better doing what they do. In this, episode Ben and Anthony sit down to discuss a wide variety of topics ranging from the Utah design community to his role in the organization of the Front design conference to what Needle does and how they are designing better ways for conversations between humans and computers.
Ben Peck
@benpeck
benpeck.com
Needle
@needleit
needle.com
Front
@front
frontutah.com
vimeo.com/frontutah
The Product Design Association
@pdautah
productdesignutah.org
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From starting a company with his wife in the basement of his home to presenting his start-up company to a daunting crowd of Canadian angel investors, Mikael Cho of Crew and Unsplash, has been able to consciously push himself and the people around him to new levels of success.
In this episode, Mikael and Anthony discuss the journey that Mikael's taken to find his professional path and how that path created his perspectives on growth, success and life as a whole. Mikael believes building trust into new business relationships and knowing that growth is organic and in his eyes, is the most successful way to be true to yourself, your client and your craft. Originating in design and development, Crew seeks to help freelancers and studios establish consistency and Companies in need of Creative talent find the best available to them . Holistically, Crew supports freelancers and studios in removing the troublesome aspects of business in order to focus on letting those people do what they do best, create.
Be sure to check out crew.co and unsplash.com
Twitter: @crewlabs and @mikaelcho
Medium: https://medium.com/@crew
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Claudio Vallejo is a passionate Freelance Web-Designer and Front End Developer by way of Monterrey, Mexico. Beginning in the Baylor business school and through the Baylor Accelerated Ventures Project, there he discovered design and development and was given his first experience in product design. In this episode, Claudio and Anthony sit down to discuss everything from how a failed college project would ignite his creative passion to his perspective on turning ideas into reality to the challenges faced as a non-us citizen looking to land a design job.
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If you know anything about Funsize, you know we love to collaborate and Johnnie Hamn is no different.
Through his 16 years of hands-on design experience and believing strongly in cooperative and collaborative design; Johnnie comes to the table with his perspective on what it means to be a design leader and client advocate at Funsize. In this episode, Anthony and Johnnie sit down and talk about his role at Funsize and the idea of selfless leadership, going the extra mile to build trust with the client, what it means to transition a client into a design partner.
Anthony and Johnnie have been friends for a very long time so they discuss a wide range of topics in this episode but one topic they focus on is how investing in relationships can elevate client services, and more often than not, make them profitable.
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If you've played Monument Valley then you've seen a slice of the ustwo pie. Three years ago, ustwo explored the state and future of the digital consultancy industry, posing the question “How, When, and Where Will The First Truly Great Digital Design Studio Emerge?“. Now, three years later, Jules followed up with his essay "The State of the Digital Nation 2016" where he provided an in-depth, four-pronged approach to building the digital studio of the future.
"The industry has experienced seismic shifts and a sweeping wave of consolidation. So let’s take another look at the state of the digital nation and why, for the bold, great opportunity lies ahead."
On this episode, I get an opportunity to talk to Jules about this important piece of writing and what the future of agencies look like in order to remain relevant, build trust, and create meaningful impact.
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Dann is a full-time freelancer and is known around the world for his skill and encouraging personality. If you've seen HBO's Silicon Valley, Google, Airbnb, Uber, Medium, Boosted Boards and Luxe Valet; then there's a chance you've seen his work. He's also the Founder and organizer of the Epicurrence and Montues events, which are life experience inspirational and adventure oriented events for designers. They're EPIC.
Dann has been traveling around the United States interviewing designers for a movie he's making about freelance designers. Over the last couple of months, he's gained some new personal perspectives on work, life, balance, and the meaning of success.
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Tony Sanchez, Product Designer at Funsize discusses the journey of his career path from textile design, to print, to screen printing, to digital product designer. Anthony and Tony talk about Funsize's Design Apprentice Program, and Tony sheds light on his experience at Funsize and shares a few tips for new designers.
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A few months ago, Andre, one of Funsize's product designers decided he wanted to move on to greener pastures in Bend, Oregon. But he still wanted to work with Funsize and we didn't want to lose him either. As he's gone out to live in a tiny house on some beautiful mountain land in Oregon, he's learned a whole new curve to working entirely remote. Rick and Anthony chat with him about how the adjustment has been going.
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Victor is a user experience (UX) researcher with a passion for representing the voice of the end user in product design decisions. He writes and speaks on the application of psychology to design. He's written for A List Apart, Smashing Magazine, UX Booth, User Experience Magazine, and more.
He's the author Design for the Mind, a book from Manning Publications on the application of principles of psychology to design.
about the book:
Design for the Mind: includes 7 Psychological Principles of Persuasive Design teaches you to recognize how websites and applications can benefit from an awareness of our innate, natural responses as humans, and how to apply the principles to your own designs.
listener discount:
bit.ly/yocco1
https://www.manning.com
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Rick & Anthony discuss a recent article entitled State of the Digital Nation 2016 by Jules Ehrhardt.
http://blog.marvelapp.com/state-of-the-digital-nation-2016/
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Rachel Gertz, Partner, Systems Consultant & Trainer at Louder than ten discusses some philosophies around project management. And roles and disciplines as teams grow and projects evolve over time.
