S1E5 VIDEO: A Lively Debate About Things We (Mostly) Agree On with Jared Spool

Oh. My. God. You guys. Jared Spool is on Corporate Underpants. 🎉

In this episode, I sit down with the Jared Spool to talk about UX, product, and—of course—the corporate messes that make our jobs way harder than they need to be. We kick things off by diving into the early, wild days of UX (back when “user experience” wasn’t even a thing), and Jared shares hilarious and infuriating stories about fighting for better design before anyone knew why it mattered.

Then we get into the real stuff: ⚡ Why proving UX’s value is still an uphill battle (and what to do about it) ⚡ How business metrics—not just usability—can make UX indispensable ⚡ How to stop waiting for a seat at the table and make leadership pay attention

Jared also casually drops the fact that he accidentally invented voicemail (oops), helped define the way we use keyboards, and somehow made usability testing sound fun. If you’ve ever had to fight for UX, justify your work, or convince execs to stop launching terrible products, you need this episode.

04:24 Jared's Early Badassery: The 70's and 80's 07:15 The Era of "Computer Operators" 09:49 The First Word Processors in the Era Before UX 13:27 Jared Accidentally Invents Voicemail 17:06 Getting People To Think About "Users" 18:23 Early 2000's: The First Research Into "What Makes A Good Website?" 21:05 The Trick: What Does Great UX Mean To Your Team or Org? 23:40 De mocratization vs. Delegation 25:14 The First Usability Lab 30:39 Jared's Work Today: How To Get A Seat At The Table 31:26 We Know How To Design Things. So Why Are Things Still Poorly Designed? 32:31 The 2010s' Boom: 6,221 Days Without Becoming a Bank 36:12 Our Snobbishness About "The Bottom LIne" 38:28 The Face Weasel 38:58 How To Become Hyper-Valuable To Mount Olumpus 41:59 Tamara And Jared Argue Over Job Titles 43:12 How To Become Powerful In An Organization 46:49 Leaders Of Awesomeness Helps You Become Undeniably Valuable 48:30 Pro-tip: Metrics Aren't "Numbers." They're "Measuring Change." 49:22 Shifting from Tactical Research to Strategic Research

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Oh my God, you guys, it's here.
Corporate Underpants with Jared Spool.
.9995I am so excited. 4 00:00:08,260.9995 --> 00:00:19,501 Welcome, welcome to Corporate Underpants, the live recording of what will also be launched as a recorded podcast that you can listen to in audio or watch in video or whatever it is that floats your boat.
I'm Tamara Adlin.

(00:21):
I'm your host.
I'm very excited to have launched Corporate Underpants, a long time idea and passion project of mine, and Corporate Underpants is all about the real things that get in the way of us launching great products, which have very little to do with the things that we focus much of our time on. 8 00:00:37,445.999 --> 00:00:47,869.94 Instead of focusing on process and on, little things in the double diamond or whatever, we should be, we can and should be as we get more and more senior. 9 00:00:48,90.04 --> 00:00:50,70.04 We should be focusing on managing up. 10 00:00:50,160.04 --> 00:00:53,890.04 We should be focusing on getting better at politics. 11 00:00:53,920.04 --> 00:00:56,740.04 We should be focusing on stakeholder alignment. 12 00:00:57,140.04 --> 00:01:14,960.04 Corporate underpants is what happens when you don't have those things in place and you end up launching your org chart or launching a product where things don't make sense for the, for our users or our customers, because we've been fighting internally about usually even about the wrong things and launching based on those. 13 00:01:15,590.04 --> 00:01:17,620.04 Misalignments and miscommunications. 14 00:01:17,830.04 --> 00:01:19,340.04 Corporate underpants is the problem. 15 00:01:19,440.04 --> 00:01:24,210.04 I'm a big believer that learning how to become better at stakeholder alignment is a solution. 16 00:01:24,410.04 --> 00:01:27,380.039 I have my own way of doing that, which I call align before design. 17 00:01:27,380.04 --> 00:01:29,260.04 And I'm working on a book on that. 18 00:01:29,260.04 --> 00:01:31,580.04 And you can go and see more about that on my website. 19 00:01:31,580.04 --> 00:01:34,190.039 I'll put links here on Adlinink. 20 00:01:34,220.04 --> 00:01:39,750.04 com and sign up to be an early reviewer that, or help me get off my ass to launch that. 21 00:01:39,990.04 --> 00:01:42,800.04 But in the meantime, we're going to talk more about the problem and you guys. 22 00:01:43,250.04 --> 00:01:48,900.04 I am very excited because we have, as my guest today, are you ready? Brace yourselves. 23 00:01:49,630.04 --> 00:01:53,400.04 The one, the only, Jared fucking Spool. 24 00:01:53,720.04 --> 00:01:55,260.04 Jared, hi. 25 00:01:55,760.039 --> 00:01:58,0.04 How the hell are ya? I am fine. 26 00:01:58,90.04 --> 00:02:01,850.04 I I didn't know you knew the middle name my mother gave me. 27 00:02:01,970.04 --> 00:02:02,360.04 Okay. 28 00:02:02,810.04 --> 00:02:08,865.7373545 that's how she'd tell me to, Jared fucking Spool, get in Would she really? I would so love to know that was true. 29 00:02:09,315.7373545 --> 00:02:12,655.7383545 no, my, my mother was born in the Midwest. 30 00:02:12,705.7383545 --> 00:02:15,945.7383545 She, I don't think I ever heard her swear. 31 00:02:16,121.43770899 --> 00:02:21,591.43770899 So she'd be truly appalled to, that I disrespected you in such an onerous manner, odious manner just now. 32 00:02:22,345.7383545 --> 00:02:23,505.7383545 Oh, camera. 33 00:02:24,351.43770899 --> 00:02:25,71.43770899 Language. 34 00:02:25,906.43770899 --> 00:02:26,646.43770899 Language. 35 00:02:27,386.43770899 --> 00:02:33,276.43770899 So Jared, I could introduce you, but anybody watching this, you know who Jared Spool is. 36 00:02:33,276.43770899 --> 00:02:47,196.43870899 If you don't, then you probably haven't been around in product or maybe you haven't been around in the world of user experience UX because pretty much everybody who came up through the ranks of user experience knows who the hell Jared is. 37 00:02:47,981.43870899 --> 00:02:51,881.43870899 They don't know much, as much about Jared as I do, because they know Jared today. 38 00:02:51,891.43870899 --> 00:03:02,17.94870899 So Jared, you can learn about Jared's ideas in tons and tons of ways through massive, wonderful writing, presentations that keep you on the edge of your seat. 39 00:03:02,17.94870899 --> 00:03:09,297.94870899 If you ever see Jared speaking at a conference, you need to go to that main stage above all others, because it's super duper fun and funny. 40 00:03:09,747.94870899 --> 00:03:15,557.94870899 But it occurred to me when I was like, Jared's been on lots of podcasts, what am I gonna, we are going to talk about some stuff that not everybody knows about you. 41 00:03:15,557.94870899 --> 00:03:18,357.94870899 So I know Jared from way back in the day. 42 00:03:18,807.94870899 --> 00:03:21,597.94870899 We are both older than the 29 years old that we look. 43 00:03:22,97.94870899 --> 00:03:24,547.94770899 I've been 29 for over 20 years, I think. 44 00:03:25,837.94870899 --> 00:03:39,407.84970899 Yeah, I know I, for years I had no, I actually had no idea how old my mom, for some reason I'm talking about my mother a lot I had no idea how old my mother was until I saw her birth date on her tombstone. 45 00:03:39,447.84970899 --> 00:03:41,487.84970899 Cause that was the only way she was 29. 46 00:03:41,802.84970899 --> 00:03:49,262.84970899 For most of my life until I turned 40 and then, or 35 or something, and then she became 39. 47 00:03:49,592.84970899 --> 00:03:51,262.84970899 And then she stayed there forever. 48 00:03:51,632.84970899 --> 00:03:56,212.84870899 And then she passed away at, and and then I learned that she was actually much older than that. 49 00:03:56,282.84970899 --> 00:03:57,672.84970899 That was the first one to like that. 50 00:03:58,23.54906349 --> 00:04:08,388.54906349 a massive shock to you that she was much older, It was really weird looking down and, Seeing the grave marker and saying yeah, I guess I'd never knew that. 51 00:04:08,838.54906349 --> 00:04:15,398.54906349 which, you know what? This is the perfect thing because yes, I never knew that was, is a big part of why our products. 52 00:04:15,863.54906349 --> 00:04:17,223.54906349 Don't work well when we launch them. 53 00:04:17,673.54906349 --> 00:04:19,22.84970899 Yes, I That is right. 