Open by default

I am always looking for what's good in people. And then, I want to pump that goodness up, promote it, and do amazing work with others.

In the spread of my career I've moved from working solo to working on technology that was closer to people (UI) and later still, working directly with people. All of these phases have challenged me to improve my communication skills, and I'm still very much learning.

As such, I maintain a number of guidelines when I'm working with people for the first time. They inform the ways I communicate with others, conduct business... and everything else, really. That's not to say that they stay fixed over time; I respect the way the relationship naturally grows. But this is how I begin.

  • The other person is smart. I have always hired people smarter than me and it has never failed me, and I take this assumption to my co-workers and co-conspirators too.
     
  • The other person has good intentions and wants to succeed. This is putting an amazing amount of trust in the other person, but then, I assume she's trusting me just as much. No agendas, no twirling mustaches. We're here to make something fantastic and enjoy it.
     
  • I will learn something from the other person. Her experience and her work can be incredibly influential on me because I allow it to be. People are fascinating.
     
  • The other person is doing her very best work. This one gets tricky. Sometimes, we phone it in (and it's worth examining why that is – another time.) But I still treat each project and piece of work as the very best representation of that person's ideas given her constraints, limitations, and experience. I look for strengths in the simplest-seeming ideas.
     
  • We both have a sense of humor. I can definitely read when Business Mode is fully required, but some things may happen that are stressful... and humor can be a release valve for that.
     
  • And finally, we will connect and create something great. Connection only means that we need to work well together – in a flow, and in a collaborative way.

And that's it. Those are the guidelines I start with in just about any relationship or point of contact.

All Apologies

As a parent, I read a lot of kids' books. There's something really lovely about them, in general: when they're looking to teach a lesson or inform a kid, man, they are direct. No 100+ pages of examples or stories; just one straight narrative and a purpose. I love that.

One of my son's frequently-read books is Tumford the Terrible by Nancy Tillman. It's the story of a cat who makes mistakes and messes, and never says he's sorry... until one day he confronts his actual feelings and finds that telling the truth and apologizing makes him feel good. Deep, right?

It seems that the simple act of apologizing becomes a lot less simple as we become older. If we hurt someone, intentionally or not, we put up barriers. We may eschew responsibility and pin it on someone or something else. The email never left my outbox... this person doesn't speak for the company... it wasn't intended that way. But in my own experience, doing this makes me feel uncomfortable. It is a little nugget of a burden that sits on my back and becomes another thing I need to carry, need to nurture, even though it's deserving of neither.

If you already know the truth, then be brave and face it. It may hurt a little bit. But like Tumford, once that apology is out there... your self, your true and wonderful self, can heal.

Energy and Spoon Theory

In my Better Living Through Design talk, I touch on how out of balance I was for a very long time. My mind would spin up with ideas and thoughts and plans, but I would almost ignore my body altogether. And one of the ways this showed up was in how much energy I had; I would assume at the start of the day that my energy was boundless (hah!) and that I could do everything on the list. Frankly, while I was a teenager, I pretty much could.

I'm also fortunate enough to currently be able in my life, without any disabilities. I know this will change in the future.

One of the big things that made me look critically at my energy and where I use it was introduced to me by a family member with a disability. I learned of The Spoon Theory, an excellent piece by Christine Miserandino, that gives a shorthand and approachable metaphor for what it's like to live with chronic illness or pain.

The Spoon Theory set me up to be more empathetic with others, and ultimately be more compassionate with them as well.

Constraints

After my WebVisions talk last month, there were quite a few fantastic questions from the audience. One of them was, “When you're figuring out what you want to do with your life and how you want to be, how do you take into account the needs of others - like family?”

I clarified by addressing “children” in that “family” bucket, although it can apply to families of all types, really. But my initial answer was this:

All the best designs work within constraints.

I do not have unlimited time nor energy. My wife, son, and other family members all have their needs and wants too. So as I'm planning my days and choosing how to exist in this world, I must take them into account as well. Because, frankly, if I don't, then I'm not being truly myself.