Discussion points * Emotional intelligence: empathy is taught. * Be a champion for your team, they are dealing with a lot * Should designers PM? Designers need to have empathy too * When building teams hire less for fit, and more for the ability to make decisions based on business goals. * PM's role needs to be unique because they need to be held accountable for project success/failure. Strategy focus * Creative has the load of creativity, is it fair to have the role of asking the hard questions like scope, goals, body language.
Links * Soap conference (Travis speaks about Design Machines) * Collaboration workshop - http://soapconf.com/edu-summit/ (workshop with Travis and Rachel) * Design & content conference, Vancouver * Fall workshop in Calgary, Canada TBA * Article by Mike Davidson, former Design Director at Twitter
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Companies are looking for a partner these days, not just a design agency to throw a marketing budget at. When working with people and trying to establish trust, it takes a little time. There is also another side of the coin, in that It's possible to deteriorate trust. Finding out how to gain trust and not deteriorate it is step one.
Listen in as Aaron O'Hearn discusses his path to Funsize, and also the nature of selling design work to product companies. We discuss some philosophies, as well as some practical aspects of business development.
Resources mentioned in this episode:
- Breaking The Time Barrier
- Invest in Lines, Not Dots
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Engineering has made leaps and bounds towards a more efficient process of building software since the early waterfall days. Agile methodologies have helped guide the way. As design has become more important to a product's success, designers have earned a seat at the table. Now design too has adapted to similar approaches to building software.
What has helped us get to where we are and how we build? What has taken design so long to catch up with engineering?
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Now that we've had a chance to get back to real life, we are left with a few memories at Epicurrence Montues. There we're some fantastic experiences. In this episode Rick sits down with fellow Funsizers Natalie Armendariz, Phi Hoang and Edgar Briseño to discuss our experience at Epicurrence Montues.
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We briefly met Ben, Owner and Creative Director of Elegant Seagulls at Epicurrence. These guys do some killer work. We wanted to hear how they were able to inject personality into each and every design they create and keep up with such a high-level of clients and projects.
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While in the midst of escaping a the sxsw madness, we set up in Anthony's home to record a couple of episodes! In this one, we are excited to have Nick Robalik, Creative Director and Johnnie Hamn (who recently joined the Funsize team!🎉 ) share their experience as they both have worked at agencies in NYC and done work in the video game industry.
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Steven Ray and Anthony Armendariz go way back. They had a company together prior to Funsize and in addition to hearing Steve's experience at Dialexa, they also tell the story of starting up a distributed mobile design boutique years ago.
Since the Funsize office was taken over by sxsw, we decided to hang out in Anthony's kitchen and lay down some thoughts about our experiences together. Including how Rick first met Anthony which was the same time he met Steven Ray.
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- What do you love about being a designer?
- How does geography affect your career?
- What do you want to be doing in 5 years?
- What's your least-favorite design trend?
Interviewees
- Mae Reed - Freelance @maebees
- Mike Townson - Project 202 @miketownson
- Mike Blakesley - Project 202 @mikeblakesley
- Joshua Bullock - vauto @blisster138
- Dan Benjamin - 5by5 @danbenjamin
- Haddie Cooke - 5by5 @haddiebird
- Chris Meeks - Hatbox @chrismeeks
- Clark Wimberly - Invision @clarklab
- Brian Peterson - Daily Fantasy Sports @ironcobratv
- Ryan Weaver - Creative Market @ryantheweave
- Danh Hoang - Adonit @danhhoang
- Nick Robalik - Creative Director @nickrobalik
- Jonathan Howell - Microsoft @ItsJonHowell
- Steven Ray - Dialexa @stevenray
- Ethan Leon - Thoughtbot @ethangl
- Amanda Donaldson - Spreadfast @AMDesignlovin
- Carlos Arellano - vauto @carlosarellano
- Bryan Smith - vauto
- Riley Spiller - Atlassian @RileySpiller
- Jonathan Haver - Rocksauce @jhTHUNDERmaker
- Jim Jordan - Funsize @JimJJordan
- Rachael LaCoss - Media General @RachelLaCoss
- Anthony Sanchez - Freelance
- Bryan Butler - Freelance @whatbryan
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It's great to push the boundaries of design to make interesting work, but is it ok to break normal design patterns to do so? How do we convince clients that something outside of the typical design trends is the right choice?
- Lovably
- Dylan's latest Album Claye
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How much research do you need before you can make some design decisions? Surely, this is different for each product, but at what point has their been enough research done for design to get started?
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We invited Sam Kapila, Director of Instruction at The Iron Yard to discuss the approach to the unique challenges involved in her role. The Iron Yard is the world’s largest code school with full-time immersive courses in 20 cities. Taking a non-traditional approach to education on subject matter that is both complex and volatile. Sam has a unique position and perspective on where design solutions are applied to more than just screens. We we're also joined by Jim Jordan, Product Designer at Funsize and one of Sam's former students.