54 00:04:19,413.54906349 --> 00:04:20,972.84970899 So it was a perfect I never knew that. 55 00:04:21,62.84970899 --> 00:04:23,942.84970899 I never knew those people used our product that way. 56 00:04:24,3.54906349 --> 00:04:31,803.54956349 So when I was coming up in the world of UX I got my grad degree from University of Washington in the Department of Technical Communication, which it was called then. 57 00:04:31,803.54956349 --> 00:04:33,623.54956349 Now it's Human Centered Design and Engineering. 58 00:04:33,633.54956349 --> 00:04:36,23.54856349 In 1996, I got my master's degree. 59 00:04:36,43.54956349 --> 00:04:41,483.54956349 And when I was graduating, Jared, you were already a key badass in our field. 60 00:04:41,533.54956349 --> 00:04:45,679.24991799 My, my ass was completely bad at that It was terrible. 61 00:04:45,699.24991799 --> 00:04:57,589.25091799 And how if people had just discovered you, like in the year 2000, or the early 2000s, what would they have discovered? What was your focus back then? In the two thousands we'd been around. 62 00:04:58,89.25091799 --> 00:05:06,104.94927248 We've been around since 88, We was user interface engineering was the company I founded which later became Center Centre. 63 00:05:06,584.94927248 --> 00:05:11,164.94927248 The I'd been in the field since the late seventies. 64 00:05:11,254.94927248 --> 00:05:14,694.94927248 So I'd been around for a very long time. 65 00:05:14,984.94927248 --> 00:05:17,444.94827248 But we were in the early two thousands. 66 00:05:17,929.94927248 --> 00:05:20,699.94927248 We were focused on the web because that was. 67 00:05:21,149.94927248 --> 00:05:22,309.94927248 That was the frontier. 68 00:05:22,309.94927248 --> 00:05:26,750.64862698 We've always been at the frontier of something Wait a second. 69 00:05:26,810.64862698 --> 00:05:29,360.64762698 You said you've been in the field since the 70s. 70 00:05:29,390.64762698 --> 00:05:31,560.64862698 There was no field in the 70s. 71 00:05:31,560.74862698 --> 00:05:33,600.74962698 I was I was in technology. 72 00:05:33,600.74962698 --> 00:05:38,270.74962698 I was a software developer building things for people to use. 73 00:05:38,320.74962698 --> 00:05:43,290.75062698 And in the very early eighties I started working on. 74 00:05:43,860.75062698 --> 00:05:46,790.75062698 What were at the time, the first personal computers. 75 00:05:46,800.75062698 --> 00:05:51,410.75062698 Keep in mind that the IBM PC didn't come out until 1983. 76 00:05:51,860.75062698 --> 00:05:54,660.75062698 The Mac came out in 1984. 77 00:05:54,680.75062698 --> 00:06:28,760.75062698 So in 1980, I was working on personal computer technology and trying to figure out what personal computers would be, Was this before or after all the stuff at Xerox PARC? So you were around It was at the same time, and it was, so we, the Xerox PARC stuff, the Apple Lisa, those, the Apple II had been out for several years the II Plus was their first big product, and then the IIe, Radio Shack had a computer called the TRS 80. 78 00:06:29,90.75062698 --> 00:06:33,530.75062698 There were a bunch of other personal computer products that were out there. 79 00:06:33,850.75062698 --> 00:06:46,510.75062698 I was working for a company called Digital Equipment Corporation that had made all of its money on big computers mini computers and mainframe computers, and. 80 00:06:46,966.49998148 --> 00:06:51,676.44998148 Okay. 81 00:06:52,70.75062698 --> 00:06:53,100.75062698 Smaller and smaller. 82 00:06:53,100.75062698 --> 00:07:01,520.75162698 And so we could start to put boxes that used to require a closet or a dedicated room to run. 83 00:07:01,790.75162698 --> 00:07:15,260.75162698 We could now put boxes on people's desktops and the question then become what do you do with it when you have something on people's desktops? And one of the things that you weren't around back then you don't think about is that. 84 00:07:15,645.75162698 --> 00:07:34,925.75212698 Up until personal computers, if you wanted to physically touch a computer and use it you had to undergo months of training and everything was written in manuals and you had to memorize all these commands and it was it was a profession, an occupation to operate a computer. 85 00:07:34,965.75212698 --> 00:07:36,285.75212698 Computer operators. 86 00:07:36,625.75212698 --> 00:07:40,0.75312698 Were a highly paid profession. 87 00:07:40,480.75312698 --> 00:07:49,170.75412698 And we knew once we saw what was happening in the personal computer space, that job was going away. 88 00:07:49,180.75412698 --> 00:07:49,820.75412698 It was. 89 00:07:49,860.75412698 --> 00:07:51,450.75312698 And so now the question is. 90 00:07:51,995.75412698 --> 00:07:59,185.75412698 How do you make things so that anybody can use them? And nobody knew the answer to that. 91 00:07:59,275.75412698 --> 00:08:00,935.75412698 That had never been done before. 92 00:08:00,986.45348148 --> 00:08:02,656.45448148 This was before the mouse. 93 00:08:02,716.45448148 --> 00:08:04,906.45448148 This was before anything that looked like a window. 94 00:08:05,86.45448148 --> 00:08:11,756.45448148 This was a blinking cursor that you had to type something after to have something happen. 95 00:08:12,525.75512698 --> 00:08:13,55.75512698 yeah. 96 00:08:13,155.75512698 --> 00:08:13,925.75512698 Mice. 97 00:08:14,790.75512698 --> 00:08:17,260.75512698 Mice were just starting to exist. 98 00:08:17,310.75512698 --> 00:08:25,420.75412698 So the Xerox alpha, and then later the Xerox star had a mouse and the Lisa had a mouse. 99 00:08:25,550.75412698 --> 00:08:28,800.75312698 And so our machine had a mouse. 100 00:08:29,140.75312698 --> 00:08:31,950.75312698 My boss, Larry Tesler, you knew of Larry Tesler. 101 00:08:32,250.75312698 --> 00:08:32,750.75312698 Here's my boss. 102 00:08:33,130.75312698 --> 00:08:34,840.75312698 Yeah, he was my boss at Amazon. 103 00:08:34,930.75312698 --> 00:08:40,420.75312698 He did the initial user test on the mouse to figure out how stiff the cord could be. 104 00:08:40,935.75312698 --> 00:08:47,465.75312698 So that it wouldn't pull the mouse out of the way and be too stiff, but not be so soft that the mouse would run over the cord. 105 00:08:47,685.75312698 --> 00:08:56,75.75212698 And he also had arguments with the industrial engineers over how many clicks would ever be done on a mouse over the lifetime of the mouse. 106 00:08:56,125.75212698 --> 00:08:59,345.65312698 They wanted to make it so that it would be up to 100, 000. 107 00:08:59,345.75312698 --> 00:08:59,795.75312698 It would serve. 108 00:09:00,15.75312698 --> 00:09:00,755.75312698 It would be good. 109 00:09:00,985.75312698 --> 00:09:02,625.75312698 And he was like, that's not even close. 110 00:09:03,75.75312698 --> 00:09:07,5.75312698 I had I later worked at a company called Symbolics. 111 00:09:07,125.75312698 --> 00:09:15,525.75312698 And they made these workstations, these giant workstations that cost 60, 000 a pop or more. 112 00:09:15,975.75312698 --> 00:09:18,695.75312698 only one user for a 60, 000 computer. 113 00:09:19,105.75312698 --> 00:09:46,706.45248148 And we had a developer who would you would, you'd, I was like three offices down and suddenly I'd hear this loud string of expletives And then this thunk against the wall, and then he would calmly walk out of his office, walk down the hall to the supply cabinet, open the supply cabinet, get a new mouse, and then walk back in his office and close his door. 114 00:09:47,476.45248148 --> 00:09:49,286.45148148 This would happen once or twice a week. 115 00:09:49,736.45148148 --> 00:09:50,76.45148148 Okay. 116 00:09:50,76.45148148 --> 00:09:55,666.45148148 So for people listening, you have to understand there was no user experience design. 117 00:09:55,716.45148148 --> 00:09:58,836.45148148 There was no idea of a product professional. 118 00:09:59,226.45148148 --> 00:10:01,866.45148148 There was a bunch of people who knew how to code. 119 00:10:01,876.45148148 --> 00:10:08,436.55098148 It reminds me in my mental model of the crypto kids, it was elitist. 120 00:10:08,516.55098148 --> 00:10:10,66.55098148 It was technical elitism. 121 00:10:10,76.55098148 --> 00:10:11,736.55098148 Either you knew how to use it. 122 00:10:12,146.55098148 --> 00:10:17,286.55098148 Or you didn't and then there were these weirdos like Jared saying, wait a second. 123 00:10:17,836.55098148 --> 00:10:21,556.55148148 And you were saying stuff like if we're going to put this on the desk, who's sitting at the desk. 124 00:10:22,106.55148148 --> 00:10:22,976.55148148 Exactly. 125 00:10:23,231.55248148 --> 00:10:43,241.55348148 Had this, so the CEO of Ford Motor was on the board of my company and my CEO was on the board of his company and they we were told very early on that, that our computer would be on the desk of the CEO at Ford. 126 00:10:43,941.55348148 --> 00:10:48,741.55348148 And we were trying to figure out what he would do with it. 127 00:10:49,291.55348148 --> 00:11:01,821.55448148 Why, up until this point if you wanted to use a computer for something, you called the IT people and they wrote a program and gave you a pile of printouts. 