What happens when specific goals or actions conflict with each other? I'm working through this right now: my wife and I made a number of choices that are super important to us, but other people in our family are less comfortable with them to the point of completely disagreeing with them. My old default reaction was to turn around and question my own decision – all in an effort to please the other person, putting my own joy and happiness aside.

But, that's not where my heart is anymore. Now I know these decisions – the ones that I feel are best for me and my family – lead to really uncomfortable conversations and possible consequences. I can't predict how other people will react, even with lots of experience, so my wife and I talked about a few possible outcomes and how we'd feel about them, and how we'd react as well. (This was instrumental, and really soothed the part of me that likes to plan everything out.)

This is a constraint, but an important one. Our decisions and actions have consequences, and how we handle them is also indicative of how we are in the world. No matter what I face, I remind myself of my intentions and work to apply them.

May Contain Editorial Content

Oh, hello everyone from the internet! This post has been updated as of October 21, 2014; see the epilogue section below for a follow-up and an important correction.

I love podcasts so much that I started one. And I'm also terribly picky about UX and UI, as you can imagine, so I was excited to give Marco Arment's Overcast a whirl. Downcast was my mainstay: its feature set was fine but it was just... kinda... ugly.

Overcast offers a free version, and one can pay $5 to unlock a number of features. The features include things like a smart equalizer and downloads over cellular. And like most podcast players, if you're new to the genre (or just looking for something new), it offers a directory. Overcast offers both a straight A-Z searchable directory as well as a curated selection of programs, called a “Starter Kit”. The curated selection is what I want to talk about.

The Starter Kit is broken up into categories. As I was scrolling through these lists, I noticed something: there was a severe lack of gender diversity in almost every category.

I was curious if it was just me or not. So I went into each section and identified any hosts or co-hosts whose names are traditionally female, and verified those that were socially associated with either gender. If a description did not include any names, I chose to count it as not having female hosts or co-hosts. Here's where things netted out as of August 27, 2014.

  • In the comedy section, there are 9 podcasts, and 1 with a female co-host (Helen Zaltzman).
  • In the tech section, there are 10 podcasts, and 1 with a female cohost (Gina Trapani).
  • In the stories & variety section, there are 7 podcasts, and 1 with a female host (Ophira Eisenberg).
  • In the public radio section, there are 8 podcasts, and 1 with a regular female host (Terry Gross). Notably, some shows such as BBC Newshour have rotating hosts of all genders, and some shows in this section routinely feature contributions from women.
  • In the pop culture section, there are 7 podcasts, and 1 with female co-hosts (Claudia Dolph and Audrey Kearns).
  • In the philosophy section, there are 8 podcasts, and 1 with a female host (Krista Tippett).
  • In movies & TV section, there are 9 podcasts, and 2 with female hosts (the Verity! podcast with Deborah Stanish, Erika Ensign, Katrina Griffiths, L.M. Myles, Lynne M. Thomas, and Tansy Rayner Roberts; Erika Ensign once again, on the Babylon 5 podcast).
  • In the games section, there are 8 podcasts, and 2 with female cohosts (The Indoor Kids with Emily V. Gordon, and Isometric with Brianna Wu, Maddy Myers, and Georgia Dow). (Please see note in Epilogue below.)
  • In the business section, there are 8 podcasts, and none with female hosts.
  • In the turns out section, there are 8 podcasts, and none with female hosts.
  • In the politics section, there are 6 podcasts, and 3 with female cohosts (Emily Bazelon, Brooke Gladstone, and Arianna Huffington).
  • In the health section, there are 9 podcasts, and 2 with female hosts (Jillian Michaels and Monica Reinagel).
  • In the Apple development section, there are 8 podcasts, and none with female hosts.
  • In the Relay.fm section, which is a podcast network, there are 5 podcasts, and none with female hosts.

Note: after I initially wrote this in early August, the “retired greats” section (with 6 podcasts and no female hosts) was removed and replaced by Relay.fm. 

So, out of 108 distinct podcasts (2 Relay.fm shows are listed in two places), only 15 feature women in a regular host or co-host capacity. The Verity! podcast has the largest roster, with 6 female co-hosts (and all talking about Doctor Who? I subscribed.) This is a disappointing number.