Some subjects discussed in this episode:
Thoughts on today’s product design processes
Design principles, design assumptions, user thinking and design approach instead of "design thinking"
When is the right time to get research in? When is it too much?
Applying Design to non-design things
Learning What doesn’t work
"Pixel Perfect Design Thinking" - ha
Designing for the imperfect scenario
What's behind the design decisions we make?
Books mentioned in this episode:
A fine line, by Hartmut Esslinger
http://www.amazon.com/Fine-Line-Strategies-Shaping-Business/dp/0470451025
Drive, by Daniel H. Pink
http://www.danpink.com/drive/
Design Unbound, by Ann M. Pendleton-Jullian, John Seely Brown
https://books.google.com/books/about/Design_Unbound.html?id=bFeMZwEACAAJ
Just Enough Research, by Erika Hall
https://abookapart.com/products/just-enough-research
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Design often needs a voice to communicate its intention. Tom Greever has recently published a book called "Articulating Design Decisions". Rick and Anthony sit down with Tom to talk through a critical skill that many designers lack.
Tom Greever's book, published by O'Reilly:
Articulating Design Decisions: Communicate with Stakeholders, Keep Your Sanity, and Deliver the Best User Experience
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How important is motion in a product? At what stage should you start thinking about motion in the design process? Is it better to spend time on the the pixel details or on the subtle motion details?
Ben Cline, Founder and designer at renown agency Rally Interactive, talks with Anthony and Rick from Funsize about the importance of motion design in modern digital products and Rally's unique approach to designing meaningful motion.
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Funsize is growing, and growing up. In this episode are some sincere thoughts around what's been going on in our little agency and what we want to do next. Here's a few topics we chat over: Getting new office space, designing for new platforms and for the input form of voice, interacting with robots, why we want to work with engineers, we want to do some UI for bowling alleys. What does it mean to be a design director? It's important to still design when you're working in a design leadership role.
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Rick and Anthony continue their conversation from the previous episode as the conversation shifts from how we work on projects with our clients to how those projects end. The project is over, but the relationship is not. Funsize has been evolving offboarding and come up with a few ideas that help soften the landing.
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Rick and Anthony discuss Funsize process. Keep project SOW's broad so it's easy to pivot. Track effort with velocity using pivotal tracker rather than fixed deliverable pricing. Price and design with complete transparency.
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Funsize has a unique process and there's no one-size-fits-all. Clients coming in have unique backgrounds and context so there's a lot of custom fitting. Rick and Anthony discuss Funsize's process of onboarding clients and compare it with the experiences we design for onboarding users.
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Hustle is back with season 2. Anthony recaps his experience at Epicurrence, Rick shares about speaking at Adobe MAX. Online streaming music services such as Spotify, Apple Music, and Google Play Music are compared in light of Rdio's recent announcement that they are shutting their service down after being acquired by Pandora.
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So, you’re a great designer - but do you know how to listen, drive a conversation, and build consensus with your clients, company, or teams? Ryan Rumsey, the Director of Experience Design at Electronic Arts IT, hops in the Funsize studio to share his knowledge and experiences in persuasion and building consensus with stakeholders in the enterprise world.
1:00
Ryan discussing his role as Director of Experience Design at Electronic Arts IT and his expertise in Enterprise User Experience Design. He also gives us an overview of some of the things he did in his previous role at Apple.
3:15
Apple’s hush hush culture. It’s easy designing software for Apple employees because everyone at Apple only uses Apple products.
5:40
Rick talks about his experience working on enterprise design projects. Ryan discusses some of the dynamics of working in an enterprise environment and the art of selling your design work to your internal stakeholders.
7:00
We discuss Ryan’s new article “Influence and Design Success - The art of letting others have your way”. As a design leader, it’s rare to be able to take credit for the pixel level work. Your job is to motivate and inspire your team to push the envelope and produce great outcomes. Sometimes when you know you have the right answer you just can’t push it. You have to be the muse and let other believe the idea was theirs. Ryan gives us an example about a project where he struggled with the stakeholder. It’s hard to tell a client no or that they are wrong, especially when there’s data to support it.
9:10
Ryan teaches us an old improv technique from his former life as a professional actor called “Yes, and?”. The scenario is that you accept what anyone said and simply add to it so you can help drive a conversation. When a stakeholder provides a comment in the heat of the moment that you don’t agree with or know is wrong, it’s always best to let them know that you heard them and that you will take some time to consider it. When you come back to the table, remind them of the conversation they brought up and elaborate on how it inspired you to think about the problem deeper and in devising the solution to meet the need. “With your inspiration I was able to create this!”
12:00
It’s not a design exercise, it’s about understanding your team or stakeholders personality or character so you can can build consensus and get designs approved.
14:30
We aren’t using these tactics for bad or for personal best interests. It’s for the good of helping our clients and stakeholders achieve desired business outcomes and ultimately success with products people love.
“Knowing the users and having empathy for them isn’t always going to
resonate with them.”