128 00:11:02,381.55448148 --> 00:11:20,481.55148148 And so what would he do? With this and one of the first things I got to work on was the, one of the first word processors and that was that was really interesting because nobody had built. 129 00:11:21,111.55248148 --> 00:11:23,981.55248148 a word processor that someone could just walk up and use. 130 00:11:24,261.55248148 --> 00:11:28,651.55248148 There were word processing existed as a vocation. 131 00:11:28,991.55248148 --> 00:11:33,771.55248148 You could become a person whose job title was word processor. 132 00:11:34,411.55248148 --> 00:11:40,841.55248148 And your job was to use equipment usually made by either. 133 00:11:41,386.55248148 --> 00:11:47,96.55248148 The Wang corporation or digital equipment corporation that we had a model called the deck mate. 134 00:11:47,526.55248148 --> 00:11:51,716.55248148 And this was a dedicated device. 135 00:11:51,716.55248148 --> 00:11:59,996.55148148 And if you wanted to learn how to use it you had to come to our facilities in Billerica, Massachusetts. 136 00:12:00,746.55248148 --> 00:12:02,986.55248148 And you would take. 137 00:12:03,621.55248148 --> 00:12:18,161.55148148 A one week course and during that one week course, you'd learn how to load a file, save a file, print a file and change the ribbon on the printer because that turned out to be really hard to do. 138 00:12:18,561.55248148 --> 00:12:23,331.55148148 And, the second week, which was the advanced course you could stay for. 139 00:12:23,571.55148148 --> 00:12:48,557.25133597 And in that course you learned bold and italics, which required that you change the daisy wheel on the printer to do italics, because it, to change fonts, you had to change Didn't the president of Ford or the CEO have a secretary? So that was the thing was that we started thinking, Oh okay maybe the secretary would use this thing. 140 00:12:49,177.25133597 --> 00:12:56,977.25333597 Then a product two guys out of the, out of Cambridge, Bob Frankston and my name servers got latency. 141 00:12:57,327.25333597 --> 00:12:59,237.95169047 It'll come to me in a You're such a nerd. 142 00:12:59,297.25333597 --> 00:13:06,177.25333597 They they invented this thing called VisiCalc and VisiCalc was this spreadsheet. 143 00:13:06,607.25333597 --> 00:13:11,417.25333597 And suddenly that changed the game because people were buying spreadsheets. 144 00:13:11,637.25333597 --> 00:13:14,227.25333597 Dan Brooklyn, that's the other guy's name, I knew it would come. 145 00:13:14,847.25333597 --> 00:13:18,297.25333597 People would buy computers just to get VisiCalc. 146 00:13:19,167.25333597 --> 00:13:22,477.25333597 So this was like the first killer app for personal computers. 147 00:13:22,927.25333597 --> 00:13:24,317.25333597 And this was for spreadsheets. 148 00:13:24,327.25333597 --> 00:13:27,17.25333597 So now we had a sense as to who was going to use it. 149 00:13:27,17.25333597 --> 00:13:30,157.25333597 It'd be people who use spreadsheets and people who use WordPress. 150 00:13:30,607.25333597 --> 00:13:34,217.25333597 And so that, that helped us a lot. 151 00:13:34,247.25333597 --> 00:13:36,127.25233597 And I ended up working on. 152 00:13:36,827.25333597 --> 00:13:38,887.25333597 The spreadsheet and the word processor. 153 00:13:38,887.25333597 --> 00:13:41,407.25333597 I also ended up working on email. 154 00:13:41,777.25333597 --> 00:13:44,7.25333597 So I wrote some of the first email clients. 155 00:13:44,207.25333597 --> 00:13:51,987.25233597 We also had a peripheral in our device that would let you do text to voice and voice recording. 156 00:13:52,217.25233597 --> 00:13:54,807.25333597 So I created a sort of personal. 157 00:13:55,257.25333597 --> 00:14:01,987.25333597 voicemail system that you could have and also a text to voice system and a voice to text system. 158 00:14:02,337.25333597 --> 00:14:06,97.25233597 So I accidentally created voicemail, which I didn't mean to do. 159 00:14:06,97.25333597 --> 00:14:07,657.25233598 So I apologize for that. 160 00:14:07,977.25333597 --> 00:14:32,707.25333597 And and then the, one of the other claims to fame that I have, and it amuses my kids to no end is that if you think of a A big keyboard, right? So a standard PC keyboard, you've got your alphanumeric key array, you've got F1 through F12, you've got your numeric keypad and between the numeric keypad and the alpha. 161 00:14:33,302.25333598 --> 00:14:46,522.25133598 Alphanumeric the QWERTY array there, there's an inverted T set of arrow keys and and six buttons that say page up, page down, insert, delete. 162 00:14:46,552.25233597 --> 00:14:46,902.25233598 Yeah. 163 00:14:47,502.25233597 --> 00:14:48,612.25233598 I designed those. 164 00:14:49,222.95169047 --> 00:14:50,332.95169047 my God, you did not. 165 00:14:51,197.25233597 --> 00:14:53,777.25333597 Yeah, Jared, you're on the keyboard. 166 00:14:53,891.55398148 --> 00:14:56,591.55398148 Rob Rubin he did the inverted T. 167 00:14:56,911.55398148 --> 00:15:07,267.25433597 But I got to design the six keys above the arrow Okay, so let me bring this, let me tell you guys listening why I'm bringing this because we're also going to fast forward. 168 00:15:07,757.25333597 --> 00:15:18,787.25433597 As charming and archaic and sweet, cute and weird as these stories sound, I bet you in five years and 10 years. 169 00:15:19,197.25433597 --> 00:15:30,567.25333597 Somebody's going to do a podcast and say, back when AI came out, there was this thing called prompt engineering and people were taking classes to learn how to become prompt engineers. 170 00:15:30,577.25433597 --> 00:15:37,277.25333597 And there were books on prompt engineering and there were all these different AI things and you could subscribe to them. 171 00:15:37,597.25333597 --> 00:15:47,37.25433597 All of the stuff that we're working on now, if you fast forward, is going to seem just as wacky and silly and interesting and old. 172 00:15:47,467.25433597 --> 00:15:55,877.25433597 And I just think that perspective is so good for us to have, to remember that the thing that stays constant is people and what they want and need. 173 00:15:56,327.25433597 --> 00:16:00,127.25433597 Yeah, there, there used to be this thing that came out every year. 174 00:16:00,147.35433597 --> 00:16:10,947.25433597 at the, and the new year, it's like people who were born 20 years ago, didn't know about, and they would list all these things. 175 00:16:11,57.25433598 --> 00:16:14,37.25433598 And it's been there all their lives. 176 00:16:14,57.25333597 --> 00:16:20,887.25533598 We're now in a world where it is very possible that you can be an adult and. 177 00:16:21,507.25533597 --> 00:16:28,142.95469047 The iPhone has always existed in your Yeah, I got this cute little statue, a Jonathan Adler thing. 178 00:16:29,72.95469047 --> 00:16:31,92.95469047 That's it's actually a phone stand. 179 00:16:31,422.95469047 --> 00:16:34,202.95469047 But this is what my phone looked like when I was a teenager. 180 00:16:34,702.95469047 --> 00:16:35,407.25533598 Not Yeah. 181 00:16:36,112.95469047 --> 00:16:39,332.95369047 No, yeah, there's people who had never had that experience, ever. 182 00:16:39,872.95469047 --> 00:16:40,282.9546905 And it's gone. 183 00:16:40,347.255336 --> 00:16:40,617.255336 Yeah. 184 00:16:40,617.255336 --> 00:16:45,347.255336 My son was just asking me questions about what it was like to use a rotary phone. 185 00:16:45,747.255336 --> 00:16:50,232.9541905 And Yeah, there's videos of young people trying to poke in the holes there. 186 00:16:50,682.9541905 --> 00:16:51,272.9541905 yes. 187 00:16:51,453.653545 --> 00:16:51,703.653545 got it. 188 00:16:51,713.653545 --> 00:17:06,23.653545 So to keep this on the whole corporate underpants and politics and alignment and getting powerful as you help to build the whole world of product in UX, this way of thinking that if we find it hard to make our arguments today, imagine how hard it was to make those arguments then. 189 00:17:06,503.653545 --> 00:17:16,313.653545 And then as we fast forward, Jared, through the eighties, became, you had your own company, user interface engineering, which it sounds technical today, but wasn't then. 190 00:17:16,313.653545 --> 00:17:18,843.653545 It was what do you mean user interface? Yeah. 191 00:17:18,863.653545 --> 00:17:21,123.652545 That was that was the. 192 00:17:21,943.653545 --> 00:17:29,753.653545 The the real sort of thinking behind it was this idea that we had to think about users. 