The Obligation

Overcast written by a prominent person in the Apple dev community - Marco Arment, in this case. I also couldn't help but think about Vesper, the note-taking app headed up by John Gruber, also prominent in the Apple dev community. With these two apps, at least, there is a common ground: they have editorial points of view.

All apps entail design decisions, but for users they've typically been confined to the feature set or aesthetics. Vesper didn't have syncing for quite a while, and some people were quite upset by that. Overcast can be criticized for its feature set or its pricing model, but since Overcast includes editorial content in the form of this podcast directory, it can also be criticized for its podcast selection.

The main issue here is: is Overcast obligated to present a diverse list of podcasts? I say yes. Here's why.

The directory screen opens up as soon as you hit the “add” icon to subscribe to something new. Thus, lots of podcast show art shows up right away. It's visual, it looks great, and it has a prominent position. It has a lot of power. Thus, it blows the opportunity to expose people to ideas and shows that they might not have otherwise heard. A lot of these podcasts do sound like they could just be Marco's favorites - there's a lot of Apple nerdery and so forth. That starts to feel insular.

Most importantly, a Starter Kit or directory is a natural tool to help with that insular nature. As I was noticing this problem, I also took a look at my own list of subscriptions - it was all white (!), and mostly men. So where would I turn to next, logically? The built in directory! And yet the tool let me down there.

I must note that searching, which is a feature in Overcast, does help with this a bit - doing a search for “women” or “black” brings up quite a few podcasts from people of color and women - but this is something I must actively seek out. The directory can help and should help, particularly given this app is written by a fellow white guy.

Notably, I tweeted @overcastfm about the origin of this list but did not receive a response. I also contacted Downcast, and was informed that their directory is sourced straight from the iTunes RSS feeds.

Making this Better

So, how can this be addressed?

One thing I must point out is that it's quite possible that the podcasting community writ large is white male biased. I haven't seen any research on that yet so, if you're aware of any, do let me know. If it's true, that doesn't excuse an app like Overcast from promoting and encouraging diversity amongst its user base.

The most visible and supportive idea is to seek out more diverse podcasts from Overcast users and feature them in the directory. This is good for Overcast and the podcasters too. For Overcast, it starts to shift the editorial voice to one of discovery and diversity instead of (arguably) insularity. For the podcasters, they get a bigger audience (so Squarespace will pay more for ads!)

Another way is to not have a Starter Kit at all. This feels like a miss, but it's also an option.Without a directory, no one is steered in any direction. Notably, the directory also makes assumptions about its users - like that they'll be interested in Apple development podcasts. This may or may not be accurate of the population as a whole.

One other idea: smarter categories. Something more customized would be great; Overcast could learn that I give a shit about women's rights and start recommending great podcasts for that.

Finally, the nature of placement in the Starter Kit is unclear; Relay.fm is an entire podcast network and has its own entire category. So another option is to offer paid placement and then get a diverse podcast category in the app that way.

Cloudy

I criticize Overcast because I think the app is good. It's not great, but it's good. I haven't been compelled to pay $5 for the full feature set, and a lot of that is actually due to this editorial decision - not the missing features. But that's the risk with apps that have more of a voice than just a feature set: some people may love it, and others may not.

Epilogue

I'm very happy to share that the great Erika Ensign, co-host of the Verity! and Babylon 5 podcasts, shared this article on Twitter in October 2014:

Shortly afterwards, it got to Marco Arment – the aforementioned author of Overcast. Details emerged, and soon the Overcast Twitter account put this call out:

That tweet was RTed far and wide and as such, the responses to that tweet have been pretty amazing on the whole. However, there have been a few people debating the usefulness of including women based on this article.

The great news is that the Starter Kit, as of yesterday (!) already has more women's voices represented. That's a good thing. It's good for Overcast listeners, it's good for the podcasting community, and as I joked above, it's probably good for Squarespace too.