16:00
Defending your work properly. Many of the people that tell you “no” or that you're wrong are highly successful individuals that get shit done. If you can help them get a win, then all of a sudden they will become a massive advocate. Your gut reaction is many times right but don’t just react or build. Take time to process. Learn to shut up and let things go. Let people know you heard and listened and that you’ll consider it. Instead of design lingo learn to use persuasive business words that business people understand.
18:30
How design teams can leverage these principles to build vision, consensus, plans, and designs that everyone can believe in. Use design thinking practices! Use principles and values to ensure you’re on the same page. If you don’t have any structure or framework it can be hard to know where to apply your creativity, and that makes for very dispersed shotgun approaches - and can end up focusing on things that actually might not need creativity. Hence, design language and UI frameworks. Creativity lives within structure. When things stop working, it’s time to look at your principles.
“Principles are uncovered, not necessarily developed.”
23:00
Rick and Anthony discuss how we onboard new clients to introduce our new Client Partners to Funsize, our principles, process, and our company culture.
28:00
We couldn’t find that Staind video so please tweet us if you find it!
29:00
A sidebar conversation reminiscing about a punk rock era.
31:00
Hustle Podcast Season 1 conclusion and announcement of Season 2.
Links * Ryan Rumsey's Website * Ryan Rumsey's Twitter
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Brandon Breitenbach is the Co-Founder and CEO of Pare Booking, a kick ass digital product that’s changing the way musicians and artists book shows and get paid. Recently, Brandon stopped by the studio while visiting Funsize to discuss the history of our working relationship, how we made decisions, the process and tools we used and what the ideal client and design agency relationship can look and feel like.
2:00
Introduction to the Pare Booking's product and user experience. Pare Booking modernizes the process for musicians and artists to book shows, manage contracts, and get paid.
4:00
Brandon’s share's his music and music booking industry background.
4:47
How Funsize met Pare Booking. Brandon and Anthony talk about the history of how Pare Booking and Funsize found each other and how quickly we were able to get started.
6:25
Why Pare Booking chose to work with Funsize. Brandon talks about what it feels like to hire a design and development vendors. Joel Beukelman recommended they work with Funsize and Brandon trusted his friend and moved forward. You can usually tell at the first conversation if there’s a match between a client and an agency. You gotta follow your gut!
8:20
Phi talks about how awesome it is to be held accountable but also to have the breathing room and trust to move forward in making design decisions.
9:00
Brandon discusses his experience working relationship with Funsize. Phi shares how we used Sketch and Marvel, two completely new tools on this project, to maximize our effort and time, and how we crafted a unique design process to be able to design the MVP app in a very short period of time.
10:50
Clients are subject matter experts. Sometimes designers don’t always know “what’s best”.
11:40
A dream client is one that that has good taste.
12:30
We discuss conceptual design, atomic design, and how they were applied in the Pare Booking project. For Pare Booking, Funsize presented multiple concepts as screen designs supplemented with mood boards/style tiles to expand on the concepts voice, feel, and visual language. This is a good way to explore and create the personality of the brand or product, outside of just focusing on what it can look like. For Pare, this lets them see the scope of the “why” behind each concept.
15:19
“We didn’t have a brand or identity when we started this project...”
16:09
Brandon mentioned that 3 concepts was just the right amount. If we had delivered any more it would have been overwhelming for him. Brandon was playing golf (and left at the 16th hole!) when he reviewed our concepts for the first time.
17:10
Brandon and Anthony talk about what’s it’s like working together in an agile design engagement. What worked was the amount of communication and transparency Pare and Funsize had throughout the project. This resulted in a high amount of trust. Both companies did their part in getting each other what the other needed to be successful.
19:45
How Funsize uses [Pivotal Tracker to manage design sprints and transparency with our team, clients, and stakeholders. Keeping your team's best interest in mind while estimating design sprint stories will help create the best work possible. Pare has now adopted Pivotal Tracker as their internal product management tool. We recall [Hustle Season 1, Episode 7: "Death to Time Tracking", where we talked about how Funsize stopped time tracking and how Pivotal Tracker has been critical in allowing the client and agency relationship to flourish.
22:50
Pare Booking was the first project in which Funsize used Sketch 100% through the duration of the project from wireframes to finished design. Phi talks about the advantages of Sketch and how it helped meet our project objectives and save time.
25:00
Whether you use Photoshop or Sketch, having a system in place to dynamically design empowers the designer to make a change in the overall design without having to worry about accumulating unnecessary design debt.
26:19
“I will use Funsize as long as I possibly can.”
26:30
Pare’s iPhone app is launching in the Apple App store between August and September 2015. If you’re a touring musician, artist, or speaker, please check out www.parebooking.com and sign up for early access!
27:00
Check out Funsize's Pare Booking Dribble Collection to see what the Pare Booking design will look like. Also feel free to demo the Pare Marvel Prototype for a hands-on experience with the app's design and user experience.
27:40
Rick announces the wrap-up of Season 1 of the Hustle Podcast and what to expect in the upcoming second season of the podcast.