193 00:17:29,753.653545 --> 00:17:33,883.653545 We had to engineer solutions that users would care about. 194 00:17:33,883.653545 --> 00:17:35,473.653545 Cause up until that point. 195 00:17:36,13.653545 --> 00:17:49,443.653545 You basically built things for yourself, right? It's like, how would I want to use this? Because back in the day, you were the, you were probably the first user of the thing you built. 196 00:17:49,443.653545 --> 00:17:56,449.3538995 You built things for yourself to use and then maybe you let other people And you were the trained engineer. 197 00:17:56,599.3528995 --> 00:17:57,749.3538995 It's like the crypto bros. 198 00:17:57,769.3538995 --> 00:18:00,429.3538995 They build things for people who already understand all that stuff. 199 00:18:00,879.3538995 --> 00:18:02,69.3538995 Yeah, to some extent. 200 00:18:02,119.3538995 --> 00:18:02,949.3538995 Yeah, absolutely. 201 00:18:03,465.053254 --> 00:18:20,85.053254 So then in the early 2000s, you at UIE, As when you own your own company, your own consulting firm, you constantly have to reinvent and figure out what people are buying and what to sell and how to package pretty much the same set of expertise you've already had, which is fundamentals. 202 00:18:20,875.053254 --> 00:18:28,775.053254 You helped create those fundamentals yeah, I mean we were the first ones to do any research on what made a good website. 203 00:18:29,225.053254 --> 00:18:45,45.053754 And we were back in the late nineties, early two thousands, we were basically just going around telling people what we'd learned by watching hundreds and hundreds of people use websites and what worked and what didn't work. 204 00:18:45,45.053754 --> 00:18:47,575.053754 And so most of the major. 205 00:18:47,915.053754 --> 00:18:52,95.053754 Navigation standards that we have today came out of that work. 206 00:18:52,195.053754 --> 00:19:07,605.054254 The way that, that people interact on websites today the, where the buttons get placed, the fact that you put form fields first and then you put the buttons after versus having the buttons at the top, though, Apple does that now, but. 207 00:19:08,5.054254 --> 00:19:24,195.053254 You didn't used to do that was because there was this sort of top to bottom left to right flow that made sense that you start in the upper left hand corner, at least for left to right languages, you start in the upper left hand corner and you work your way and then the buttons at the bottom. 208 00:19:24,215.053254 --> 00:19:25,559.953254 It just was made sense. 209 00:19:25,820.053254 --> 00:19:30,260.053254 If you put the button at the top, people are going to hit it before they, they fill in the information. 210 00:19:30,260.053254 --> 00:19:31,540.053254 Then they're going to get an error message. 211 00:19:31,540.053254 --> 00:19:34,570.053254 And then they have to figure out why they're getting an error message. 212 00:19:34,570.053254 --> 00:19:37,420.052254 Oh, wait, I'm supposed to fill in information and then hit the button. 213 00:19:38,100.053254 --> 00:19:46,90.053254 And all of these sort of things that we don't give much thought to because they've just become the way things work started. 214 00:19:46,540.053254 --> 00:19:51,30.053254 Because we looked at hundreds of websites that didn't do it that way. 215 00:19:51,70.053254 --> 00:19:57,650.053254 And watch people struggle with So everything, I think this is two important points that I like to bring up. 216 00:19:57,660.053254 --> 00:20:02,240.053254 One is that if we in our profession do our job it looks like we were never needed in the first place. 217 00:20:02,670.052254 --> 00:20:08,750.053254 Because I, I think people listening to this can't imagine that, that a website would start at the top and go to the bottom. 218 00:20:08,860.053254 --> 00:20:24,415.053254 Like these things that we could take as obvious, Jared's one of the guys who had to fight Engineers and executives to not fuck that up because every time you have technical people or new business people, they want to reinvent everything. 219 00:20:24,865.053254 --> 00:20:46,735.053254 And some of the things we take for granted today, this is the person who fought for them, which is why it's so interesting for me to bring you on today and talk about what it is you're doing now, because as we talk about the whole idea of executive alignment, stakeholder alignment, misalignment being the thing that causes catastrophes in product. 220 00:20:47,185.053254 --> 00:21:05,220.053254 You have come to be a driving voice in my in the way I see you with Center Centre and the and the leaders of awesomeness stuff that you do in yelling about the fact that we have to get really good at convincing people of this and having them listen to us. 221 00:21:05,690.053254 --> 00:21:06,390.053254 Yeah. 222 00:21:06,580.054254 --> 00:21:06,880.054254 Yeah. 223 00:21:06,880.054254 --> 00:21:18,310.054254 It's, the basics are that, that you have to really understand what it is that people need from you. 224 00:21:18,310.054254 --> 00:21:41,940.153254 And then you have to position what you're doing in such a way that, And so the trick for any of this is really understanding what does a great UX really mean to an organization, to a team, to the users, understand that and find a way to position things. 225 00:21:41,950.153254 --> 00:21:43,300.153254 So that's the obvious. 226 00:21:43,715.153254 --> 00:21:44,785.153254 Direction to go. 227 00:21:45,145.153254 --> 00:21:55,295.153254 And the challenge for any of that is really about how do we. 228 00:21:55,745.153254 --> 00:22:13,750.8531085 How do we become relevant and prioritized above all the other things that the organization is freaking out about at any given time? And just to poke in here for those of you listening, Larry, one of our viewer one of our live attendees said, I had a lot of fights about usability stuff. 229 00:22:13,890.8531085 --> 00:22:21,650.8531085 with engineers and marketers in the late nineties and early two thousands and drew on Jared's wisdom to at least hold my own once in a while. 230 00:22:22,100.8531085 --> 00:22:24,110.8531085 Yes, Larry and I go way back. 231 00:22:24,110.8531085 --> 00:22:27,430.8531085 So that, that He's a brilliant UX person. 232 00:22:27,430.8531085 --> 00:22:34,571.453463 And I think he, he undersells his own abilities, but yes, that is in fact, A lot of it was. 233 00:22:34,592.2523175 --> 00:22:37,582.2518175 does content content insights, I believe is your podcast, Larry. 234 00:22:37,582.2518175 --> 00:22:38,372.2518175 We'll put a link to it. 235 00:22:38,572.2518175 --> 00:22:38,602.2518175 Okay. 236 00:22:39,52.2518175 --> 00:22:44,872.2518175 Yeah the the thing is that people have the right intention. 237 00:22:45,322.2518175 --> 00:22:58,382.2508175 The other day someone was, came to me and was like, what do I do? My product manager keeps bringing me designs that they just want me to flesh out and, how do I tell them that's my job, they shouldn't be designing and I'm like. 238 00:22:58,832.2508175 --> 00:23:00,472.2508175 They have an interest in designing. 239 00:23:00,482.2508175 --> 00:23:09,602.2508175 Why are you pushing them away? sometimes it's, you might treat it the way, you treat a six year old who wants to help you bake cookies. 240 00:23:09,612.2518175 --> 00:23:13,962.2503175 You just okay, we're going to set you up here with your own dough and your own stuff. 241 00:23:13,962.2503175 --> 00:23:15,72.2503175 And you just play with that. 242 00:23:15,72.2503175 --> 00:23:19,152.2503175 I actually placed the cookies on the cookie sheet, but but. 243 00:23:19,527.2503175 --> 00:23:39,927.2513175 If you've got people who are interested in participating in the design process, I think that's great because I was in a in a universe way back when nobody was interested in, in, in participating in the design process and they didn't understand why it had to be a thing. 244 00:23:40,202.2513175 --> 00:23:48,777.950672 So Let me pick on that for a minute though, because I had an episode with Jillian Hudson a couple of weeks ago where we talked about UX democratization gone wrong. 245 00:23:48,787.950672 --> 00:23:51,377.950672 And you talk about this in some of your talks as well. 246 00:23:51,757.950672 --> 00:24:02,547.950672 And I know that you referenced some of Dana Chesnell's work in this too, with there's a balance between this idea of democratization and saying that the product person has an interest in design. 