I deeply appreciate the thoughtful responses from Erika, Marco, and Jason Snell (who compiled some of the Starter Kit), and of course, all the listeners. Here's hoping this is a first step towards a more diverse and more inclusive community for people of all genders and races.

Correction: The original article did not include Isometric in the gaming section, and I apologize for the oversight. That was an error on my part, and the original numbers have been updated above to reflect this.

Bigger and better than ever

Since the web became popular I've scooped up domain names here and there, thinking something would come of them someday. In the early days of my own domain, I considered splitting phonezilla.net (my personal site) into two sites. I wanted to test out my creativity and see if it made sense to separate my journal and personal information from my art and work. It didn't.

I wasn't quite sure where that second site would go. I experimented. But there wasn't a real goal in mind.

Sometime after that, web stats packages became available and popular. The parts of me that love numbers started to love these things and realized, "Ah! This is one of the reasons I'm doing websites! Because visitors." Note that - not people. Visitors. Hits. Page views. Referrers. All of that became increasingly important to me to the point that reviewing my site's stats became a daily ritual.

It grew from there. How can I get more people to read my stuff, or view my web projects? Getting listed on Yahoo!, sure. Trying to get on Cool Site of the Day, sure. Just getting out to more people. Not necessarily the right people - just people.

Over time, traffic to my site picked up a lot. Many, many more people were visiting my site in the early 2000s than now. But because of where I was at the time, I let one particularly nasty and relentless troll get to me, and I took all of it down. All of it. I found a risk to putting one's self on the web: getting hurt. And I got hurt, bad. My ideas of numbers and connecting with people and all of that was blown away by one person whose goal was to make my life miserable.

So I didn't have a website for a very long time. Here's the problem: I missed it. A lot. It ultimately took me about 7 1/2 years to figure out what my website could do, and should do, for me at this point in my life.

However, numbers

I mention all of this because of numbers. That part of me that still loves to obsess over numbers hasn't gone anywhere, so I check the stats for my site regularly.

But there's a twist now: if someone I respect favorites or retweets something I post (and especially if it's a link to something I wrote), that feels very good. It has at least as much meaning as a big day in the stats tab, if not much more.

More importantly, I interpret that as a connection with someone.

And that right there is why I do this.

Without People

As I look back through my life, work inclusive, I see a very clear pattern. From early on, I became a rather independent person who preferred to be alone. It came out through things I did, and the ways I acted, and I didn't realize it.

I touched on this briefly last year:

Some of my choices [in life and work] gave me this opportunity to be invisible. Photography, as I discussed with my friend Paul this weekend, let me hide behind a camera. Doing work in computers let me hide behind a screen. Hiding. Not showing myself. 

That's not a coincidence; it's how I operated. I did things on my own so that I could get all of the credit, all of the attention, all of the joy - and I ignored the "all of the blame" part.

The other day I had the good fortune to participate in a friend's design class; she invited me to critique her students' final presentations. We got to talking over lunch and learned we both love photography. She asked what kind of photography I liked - I answered architectural. When it came to explaining why, though, a light bulb went off in my head: there are no people in those pictures. None.

Buildings aren't people. They don't move spontaneously (usually). They don't show emotion as people do. They are not alive. They are objects ultimately. Those facets coupled with my overwhelming comfort to do things solo, preferably behind a screen, was showing up in my art.

And the attempts to include people were very slow and cautious... experiments. I recall an assignment from my high school photo class in which we needed to photograph strangers. And wow, for an introvert like me? That was terrifying. But I did it, and some of the photos were quite nice. Years and years later, I dabbled in anonymous street photography (still hidden). And I did end up doing portraits of friends, some with constructed scenarios and some for more formal holiday cards.

UX Without People

There's a direct comparison to my day job and my work. I started programming, solo. I slowly reached out to BBSes, GEnie, and user groups and later thrived in a US mail-based user group.  Eventually I became fascinated by the ways software and hardware interacted with people, and so I moved over to UI - still not working directly with users, but closer. My first gigs in UX didn't involve research nor talking with users, so I had to be a magical idea person. Finally, now I'm in UX and life work where I must work with people in order to help them.