Links * Pare Booking's Web Site * Pare Booking's Twitter * Funsize's Pare Booking Dribbble Collection * Funsize's Clickable Marvel Prototype * Sketch for Screen Designers * Photoshop now has multiple canvases! * Marvel App for Prototyping * Pivotal Tracker * Thanks Joel Beukelman!
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Show Notes: * 0:55 Rick is back from paternity leave. His new son is awesome. * 1:11 Joining us on this episode is the Senior Director of Design at Jawbone, friend of Funsize, and a hugely inspirational designer, Mr. Peter Merholz. * 1:30 Anthony chronicles Peter's background with the international consulting firm, Adaptive Path, which is perhaps best known for championing "User Experience." * 1:50 Fun Peter Merholz facts: Peter hired Funsize while at Groupon and was Funsize's first client. Thanks, Peter! He also coined the term 'blog'. * 3:44 Fun fact about the new Up4 from Jawbone is that it can do NFC payments! * 4:00 The theme for this episode was conceived following Peter's blog post "There's no such thing as UX design." * 5:20 Don Norman, credited with the coining the term User Experience in the early 90s, created the User Experience Architect's office at Apple. * 6:25 Initially, Adaptive Path considered themselves a user experience consultancy because no one else was talking about user experience at the time. The term "design" was an avoided term because designers were not involved in product strategy, often reduced to pixel pushers and production workers. * 8:40 "User experience is an outcome, not a practice." - Peter Merholz. There are many contributing factors to good or bad user experience, but design is only one part of the whole. * 9:32 User experience designers were actually interaction designers, information architects, or other designers cloaking themselves with the phrase because it sounded good. * 11:11 Picking apart the concept of the "User Experience Designer." A litmus test for the viability of the "User Experience Designer" career path: How would one grow as a UX designer? What's that path or evolution look like? * 14:20 The thing that we call "User Experience design" may fit in two buckets: 1) Product Management & 2) Design Execution. * 15:00 A historic lapse in balanced Product Management may have generated "User Experience Design." * 17:00 Product designers began to create a set of user research & persona development practices in order to ensure product strategy would not forget to acknowledge the user. * 18:20 Strategically-minded designers can lead products as well as strategically-minded engineers or business persons. * 21:55 If we do call "User Experience Designer" a profession, it would be best compared to a film director. * 25:00 Anyone who tells you they've figured out how the formula for the perfect product team is lying to you. * 25:50 Peter eventually left consulting because he found the relationship they had with clients wasn't leveraging his agency enough impact on final products. Peter effortlessly flips the interview around on Funsize to discuss how we ensure impact with clients and products. * 28:00 Funsize discusses our team structures and project pacing. * 29:25 We share about a tactical program we run called Special Ops, in which designers may do work that can help steer the product in the direction we believe it should go. Special Ops often strengthens our impact within the client organization. * 32:00 We discuss pairing design teams with clients and the importance spreading out designer's velocity across more than one project at a time. No designer works alone! * 33:45 We talk about the problems with in-house designers at product companies and how to avoid driving designers insane. * 35:00 Peter discusses tactical hiring decisions and team formation at Groupon, to which he gives credit for stronger impact of designers and decisions. * 38:30 We recall our discussion with our friends at Adobe, where we learned that there's two designers to 60+ engineers at Photoshop. * 39:00 Peter recalls hiring outside design support while at Groupon. * 42:15 We note how, for consultancies, it's becoming just as important to help the people and companies you work with hiring internal teams as it is to help them with needed design work. * 43:00 Design teams in an organization are very different from other types of teams, and they shouldn't be structured or managed as though they were just another flavor of engineer, lest you want frustrated designers. * 45:45 We're excited to meet up at Front Conference in Utah, coming up this summer.
Links:
- There's no such thing as UX design" by Peter Merholz
- Peter on Twitter
- Peter's Blog
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It’s a wonderful time to be a product designer. There's more design and prototyping tools available to us than ever before (and more and more keep popping up). It’s safe to say we’ll all be using these tools in various ways to achieve the specific results we need. Keynote is a fantastic low-barrier-of-entry tool that allows product managers, designers, and marketing professionals to achieve product success while maximizing time
In this special SXSW '15 Hustle/Balance Podcast cross-over episode, Joel Beukelman and Ted Boda talk about how Keynote has allowed cross discipline teams at Google, Nest, and Netflix to work quickly and efficiently together to craft great products.