247 00:24:02,997.950672 --> 00:24:18,757.949672 But still hanging on to the fact that there is a discipline here and that just because you can draw a wireframe Doesn't mean you know how to her point was Jillian's point was we leave out the part Democratization of UX we leave out the two words with training. 248 00:24:19,207.949672 --> 00:24:24,597.948672 What do you think of that statement? You might disagree I think that there's a couple of things here. 249 00:24:24,597.948672 --> 00:24:35,897.947672 One is I'm not a big fan of democratization but not for the same reason, almost all the time when people talk about democratization, what they're really talking about. 250 00:24:36,597.948672 --> 00:24:53,523.6480265 Is I want to turn over the boring, easy parts to this other group of people so I can go do the more interesting, more difficult And that's not democratization. 251 00:24:53,573.6480265 --> 00:24:55,33.6480265 That's delegation. 252 00:24:55,753.6480265 --> 00:25:08,253.6480265 And, that is in itself problematic because it this notion that you're no longer going to do the simple usability test. 253 00:25:08,253.6480265 --> 00:25:09,463.6470265 You're going to let somebody else do it. 254 00:25:09,463.6480265 --> 00:25:13,873.6470265 And almost always it's basically using horrible methods. 255 00:25:14,448.6480265 --> 00:25:20,438.6480265 That nobody should be using like unmoderated testing or survey tools or things like that. 256 00:25:20,748.6480265 --> 00:25:26,48.6480265 So it's, so I'm not a big fan of that part of the movement of democratization. 257 00:25:26,588.6480265 --> 00:25:27,688.6470265 Here's where I come in. 258 00:25:27,958.6480265 --> 00:25:29,578.6470265 I think that. 259 00:25:29,843.6480265 --> 00:25:35,133.6480265 Research and design are skills and they are learned skills. 260 00:25:35,133.6480265 --> 00:25:38,293.6480265 Nobody is born knowing how to do usability tests. 261 00:25:38,293.6480265 --> 00:25:42,323.6480265 I can tell you this because I lived in an age where none of us knew how to do it. 262 00:25:42,353.6480265 --> 00:25:43,693.6470265 We had to invent them. 263 00:25:43,703.6480265 --> 00:25:58,489.347381 I was in the first usability test lab that ever existed for software and I was that? Where was that? In Maynard, Massachusetts, on the fifth floor of ML5 in, in 1982. 264 00:25:58,715.0467355 --> 00:26:07,45.0467355 What's ML5? That was the designation of the building called the mill that was owned by digital equipment corporation. 265 00:26:07,55.0457355 --> 00:26:12,975.0457355 And we were testing the first personal computers years later. 266 00:26:13,425.0457355 --> 00:26:23,424.9790688 Okay. 267 00:26:23,434.3120477 --> 00:26:28,994.3130477 the, one of the first online hiring companies monster that was at monster. 268 00:26:29,204.3130477 --> 00:26:33,394.3130477 com and they had their offices on the same floor. 269 00:26:33,744.3130477 --> 00:26:40,794.3120477 And I went and spoke at an event that they were hosting their UX people were hosting this event. 270 00:26:41,144.3130477 --> 00:26:46,304.3130477 And I went to speak at this thing in there in this lovely little room that. 271 00:26:46,804.3130477 --> 00:26:49,184.3130477 Was in their offices this function room. 272 00:26:49,494.3130477 --> 00:26:57,224.3130477 And I was talking about you do know that the first usability test lab is on this floor in this building. 273 00:26:57,824.3130477 --> 00:27:02,884.3120477 And they're like, no, they were giving tours of their lab, which was very fancy, very nice. 274 00:27:03,184.3130477 --> 00:27:05,369.2130477 And I took them down the hall. 275 00:27:05,589.3130477 --> 00:27:07,239.3130477 To what was their break room. 276 00:27:07,239.3130477 --> 00:27:11,59.3130477 And I said, yeah, the lab was right here in an air conditioning closet. 277 00:27:11,639.3130477 --> 00:27:22,9.3120477 There was, we had to, whenever we were running usability tests, we had to shut off the air conditioning for the entire building and and. 278 00:27:22,459.3120477 --> 00:27:23,649.3120477 entire building. 279 00:27:23,919.3110477 --> 00:27:24,579.3120477 Oh, my God. 280 00:27:24,583.6126932 --> 00:27:34,253.6126932 for the entire building because it was this giant, massive air conditioner that was the size of this wall, and it made so much noise when it ran. 281 00:27:34,603.6116932 --> 00:27:41,493.6116932 And so we would just turn off the breaker and there'd be no air conditioning in the building while we ran the usability test. 282 00:27:41,863.6126932 --> 00:27:44,369.3120477 People hated Oh, I would imagine. 283 00:27:44,819.3120477 --> 00:27:50,539.3120477 So also by Joshua L says, Jared, your usability tests with Lycos in the late 90s started my career. 284 00:27:50,599.3120477 --> 00:27:51,539.3120477 Many thanks. 285 00:27:52,89.3120477 --> 00:27:56,959.3120477 Yes we did such cool tests with Lycos, we would go we would go into the field. 286 00:27:56,959.3120477 --> 00:28:02,729.3130477 So we did some of the first field based user research that was ever done for software. 287 00:28:03,49.3120477 --> 00:28:09,459.3130477 We would go, we went to the Brimfield this giant what do you call it? I damn, I am having. 288 00:28:09,539.4130477 --> 00:28:11,979.3130477 I should eat more fish. 289 00:28:11,999.3130477 --> 00:28:15,79.3130477 My, my grandfather would tell me fish is brain food. 290 00:28:15,419.3130477 --> 00:28:24,588.6146932 Yeah no they're, what do you call it? There are booths where people sell all the like a market, like a farmer's Yes, there's a yard flea market. 291 00:28:24,628.6146932 --> 00:28:25,168.6146932 That was it. 292 00:28:25,458.6146932 --> 00:28:26,18.6146932 Brimfield. 293 00:28:26,58.6146932 --> 00:28:28,48.6146932 They have hundreds and hundreds of people. 294 00:28:28,48.6146932 --> 00:28:30,998.6146932 It takes over the whole town in Western Massachusetts. 295 00:28:31,268.6136932 --> 00:28:33,68.6146932 Happens four times a year. 296 00:28:33,258.6146932 --> 00:28:35,228.6146932 Cher comes up to shop there. 297 00:28:35,488.6146932 --> 00:28:36,198.6151932 Antiques Fair. 298 00:28:36,198.6151932 --> 00:28:36,738.6156932 That's what it is. 299 00:28:36,748.6156932 --> 00:28:37,588.6146932 Thank you, Josh. 300 00:28:37,828.6156932 --> 00:28:40,68.6156932 And the and we went out. 301 00:28:40,518.6156932 --> 00:28:48,758.6156932 we went out there and we set up a tent and we were, it was like a hundred degrees out, 98 degrees out or something. 302 00:28:49,18.6146932 --> 00:29:02,403.6156932 And we were asking people with ice cold soda and $20 gift certificates to come in and Look for whatever they'd look for at the antique fair. 303 00:29:02,403.6156932 --> 00:29:05,263.6156932 We wanted to see them use a search engine to do it. 304 00:29:05,913.6156932 --> 00:29:20,273.6156932 And and we invented a whole new method called interview based tasks where you interview people about what they would be doing if they weren't with you, and then you have them do that in front of you. 305 00:29:20,573.6156932 --> 00:29:22,543.6156932 So that's what we did. 306 00:29:22,593.6156932 --> 00:29:23,873.6156932 And we watched, we. 307 00:29:24,493.6156932 --> 00:29:30,603.6156932 We probably conducted usability tests over three days with more than 150 people. 308 00:29:30,863.6156932 --> 00:29:34,303.6156932 It was the most number of folks we'd ever done up to that point. 309 00:29:34,323.6156932 --> 00:29:42,138.5156932 And it was, and we had to run massive extension cords from the ladies room that was next door to the. 310 00:29:42,698.6156932 --> 00:29:44,208.6156932 Where we got our tent set up. 311 00:29:44,388.6156932 --> 00:29:46,148.6156932 We bought the cheapest tent we could get. 312 00:29:46,148.6156932 --> 00:29:47,808.6156932 So it was right outside the ladies room. 313 00:29:48,138.6156932 --> 00:29:53,868.6151932 And we ran extension cords to power the laptops that we brought out. 314 00:29:53,868.6151932 --> 00:30:04,739.3150477 We brought Actually, that was probably one of the most valuable tents because where do you park the husband while you're peeing? It should have been some manly like tool tent or something like that, but instead of, all right, so hold on a second. 315 00:30:04,819.3150477 --> 00:30:07,189.3160477 So I, part of this is me being fascinated. 316 00:30:07,189.3160477 --> 00:30:10,879.3160477 I had a whole series of interviews called UX pioneers that I took down. 317 00:30:10,879.3160477 --> 00:30:14,979.3150477 I need to put them back up again and I need to do one with you, which is how you help start the field. 318 00:30:14,979.3150477 --> 00:30:21,9.3160477 And that's why I've gotten into this, but I want to redirect us now, even though I want to continue this to today. 