(As an aside, this also shows up here: you're reading this, but it's not a conversation and I'm not getting any feedback in the moment. That's actually easier for me to handle, otherwise we might be talking about it. At one point I conflated blogs and journals and even Twitter with directness. But there's a layer between us, a technology and societal messiness that is in our way. I love that we can still connect about this topic, or something else, even though this is not a conversation.)

So I understand that whole "magical UX/Creative genius" thing because I really loved being that person, and early in my career I really couldn't see myself as not being that person. It is an amazing feeling to be the one who comes up with all of these ideas out of thin air and all of them are loved. (Or most of them.) That's exciting. That's fun. But it's not enough. It doesn't work without people because life doesn't work without people.

Observation, understanding, action

In and of itself, noticing this pattern isn't action. It doesn't change anything in and of itself. But being highly observant of my behaviors and my patterns, both in the present and in the past, helps me be far more mindful and present now.

IA Summit changed my life, again

Note: this article reflected my feelings on IA Summit at the time of attendance. As of 2018, I've learned of serious safety violations at the conference over many years. Please consider that when reading this, as my experience may not be typical. Until further notice, you should not attend the IA Conference (which is what IA Summit is now known as) or support the IA Foundation. – Ed.

I didn't expect it. How could anyone? A conference changed me in 2013. Yes, a conference. So while I've been an enormous booster of IA Summit, I wasn't expecting to have a similar experience in San Diego this year.

But I was wrong. IA Summit did change my life again. Truly.

Over the past day or so since my time at the conference ended, I've been reflecting on why this is. I've talked about it at length with my friends. And I think it boils down to this.

The talks are tremendous and diverse (the keynotes, in particular, are just stellar). The program is well-crafted and thoughtful. The venue and experience of the event is just about flawless. But in the end the people and the community are second to none.

I think about how attendees can go on stage at Five Minute Madness and feel comfortable and safe (!) enough to share their deepest feelings. I see how conversations run the gamut from taxonomy and emotion to design patterns and pie (yes, we talked pie). The energy of the entire conference is overwhelmingly positive, encouraging, and supportive. Flex track exists. Karaoke and game night exist. Yoga, 5K & 10Ks, and social events are plentiful. The keynote had yoga. THE KEYNOTE HAD YOGA.

Due in part to all of this, IA Summit offers that fertile ground. I can have life changing conversations with people. (LIFE CHANGING! FOR REAL!) I can approach parts of work in entirely new ways. I can get in front of a room full of strangers and sing "It's the End of the World As We Know It" without a lyric sheet. I can both see people for who they are and be seen for the person I am.

IA Summit gives people in this very special industry the chance to be themselves, fully. It is refreshing. It is true. I have not experienced this anywhere else. I do not expect to. Instead, I expect to attend this conference every year until I can no longer do so. It is my home, it is my tribe, it is my people.

I will miss all of you, stay in touch throughout the year, and see you again in Minneapolis... if not sooner.

Evolving UX Strategy

I've been involved with UX strategy for a few years now. As I progressed from a developer to a UI developer to a UX designer to a UX strategist, my thinking on what UX and UI are has changed dramatically.

My original, self-made definition of UX strategy was something like this:

UX strategy is the creation, management, and governance of an overall plan for the experience of a product portfolio, ensuring it meets the needs of users and the business through research, design, and measurement.

When I attended the UX STRAT conference last September, many presentations validated my own stance on this. My thinking on this has changed a bit, though:

You make wireframes, you don't make companies

In my experience, having "just" a UX designer, UX architect, or even a UX manager doesn't necessarily bring about the necessary change to ensure an organization is ready to be user-centric. Part of the reason I consciously entered UX strategy was to not only ensure my work wasn't just floating out in "creative UX land" but truly reinforce that UX actually matters when it comes to products and businesses. This was demonstrated primarily through metrics and creating an overall plan to integrate UX activities within Agile frameworks. Fun process stuff!