Show Notes: * 0:45 Drinking bourbon and opening up the show * 1:30 Joel talks about his new job at Google working on Android Auto, how he and Ted started working with Keynote for prototyping at Netflix, and the inspiration of the Balance Podcast. * 3:30 Ted introduces himself and his experience working on the Keynote team at Apple, Nest, and his new exciting projects. * 4:55 “Keynote is my entire design tool.” - Joel * 4:55 Keynote has all the features you need to plan, design, build consensus, track changes, present and spec your entire product; and can maximize valuable time. * 9:50 Keynote does everything you need to do 80-90% really well in one tool. * 10:50 Ted talks about presenting Design to Steve Jobs. * 13:27 There are sooo many prototyping tools available today. * 20:00 Just show me the damn thing! Oh that’s the thing! * 23:40 Pixel pretty damn perfect. Your mock doesn’t matter. Even if your design is perfect the engineer isn’t going to necessarily make it perfect. * 24:22 You’re at an advantage if you're working on a project with an established visual identity. * 32:58 When you’re at a big product company it’s all about money and conversion and testing. The last 25% is the polish that happens in implementation. * 34:00 You have to know the voice of your product and Keynote makes it easy for writers to hop in and do their work. * 37:30 Details matter. When you’re doing something wrong for the driving context people could die. * 39:00 Use the tools that works best for you. Joel and Ted prefer tools that save time. * 41:25 Get ted and Joel to do a workshop at your company at www.keynote.com * 43:23 Joel runs out of Bourbon.
Links:
- Joel on Twitter
- Ted on Twitter
- Balance Podcast
- I Love Keynote
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It's SXSW '15 and we had the awesome opportunity to hang out with Photoshop product designers before our epic high-five hour party. Anthony and Danielle set out to tackle a controversial topic.
The dilemma is that there is a lot of great-looking design on the web at sites like Behance and Dribbble and also in a great many designers portfolios. Sometimes you see something that looks incredible aesthetically on the screen but then you find out that it was either unsolicited by the “client” (example: how many times have see someone redesign Instagram on Behance?) or that carries the footnote something like “rejected concept.” It might look amazing, but why didn’t it ship?
Show Notes * 00:00 Introductions * 05:30 It’s important to play, but there’s serious constraints with a 25 year old project * 07:45 It’s fun to be wrong * 09:18 It discounts the hard work a product team has put in * 11:05 Let’s you think big and you need that to live! * 10:20 A benefit is the “What if” which pushes the design * 12:00 Project Recess, a new photoshop experience. * 14:00 Scenario: 100% honesty, which designer would you hire? * 29:00 Hire strong opinions, loosely held * 30:00 Teams need both types to even each other out * 32:44 “lovingly curating” keeping teams on a rotation to keep roles complimentary * 35:08 Experimental projects in a product that don’t ship are still worth the lesson you learn * 37:00 The best work may be conceptual stuff you can’t show * 39:50 Understanding how a design vision can be rolled out over time * 43:00 Some quick descriptions of Photoshop’s team structure
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Do you know your product and how to get exposure for it? Jordan Menashy VP of Marketing and Co-Founder of Bench.co talks to us about marketing a product. Rick and Danielle from Funsize ask questions from a non-expert perspective.
Show Notes * 00:00 Introductions * 05:41 Activating a marketing engine * 08:00 Determining product market fit can only be accomplished by launching * 09:25 Launching: Store up some "big reveals" when rolling out to keep the momentum going for the first few months * 15:10 Approach a mentor and don't waste their time, have questions ready! * 19:00 Use google analytics, there is no secret tool, just hard-work and good analysis * 23:29 R&D vs Engine * 25:30 Good marketing is about good methodology not false promises * 27:00 You need to allow for failure so you can learn how to make it work * 28:00 Getting started: Get a target customer acquisition cost (CAC) and find a channel that works for you. That channel can be converted into an engine, then you want to refine that engine with R&D * 35:00 Get your engines running and check against your business metrics * 36:35 Rick misunderstands marketing... * 37:11 Examples of engines that work and don't work for Bench.co * 39:00 How do you get started with no experience and little marketing budget?
Links
- Jordan on twitter
- Bench.co
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Agencies, studios, in-house at a large companies, designer on a product team, and, now, working from home at an online retailer with a distributed team. Phil has worked in almost every type of environment a designer might find themselves in.
In this episode, we get a unique view from his perspective about working with humility, discipline, and honing your craft.
Show Notes
- 00:00 Introductions
- 01:36 Current definition of what Phil does: "Digital Designer"
- 06:56 Who is Phil Coffman?
- 11:30 Small studio, humble beginnings
- 13:43 Working in-house at a large oil company
- 18:35 Web design moonlighting
- 19:20 Springbox: Client services at an agency, working with large brands
- 24:15 Element: Starting a new design studio
- 26:30 Establishing a design voice for a company and building a team
- 31:05 Spacecraft: Merger with Element, and designing on a product team
- 36:00 The itch to work on just one product
- 38:45 PC Part Picker: Design lead with a distributed team
- 42:30 Setting boundaries for working at home
- 43:45 Working with a distributed team
Links
- Phil on Twitter
- Phil on Dribbble
- PC PartPicker
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Visit the Funsize website
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Most of us are designers at Funsize but we also have project managers who help us iron out requirements, stay on schedule, and ensure the work is meeting the mark for the clients and users. We talk with 2 of our PM's and what it's like to play the part of ambassador between designers and clients.
Show Notes
- 00:00 Introductions
- 05:01 Challenges of working with designers
- 10:00 Working with clients vs designers
- 12:10 Should product designers be product managers?