319 00:30:21,459.3160477 --> 00:30:38,989.3160477 And how all of this experience, and then by the way, people listening and then in the early mid late 2000s, 2010s on that, Jared was the guy that you'd spend 20, 000 to come in for one day and talk to your team at a giant company, and they would happily pay that and more, I'm sure. 320 00:30:39,769.3160477 --> 00:30:40,429.3160477 Now. 321 00:30:40,854.3160477 --> 00:31:12,699.3160477 Now you're doing this thing that is about how do we as product and UX professionals get and keep a seat at the table, which is to me, related to where I've come to, I'm sure you got there before me, but if we can't get people talking to each other and working together well, and if we can't get people to listen to us, Whining about people not listening to us is completely, totally pointless, and we are way too prone to do that. 322 00:31:12,699.4160477 --> 00:31:38,419.3150477 And when you stop whining, what do you do? And what are your goals, right? So where, how did you get to this? How did you get to where you are now, which is, and maybe you should describe it, what is Leaders of Awesomeness? So the, over the years, our function, what we've been trying to do at what first UIE and then Center centre was always the same, which is we're trying to figure out how to get rid of all the poorly designed things in the world. 323 00:31:39,349.3160477 --> 00:31:43,509.3160477 And I, as far as I'm concerned, we know how to design things. 324 00:31:43,529.3160477 --> 00:31:46,129.3160477 We should, there shouldn't be anything that's poorly designed. 325 00:31:46,699.3160477 --> 00:31:49,209.3160477 But we still produce things that are poorly designed. 326 00:31:49,209.3160477 --> 00:31:56,389.3150477 So we've always been trying to figure out why do we keep making this stuff? And at first it was because we didn't know how to do it. 327 00:31:56,399.3160477 --> 00:31:57,849.3150477 So we had to figure out how to do it. 328 00:31:58,179.3160477 --> 00:32:04,769.3170477 And then it was because we knew how to do it, but it wasn't widely distributed information. 329 00:32:04,789.3170477 --> 00:32:06,249.3170477 So we had to figure out. 330 00:32:06,749.3170477 --> 00:32:09,499.3170477 How to how to distribute the information. 331 00:32:09,949.3170477 --> 00:32:15,69.3170477 Now it's part of the basic curriculum of design and all of those things. 332 00:32:15,459.3160477 --> 00:32:18,579.3160477 And so now the issue is that. 333 00:32:18,954.3160477 --> 00:32:23,174.3160477 Organizations don't know how to lead design. 334 00:32:23,544.3160477 --> 00:32:36,744.3140477 And so that's been the focus for the last decade or so has been about how do we lead design and organizations? And this came about, there was this big boom in the mid 2010s. 335 00:32:37,294.3140477 --> 00:32:43,344.3140477 Early 2010s where we organizations were building design teams. 336 00:32:43,344.3140477 --> 00:32:52,794.3140477 You had capital one acquire adaptive path, cause it was cheaper to hire 30 people at a time than it was to recruit and. 337 00:32:53,104.3140477 --> 00:32:55,594.3140477 Interview 30 individual UX people. 338 00:32:55,844.3140477 --> 00:33:06,564.3140477 So they just, people were just buying agencies because it was, adaptive path did not start out to become a bank, but they ended up a bank and. 339 00:33:07,29.3140477 --> 00:33:21,979.2130477 We used to have a sign, I used to have a sign on my door when we had an office that had the number of days since UIE was founded written out and it just, had 6, 221 days without becoming a bank. 340 00:33:22,399.2140477 --> 00:33:31,789.9129022 Was our, it was the number and we would update it every I haven't thought about adaptive path in a while, but yeah, they were an enormous, yeah. 341 00:33:31,789.9129022 --> 00:33:32,649.9124022 And, then. 342 00:33:33,149.9124022 --> 00:33:38,379.9124022 McKinsey bought somebody and Fjord and then, all those agencies got bought. 343 00:33:38,769.9124022 --> 00:33:45,559.9104022 And it was because there was such a growing demand for design and UX. 344 00:33:46,4.9114022 --> 00:34:05,244.9114021 That, that you couldn't find people and when that, once they started building this stuff, it became clear that if you're going to have these big teams, that's at one point Capital One had more than a thousand, like 1200 UX Verizon has 600 UX people. 345 00:34:05,804.9114021 --> 00:34:22,254.9114022 And, and these big organizations with these huge numbers, it's like how do you lead that type of effort? How do you start to think about what design is like at a strategic level? And what we quickly realized was that. 346 00:34:22,659.9114022 --> 00:34:28,209.9114022 Most of the design that we talk about today, most of the UX that we talked about today is a hundred percent tactical. 347 00:34:28,489.9114022 --> 00:34:33,349.8114021 It's all about running usability tests and creating wireframes and handing over Figma files. 348 00:34:33,829.9114022 --> 00:34:36,749.9114022 And it's not about being strategic. 349 00:34:37,49.9114021 --> 00:34:43,209.9104021 It's not about asking how would a better user experience produce. 350 00:34:43,659.9104021 --> 00:34:44,289.9104021 results. 351 00:34:44,299.9104021 --> 00:34:59,779.9094021 An example from the headlines, right? So last week or the week before last Workday, which is a company that made 7 billion, 259 million last year work day laid off. 352 00:35:02,9.9094021 --> 00:35:07,389.9094021 1750 people, which of which a bunch of them were UX people, not all of them. 353 00:35:07,389.9094021 --> 00:35:17,599.9094021 In fact, a very small percentage was UX people, but there were UX people in the layout and mostly their product teams and by laying off. 354 00:35:17,660.0094021 --> 00:35:19,859.9094021 1, 750 people. 355 00:35:19,859.9094021 --> 00:35:34,689.9094021 If you assume that when you add in salary and benefits and equipment and electricity and Figma licenses and all the things that it takes to employ a person, they've saved they're going to save 350 million this year. 356 00:35:35,119.9094021 --> 00:35:39,39.9094021 That's how much 17, 050 people cost to them. 357 00:35:39,529.9094021 --> 00:35:52,129.8094021 And if you ask the question, if they kept those people, how would they have produced? More revenue for Workday than 350 million. 358 00:35:52,409.9094021 --> 00:35:53,809.9094021 None of them could tell you. 359 00:35:54,259.9094021 --> 00:36:03,139.9094021 And this is a lack of having design leadership the inability for us to understand how every designer. 360 00:36:03,459.9094021 --> 00:36:12,59.9094021 Has to produce more than $200, 000 worth of value to the organization every year just to keep their job. 361 00:36:12,59.9094021 --> 00:36:13,789.9094021 It's always the bottom line. 362 00:36:13,909.9094021 --> 00:36:17,485.6087566 We get snobbish about that too, as design people or UX people. 363 00:36:17,775.6087566 --> 00:36:29,525.6087566 We get super snobbish about business stuff and we get on the high horse about every product should be suitable for users and we should be at the center of the room and people should really, but that's okay. 364 00:36:29,775.6087566 --> 00:36:32,425.6077566 And who cares except us and our echo chamber. 365 00:36:32,945.6087566 --> 00:36:34,35.6087566 And your point is. 366 00:36:35,5.6087566 --> 00:36:44,975.6087566 I love that, that you personally, as an individual professional, better be able to prove and point to exactly how you're making more than your own salary for the company. 367 00:36:45,59.9094021 --> 00:36:46,559.9094021 It's not just your own salary. 368 00:36:46,749.9094021 --> 00:36:48,679.9084021 One of the problems is the design. 369 00:36:48,679.9094021 --> 00:36:52,229.9084021 This is something that Pavel Samsonov pointed out the other day. 370 00:36:52,559.9084021 --> 00:37:16,355.6087566 Design has ceded which by the way, if you haven't had Pavel on your show, you have to have I know, I reached out to, I'm in love with Pavel, Pavel's looking for work by the way folks and if you want an amazing thinker, Yeah, someone should hire him because if he's on the street, bad things are going to happen that you don't want that kind of, of brain work out there turning Pavel, you're gonna have to put this at the top of your resume. 371 00:37:16,355.6087566 --> 00:37:19,485.6087566 Jared Spool says, I'm dangerous when left to my own devices. 372 00:37:19,495.6087566 --> 00:37:20,905.6087566 You should hire me immediately. 373 00:37:21,405.6087566 --> 00:37:32,760.6087566 I have a story to tell you about Pavel and his resume, but that's a whole different story that the thing is that he pointed out that design has ceded. 