Since I started real content strategy work within the past 6 months on a project, I've come to deeply respect and appreciate the work that content strategists do. But there's something big and meaty and distinct about content strategy that UX by itself hasn't had, in my experience. Take a look at Brain Traffic's foundational quad chart and let me know if you see it.

Got it?

There are people components and, in particular, there's workflow. Brain Traffic defines workflow in this context as this - emphasis mine:

What processes, tools, and human resources are required for content initiatives to launch successfully and maintain ongoing quality?

This is something that has been woefully missing from UX positions I've both been in and experienced: a lack of expectation that UX people need (or should or can) instill bigger change than "just" research and "just" flows: we, too, need to aid in defining the overall way a company approaches UX in order to ensure its quality.

The tension we feel

This is where I and, I trust, others have felt pain when it comes to growing out of a straight-on UX role into something bigger: because UX is oft aligned with marketing, creative, design, or all three, it may not be taken seriously as an integral part of the business. We hear this when people say, "We'll add the UX later" (I HAVE HEARD THIS AND IT HURTS ME SO) or, "We don't need a UI for this; we'll just have our coders make one" (YOU ARE STILL MAKING A UI).

UX strategy is one way that we can bring our skills out and apply them to things bigger than a product, bigger than a portfolio, bigger than an interface. Instead we can do our research and work, focused internally, and say, "This is how we could design our organization in order to achieve this goal." We state the goal and how to do it. Then we make PowerPoints and use the language of our business partners.

Here is the catch: other people do this work too. They may be called strategists. They may be risk managers. They may be change management. They may be organizational designers. They may not be any of these things. But all of these people, particularly if they are already in your organization, may feel like they've got this. They understand the problem, just from a different perspective than us, and may already working on how to solve it.

So once again, it's on us to figure out how to best work within our organizations - hierarchies, politics, titles, and all - and design plans to achieve our goals. That sounds like a workflow to me, or maybe, a workaround-flow. But none of it will happen if UX is not empowered to bring change in your organization. And to me, UX strategy is analogous to content strategy in that organizational change is not only possible, it is expected.

Taking over the world

In an interview with the UX STRAT folks, I opined that UX and UX strategy will continue to grow and then go away altogether. I do believe that someday, UX will not be a discipline in and of itself within organizations because, by then, these principles and practices will be more standardized. It won't be weird to conduct usability testing for design optimization, or do hardcore deep research on users in order to figure out what to build.

Until then, we are still out there working hard to convince people that UX isn't just a magical thing that one person makes randomly based on gut and nothing else. We are still out there working hard to demonstrate that a designed experience can make people happier and genuinely empowered. But it's not going to happen - or, happen well - without UX strategy.

DTDT

Thus, I'd like to cast out a new definition of UX strategy for myself. (Who in UX doesn't love DTDT, right?)

UX strategy is the creation, management, and governance of a plan for the experience of a product portfolio to support user needs and business goals. This plan encompasses both external and internal touchpoints through research, design, human resources, and workflows.

Consider it a work in progress.

On Compassion for Others

When it comes to compassion of the self and compassion with other people, for me, it’s been easier to be compassionate with other people than myself.

But something I had first read via Tara Brach said that everybody that you encounter in the day is fully-formed, too. They have their own hopes and dreams and desires and pain and suffering -  they have all of these things, too. And they’re carrying those around with them at that same time you are.

The interaction level with other people may be almost nonexistent. It might be somebody that you see walking down the street as you’re driving by. It might be somebody who’s the cashier at a store. It might be somebody who is asking for money as you walk down the street. But they are full people, too.

I really started to take that in, sit with that and, frankly, just kind of look around at stoplights and look at everybody... it gave me such a different perspective. All these people are just out there living their lives and doing what they need to do or what they have to do or what they want to do.

When I started to see other people as people, that led me to be generally more compassionate and open to the idea of interacting more with strangers - that ties into introversion and social awkwardness, too. I may never understand these people’s pain. I may never hear about it. But acknowledging the fact that it does exist and everybody has it to some degree has that’s been very helpful for me.

This post was excerpted from episode 9 of Designing Yourself, "Embracing the Suffering".