- 15:08 Having T-shaped skills
- 16:29 Designers should have knowledge of development
- 20:17 Everyone building a product should have an understanding and respect of others expertise
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Kirill Zubovsky started scoutzie.com a few years ago as a destination for mobile designers to showcase their work and as a curated marketplace for design. Over the years Scoutzie changed their model, pivoted, and experimented with several unique business models. Anthony Armendariz’s relationship with Scoutzie helped grow his business to the point of being able to create a business which would become Funsize.
As of 2015, the Scoutzie team decided to shut the product down. We discuss with Kirill about his experiences, and what’s next.
Show Notes * 00:00 Introductions * 02:47 Scoutzie in the beginning * 13:00 Going through Y Combinator & proving the model * 16:29 Difficulties arise * 18:09 Take enough money early-on, once you run out of money, no one wants to give you more * 22:07 Pivot roll-out: automated project management * 25:05 Investors & users reaction to announcing shut-down * 26:50 Attempts at resuscitation * 30:47 In retrospect * 34:44 How it feels now and what's next?
Links * Kirill on Twitter @kirillzubovsky * Scoutzie.com * Y Combinator * "The Only Thing That Matters" article Kirill mentions by Marc Andreessen @pmarca * Kirill's Recommended Reading: Zero to One by Peter Thiel * The Hard Thing About Hard Things by Ben Horowitz
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The list of the product designers responsibilities goes on and on. When is it too much for one position to handle with quality? Maybe there's a different way to look at it all together.
With many of today's industry leading studios closing up shop for one reason or another we are left with a lot of questions. Why are they closing? What does the future hold for design agencies? Funsize sits down with Greg Storey, former partner at Happy Cog to discuss these questions.
Show Notes * 00:00 Introductions * 04:30 Product designer responsibilities * 08:20 Specializations and generalists * 10:20 Design is planning * 14:18 The role has changed * 17:15 Elevate your thinking beyond deliverables * 19:50 "Design with intent" * 21:40 Can a product designer be a product manager? * 26:00 Affect of design in early stages of product vs post-MVP * 34:22 Design with humility and diplomacy * 37:32 Values to look for when hiring a designer * 40:00 The future product designer
Links * Adam on twitter * Bench.co * @mantwan @rickmesser @funsize * Anthony's talk adapting to change * Anthony's tweet about designers needing to learn project management
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With many of today's industry leading studios closing up shop for one reason or another we are left with a lot of questions. Why are they closing? What does the future hold for design agencies? Funsize sits down with Greg Storey, former President and Partner at Happy Cog, to discuss.
Show Notes * 00:00 Introductions * 02:20 News of the design agency being dead * 04:00 The client is changing * 15:30 The big small shop, design agency sizes today * 20:40 Differentiate? Price, specialization, and great client experience * 26:20 Distributive team? Play Halo * 31:25 Teehan+Lax, what's an agency actually worth? * 38:54 Career ceilings at agencies
Links * Greg on Twitter @brilliantcrank * The Bureau of Digital Affairs * Airbag Industries * Teehan+Lax closing its doors * San Francisco Design Agencies Feeling the Squeeze by Peter Merholz
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If creating a new service and product wasn't hard enough, how hard it is once it's in the marketplace? What's the best way to organize a team for ideal team alignment to tackle holistic user experience, the iterative design of discrete features, and ongoing optimization? Clark Valberg, CEO of InVision, shares his journey and their team's approach to driving a digital product.
Show Notes * 00:00 Introductions and random laughs * 02:52 Question 1: How and why did InVision start? * 13:00 Question 2: How do you choose what features are right to build for InVision? * 21:48 Question 3: Is it difficult to let the team own themes of the product? * 25:52 Question 4: What consideration does InVision give to competitors? * 30:00 Question 5: Can you describe a misstep InVision has made along the way? * 35:00 Question 6: What's made InVision successful up to this point? * 43:00 Question 7: How large is theInVision team? Any positions open?
Links * invisionapp.com
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Material Design * Elevation * Animations * Adaptive Color Bar in chrome
Lock screen notifications * Compared to iOS notifications
Android Wear * Google Glass * Watches * Interactions with other devices and wearables * favorite features
Conclusion * Now's a good time to switch to Android if you've been thinking about
making the switch to iOS.
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Anthony and Natalie share a story about working with David Blaine and why treating people with respect and fair pay is critical to long lasting impressions. View our blog post to see some of Anthony's original notes.
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Anthony, Natalie and Rick discuss what they've recently learned on a client trip to Finland about work–life balance.
Part of the Funsize culture is Funsize Fridays. Funsize doesn't do client work on Friday. In this episode they also talk about the how, why, and what of Funsize Fridays.