374 00:37:33,30.6087566 --> 00:37:36,700.6087566 The idea of establishing what value is to the product people. 375 00:37:37,200.6087566 --> 00:37:39,770.6087566 And we shouldn't have done that. 376 00:37:39,880.6087566 --> 00:37:52,600.6087566 That was a huge mistake, right? Because UX people, particularly people who do research into who their users are, what their users need, what their current experiences are like, are ultimately the. 377 00:37:52,935.6087566 --> 00:38:04,25.6087566 Best equipped to understand what is valuable to customers and users and employees and all the people who end up using these things that we design. 378 00:38:04,255.6087566 --> 00:38:14,745.6087566 Because if we are doing the right research, we are actually identifying what, where there's missing value. 379 00:38:15,25.6087566 --> 00:38:20,15.6087566 And when we, I, when we're able to identify that it changes everything. 380 00:38:20,36.3081111 --> 00:38:23,366.3081111 So that's one of the reasons I harp so much in my own Align.... 381 00:38:23,456.3081111 --> 00:38:28,516.3071111 And one of the ways that we're different and the bickering at it, which I'm, I joke, but I'm, whatever. 382 00:38:28,525.6077566 --> 00:38:32,636.3071111 Other than you have better I do have better hair today, especially. 383 00:38:32,636.3071111 --> 00:38:33,726.3061111 It's really quite good. 384 00:38:33,740.6077566 --> 00:38:35,676.2061111 Yeah it's really, I didn't dry it. 385 00:38:35,960.5077566 --> 00:38:37,620.5077566 I tried to do something with mine. 386 00:38:37,620.5077566 --> 00:38:38,376.2066111 It just Yeah. 387 00:38:38,376.2066111 --> 00:38:44,410.5077566 So we talked about you growing a mustache, but your wife then called it, what did you say she called it? a face weasel. 388 00:38:44,811.2071111 --> 00:38:47,306.2071111 So that, that pretty much put the kibosh on that. 389 00:38:47,356.2071111 --> 00:38:48,766.2071111 Not that there's anything wrong with that. 390 00:38:49,676.2071111 --> 00:38:58,306.2071111 So you, what I'm really interested in is like when you get down and dirty with it, like I've been working so much with early stage startups and with innovation teams that are startups within big companies. 391 00:38:58,666.2071111 --> 00:39:03,436.2071111 And I think you have a focus so wonderfully on. 392 00:39:03,886.2071111 --> 00:39:11,556.2071111 What to me are bigger companies and bigger organizations and bigger structures and leading design, which is where you took it. 393 00:39:11,556.2071111 --> 00:39:19,496.2061111 So if I could make that full sentence and connect A to B, it's that if we know how to design great products, we know how to do it, which I completely agree on. 394 00:39:19,496.2071111 --> 00:39:20,796.2071111 It's in one of my slides too. 395 00:39:20,936.2071111 --> 00:39:26,706.2071111 Why do we keep launching crap? And the question then becomes, it's not in our process. 396 00:39:26,716.2071111 --> 00:39:28,266.2071111 It's not in the way we're doing it. 397 00:39:28,266.2071111 --> 00:39:29,256.2071111 It's in something else. 398 00:39:29,286.2071111 --> 00:39:30,596.2071111 To me, it's in something bigger. 399 00:39:30,596.2071111 --> 00:39:31,266.1071111 It's in the, yeah. 400 00:39:31,416.2071111 --> 00:39:41,736.2071111 I call it tornadoes coming from Mount Olympus where the executive team is battling and in like children and throwing lightning bolts down at us, which our processes cannot stand up to. 401 00:39:42,136.2061111 --> 00:39:44,346.2071111 No process can stand up to a tornado. 402 00:39:44,796.2071111 --> 00:39:54,36.2076111 You're looking at leading design, which is if you're in an organization and you are want to become a leader, that it's not just the person who gets great at wrangling the double diamond. 403 00:39:54,956.2076111 --> 00:40:00,446.2076111 It's the person who has to become powerful on Mount Olympus, whether or not they live there. 404 00:40:00,896.2076111 --> 00:40:01,346.2076111 Yeah. 405 00:40:01,506.2076111 --> 00:40:07,976.2086111 You, I would phrase it as you have to become hyper valuable to Mount Olympus. 406 00:40:08,366.2076111 --> 00:40:13,336.2086111 You have to make sure that They don't want to make a move without you. 407 00:40:13,786.2086111 --> 00:40:44,486.2086111 And I wrote a a piece that was intended to be a little bit tongue in cheek, but not completely where I basically put out this radical proposal that we should put, uX research in charge and have design and product and development report to UX research, because basically that's what should be driving the roadmap. 408 00:40:44,486.2086111 --> 00:40:47,906.2086111 It's what should be driving what gets released. 409 00:40:47,906.2086111 --> 00:40:51,406.2086111 It's what should be driving the definition of done is. 410 00:40:52,71.2086111 --> 00:41:03,206.9079656 The experiences that we should be building and where I would bicker with you, because UX researchers are even less good at wrangling the politics, as far as I can tell. 411 00:41:03,656.9079656 --> 00:41:06,826.9079656 sure, right? That's fine. 412 00:41:07,126.9079656 --> 00:41:26,406.9079656 Most chefs are bad chefs, right? We can talk about Sturgeon's law, which is basically 90 percent of everything is crap So 90 percent of user researchers are not qualified to have this position 90 percent of product people are also not qualified To have these conversations. 413 00:41:26,602.6063201 --> 00:41:48,612.6073201 up what Mark, so Mark Wieman, also people out there, is Probably one of the three best product people I know getting something from a set of ideas to a product that actually works is Mark and Mark has been talking for a while about this idea of leaving the I leaving the term UX behind and rebranding as product people, which has any product people out there. 414 00:41:48,642.6073201 --> 00:41:52,342.6073201 And I just talked to Bruce McCarthy, who's authored Aligned. 415 00:41:52,342.6073201 --> 00:41:54,592.6073201 He's yeah, no, things are no better in the world of product. 416 00:41:55,42.6073201 --> 00:41:55,472.6073201 yeah, they're not. 417 00:41:55,472.6073201 --> 00:42:02,8.3066746 What do you think about what, what do you think about what, I totally get where he's coming from, I think, I think the conversation's over. 418 00:42:02,18.3066746 --> 00:42:07,58.3066746 If we're arguing over titles, I don't care yeah, but you're not looking for a job. 419 00:42:07,508.3066746 --> 00:42:10,648.3066746 yeah, but no, I'm not looking for a job but. 420 00:42:11,98.3066746 --> 00:42:21,908.3061746 Positions listed the title of job positions mean nothing, right? That, that what does it mean to be a senior principal staff designer, comma, vice president. 421 00:42:21,958.3061746 --> 00:42:25,78.3061746 It, these are titles that don't make sense. 422 00:42:25,518.3061746 --> 00:42:30,188.3061746 And, and by the way, that's a real title from a JP Morgan chase post. 423 00:42:30,678.3061746 --> 00:42:42,928.3056746 And titles are just used by HR so that they can propagate their bad habit of making sure that the salary band they place you in still pays men more than women what matters. 424 00:42:43,293.3056746 --> 00:42:49,163.3056746 Is what we deliver as value back to our organizations. 425 00:42:49,573.3056746 --> 00:42:50,953.3056746 It always comes back to that. 426 00:42:50,963.3056746 --> 00:43:03,599.0050291 It doesn't matter what the Yeah, but if you can't, okay, but that's the title is the gate to, in this world right now, scads and scores of people who are great at UX and product and research and all of those things are out of work. 427 00:43:04,269.0050291 --> 00:43:07,549.0060291 And we can say the titles are stupid. 428 00:43:08,379.0060291 --> 00:43:12,9.0060291 But first we have to get in, and then we have to become powerful. 429 00:43:12,459.0060291 --> 00:43:12,979.0060291 Yes. 430 00:43:13,574.0060291 --> 00:43:16,394.0060291 Certainly you cannot change an organization from outside. 431 00:43:16,394.0060291 --> 00:43:32,604.0065291 So you have to be inside, but to become powerful in an organization, to have influence, to win over stakeholders, what you have to be able to do is be able to talk to how. 432 00:43:33,134.0065291 --> 00:43:38,344.0065291 What it is you're building achieves the objectives of the organization. 433 00:43:38,704.0065291 --> 00:43:42,434.0065291 The title, once you're inside, the title doesn't matter. 