Speaking and Process Mentorship
In the last ten years, I have learned that I am just as passionate about how designs get delivered as I am about what gets designed. I’ve had the opportunity to present on the regional and national level with a focus on teaming, culture, and designing in code.
In 2016 I was invited to give a keynote at the Lean Startup Conference.
It was an Ignite style talk (20 slides, in 5 minutes) on the main stage along side many of my design heroes discussing how our design team was innovating inside of a huge enterprise with an emphasis on culture, technology, and moving quickly. I had the honor of sharing the stage with Guy Kawasaki, Jason Fried, Jeff Gothelf, Irene Au, Jake Knapp, and Phil Gilbert among others.
Scaling culture at IBM Design
Before Lean Startup, I had a regular gig traveling to Austin, TX to give talks to the early career designers enrolled in the flagship Designcamps—a three month long immersive dive into Enterprise Design Thinking for new design hires while the company grew the designer ranks from a few hundred to over 3,000 full time designers.
I bundled up my thoughts and ideas. I reflected on what I wish I had known in my first few years inside of IBM and I penned a simple set of slides and spoke from the heart.
Relationships matter and are hard to fake. Product teams are so much bigger than design teams. Do whatever it takes to ensure you’re speaking the same language with the folks you’re collaborating with.
And above all else—prototype everything, with real data whenever possible.
Duke Ideate Conference
I was invited with a design research colleague of mine to present on the realities of Ai first Product Design to a packed house of some of Duke’s finest design, business, and engineering minds.