Show Notes
- Catch up: What funsize has been up to
- Finland trip: Sauna’s, Cabin workshops in the forest, and work–life balance tips from our clients in Finland
- Funsize Fridays: How, why, and what of our weekly tradition of no-client-work Fridays
Links
- DPM Anthony and Danielle are speaking at Digital PM Summit 2014 http://dpm2014.com/speaker/anthonya/ http://dpm2014.com/speaker/daniellemoser/ http://dpm2014.com
- Fundamentals of iPhone App Design on sale now https://mijingo.com/products/screencasts/iphone-app-design-tutorial/
- Finland Photos
- Phi’s Video in Finland - http://vimeo.com/104813583
- Rick’s post on Exposure of the Finland Trip – https://rickmesser.exposure.co/finland
- Phi’s post on Exposure of the Finland Trip https://phi.exposure.co/suomi
- ALL THE INSTAGRAM'S of our trip! http://searchinstagram.com/fnszinfinland
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Episode Outline
- The cost of a wrong client
- Don't choose a client based on money
- Ask the right questions early
- Favorite Clients' Traits
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Updated show notes coming soon...
For now...
- 00:00 Intro And News; iOS8 and Elle, plus Google Watch
- 13:05 Why Do We Track Time?
- 17:39 Why We Hate Time Tracking
- 26:39 Alternatives to Time Tracking
- 43:41 This Podcast Has A New Name
Links:
- http://www.google.com/design/
- http://www.pivotaltracker.com/
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- 00:00 Introduction
- 02:15 The Designer Developer Relationship Today
- 06:51 Both Sides Of The Fence
- 12:29 Code & Color: An Example Of The Disconnect
- 15:37 Build An Experience Together, Not Apart
- 20:17 Tool Time: Design Tools For Developement
- 22:07 Geography Matters
- 25:01 Style Guide Problems And Some Solutions
- 27:52 Front End Developers For Native, Is There Such A Thing?
- 33:00 Changes In The Baseline
- 35:20 More On The Dirt
The Dirt Links
- The Dirt Twitter: @thedirtshow
- Tim Twitter: @csskarma
- Mark Twitter: @markgrambau
- Fresh Tilled Soil
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- 0:00 Intro and News
- 11:31 Getting Into The flow
- 22.41 Design Tips and Resources
- 29:53 Sketch and The Missing Link
- 43:15 A Word On Organization
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This episode covers the process product designers go through from getting a product started to scoping it, designing it, and managing it. Here's the outline:
- 00:00 News
- 12:00 Overview
- 19:11 Product strategy and UX
- 28:10 Conceptual design and visual design
- 36:14 Design management
- 39:23 Product mangagement vs project management
- 48:52 Conclusion and what's next for this podcast
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Pricing is a tricky subject. So many of us have found our way along in the dark, without much help. In episode 3, we discuss pricing models as well as our own approach. We also talk about things we've learned from some very smart people who are experts on the subject.
Show Notes * 00:46 Yes, I Love Technology: News about new tech and how it relates
to the mobiles. * 11:51 Pricing: Not first date conversation. * 13:41 Fixed Pricing * 16:25 Value Based Pricing * 26:08 Hourly Rate * 35:10 Retainer Based Pricing 37:33 Pricing Resources 42:00 Funsize's Approach To Pricing * 50:24 Common Pricing Questions
Links * Value Pricing with Dan Mall and Jason Blumer on the businessology
show podcast * Design is a Job by Mike Monteiro * Q: How much does a mobile app cost? A: About as much as a car * The Harvest Guide to Pricing by Harvest
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The Evolution of a Mobile Product Designer * Jobs pre-iPhone era * The product designer craze * Dribbble web to ui evolution
A Product Designer Today * It is a war finding good product designers * "Acqu-hire" a product designer * Finding your way into product design in the small start-up world * Mobile Product Designers translate business goals into interactive designs * A little about working in an agile environment. "Show early and often". * The Might "M.V.P.", iteration on actual user feedback * Agile products evolve with the times * UX design is interaction design, User Experience is the end product
Careers in Product Design * Type of jobs: What kind of design do you want to do? Native or responsive, in-house or client services? * What Funsize looks for in a Product Designer * Take risks and learn how fail the right way.
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Anthony and Natalie give their background story and how they came to mobile design. Rick listens, laughs, and drinks.
Other information covered:
- Funsize background story and introduction to the Podcast
- Web design got boring and we needed a career change
- Mobile design before the iPhone existed
- Quitting your job and being a freelancer in the new mobile industry
- Let’s follow our dream and start a husband and wife design business
- Clients are smart and the traditional digital agency model
is broken * Remember when? Designing web templates for Xanga and AsianAvenue.com * Natalie and Anthony met at an agency designing tampon and laxative
work * How Natalie and Anthony started their careers in mobile product
design * Just because you’re a talented web designer doesn’t mean you know anything
about designing for mobile * Being flexible with your cost so you can master new skills * Native mobile product design “NMD” vs. responsive web design “RWD” * Watch out NYC and SF. Good talent lives where they want! * Agile methodology and building relationships with clients to ship
product incrementally * Not every business needs an app, sometimes mobile web is the way to
go * Working on products that better the quality of life * Teleportation (beaming), the future of the Foursquare check-in * Lastly, topics we hope to cover in the future
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