434 00:43:42,624.0065291 --> 00:43:47,794.0055291 If you are propagating bullshit, you will not get very far for very long. 435 00:43:48,294.0055291 --> 00:43:49,154.0055291 you have to. 436 00:43:49,519.0055291 --> 00:44:00,439.0055291 Be the one who says, okay, if our objective is to increase our market share by this percentage, this is how we're going to do it. 437 00:44:00,819.0055291 --> 00:44:13,969.0045291 And this is how we'll do it by delivering products, delivering services that people want to pay us for and they want to pay us more for it because it delivers a great experience. 438 00:44:14,369.0045291 --> 00:44:25,219.0055291 One of the best experiments that is happening right now, while we are sitting here is watching NBC Universal try to beat Disney. 439 00:44:25,804.0055291 --> 00:44:34,134.0055291 At its a game, they are building a set of theme parks in Florida, the new universal epic parks. 440 00:44:34,614.0045291 --> 00:44:42,834.0055291 They are investing billions of dollars and the only advantage that they will have over Disney. 441 00:44:42,964.0065291 --> 00:44:44,604.0045291 It's not the technology. 442 00:44:44,694.0055291 --> 00:44:46,144.0045291 It's not the real estate. 443 00:44:46,144.1045291 --> 00:44:47,994.0055291 It's not the business model. 444 00:44:48,254.0055291 --> 00:44:49,434.0055291 The only. 445 00:44:50,414.0055291 --> 00:44:55,684.0055291 they will have is they will deliver a better experience than Disney. 446 00:44:56,134.0055291 --> 00:45:05,34.0055291 And that's the most interesting thing, right? You look at a company like Gusto. 447 00:45:05,834.0055291 --> 00:45:27,159.0045291 Gusto is a fascinating story because they came out of nowhere and challenged one of the largest companies in the world, ADP, on their own turf and stole customers to the point where within five years they'd reached a 9 billion valuation. 448 00:45:27,609.0045291 --> 00:45:50,739.0045291 And the way they did that was not by somehow reinventing payroll services, but instead just offering payroll services that had A better user experience doing the exact same things that ADP did and does just with a better user experience. 449 00:45:51,209.0045291 --> 00:45:57,99.0035291 The ticket to delivering products and services in any industry. 450 00:45:57,549.0035291 --> 00:46:04,969.0035291 that will put you in a market leadership position is to compete on experience. 451 00:46:05,294.7028836 --> 00:46:13,664.7028836 But in a world where you're preaching to the converted, which is the people listening here, which are like, yes, as experienced, first of all, title does matter in that it can hurt you. 452 00:46:13,774.7028836 --> 00:46:15,634.7028836 So for women that I coach. 453 00:46:16,259.7028836 --> 00:46:21,949.7028836 Taking a title that's too low can decimate their ability to do anything in an organization. 454 00:46:22,399.7028836 --> 00:46:31,419.7018836 And, but, I want to talk about how you, because we have five minutes left and I want to make sure we get to this, how you help with the leaders of awesomeness. 455 00:46:31,469.7028836 --> 00:46:43,659.7018836 Because my way of understanding what you do, the way I recast it was, Training, helping people become so valuable that there's the value, their value screams so loud. 456 00:46:43,689.7018836 --> 00:46:46,379.7018836 Just your value screams so loud that no one can ignore it. 457 00:46:46,889.7018836 --> 00:46:53,979.7018836 So how do you do that with leaders of awesomeness? So we work on a variety of dimensions. 458 00:46:53,979.7018836 --> 00:46:57,599.7018836 We work on one of the one of the gateways. 459 00:46:57,704.7018836 --> 00:46:59,44.7018836 into being strategic. 460 00:46:59,54.7018836 --> 00:47:15,474.7018836 So everything we do is about being strategic versus tactical, which means putting aside the reactive, tactical, product based thinking and focusing on instead of reactive being proactive, which means getting out ahead. 461 00:47:15,824.7018836 --> 00:48:03,719.7018836 of what the organization needs instead of being waiting to be asked focusing on people's experiences, not the product, right? Not thinking about how does somebody use this functionality? Ask the question, what is their day like? Who has the best day last week? Who had the best day with your product? Who had the worst day with your product? What made the worst day for them? How did your product help them? Did it make it better? Make it a better day or make it a worse day on top of what was already going on, right? Who had a great day? Did your product help make it a better day, or did it actually reduce how good the day was, right? And why were they different? You have to be able to talk about people's experiences. 462 00:48:04,339.7018836 --> 00:48:08,789.7018836 UX is about improving people's lives. 463 00:48:08,949.7018836 --> 00:48:18,259.7008836 If we're not improving people's lives, why are we building what we're building? So everything we do should make their life better than what we, they had before. 464 00:48:18,579.7018836 --> 00:48:25,789.7018836 And yet so many UX people cannot talk about the experiences that they are improving in people's lives. 465 00:48:25,839.7018836 --> 00:48:29,679.7018836 People are getting more powerful because of your it's working, yes. 466 00:48:30,229.7018836 --> 00:48:30,459.7013836 Yeah. 467 00:48:30,459.7013836 --> 00:48:31,439.6018836 They're there. 468 00:48:31,439.7018836 --> 00:48:34,989.7018836 People are leading their organizations to success. 469 00:48:34,989.7018836 --> 00:48:38,829.7008836 They're able to talk about challenges that. 470 00:48:39,419.7018836 --> 00:48:43,699.7018836 They nobody else in the organization knew about. 471 00:48:43,959.7018836 --> 00:48:53,29.7018836 We have a big focus on metrics because it turns out that executive teams like to talk in terms of metrics. 472 00:48:53,29.7018836 --> 00:48:55,429.7013836 People think metrics has to do with numbers. 473 00:48:55,429.7013836 --> 00:48:58,679.7008836 It's not numbers, it's measuring change. 474 00:48:58,889.7008836 --> 00:49:00,979.7018836 And if we want to talk about how. 475 00:49:01,239.7018836 --> 00:49:03,309.7018836 We are improving people's lives. 476 00:49:03,459.7018836 --> 00:49:06,849.7018836 We have to be able to measure the change in their lives. 477 00:49:07,19.7018836 --> 00:49:08,869.7018836 And we have to show that at scale.. 478 00:49:09,369.7018836 --> 00:49:12,399.7018836 And so we spend a lot of time on metrics. 479 00:49:12,399.7018836 --> 00:49:22,579.7028836 We spend a lot of time on strategic research, which is completely reshifting from tactical research, which is 98 percent of the research that is done in the world today. 480 00:49:22,729.8028836 --> 00:49:28,789.7028836 But we shift to strategic research where what you're focused on are people's experiences. 481 00:49:29,19.7028836 --> 00:49:32,859.7018836 And instead of delivering insights, you focus on building expertise. 482 00:49:33,169.7028836 --> 00:49:43,459.7018836 You want your entire organization to be the world's foremost experts on who your users are, what your users need and what their current experiences are like. 483 00:49:43,589.7018836 --> 00:49:49,249.7028836 If your organization is not the expert in those things, you are seeding that. 484 00:49:49,489.7028836 --> 00:49:52,860.4012381 to your competitors the way, that's the one thing they can't catch up with. 485 00:49:53,0.4012381 --> 00:49:57,110.4022381 If you know your users better than they do, no one can catch, everybody can catch up with tech. 486 00:49:57,525.4022381 --> 00:49:59,599.7028836 No one can catch Exactly right. 487 00:50:00,385.4022381 --> 00:50:02,535.4022381 Okay, so we're down to the last minute here. 488 00:50:03,75.4022381 --> 00:50:16,345.4012381 I have about a thousand and twelve more arguments I want to have with you, but where I want to respect the time, but I am going to beg you to come back on, maybe in a month or two, to continue this conversation and continue talking about this as it evolves. 489 00:50:16,949.7028836 --> 00:50:21,360.4017381 Okay, I will not leave this spot until we do Okay, that's good to hear. 490 00:50:21,360.4017381 --> 00:50:24,609.7028836 You can grow a face weasel and we'll I could. 491 00:50:24,775.4022381 --> 00:50:25,415.4022381 expect to see that. 492 00:50:25,955.4022381 --> 00:50:33,315.4012381 So if you, any of you out there want to learn more about Leaders of Awesomeness, which you absolutely should you should go and we'll put the link out there. 493 00:50:33,345.4022381 --> 00:50:35,85.4022381 Think about joining one of the cohorts. 494 00:50:35,305.4022381 --> 00:50:47,435.4022381 If you put a question for Jared Spool into the comments on this podcast, I will hound him until he is sad, to answer that for you extra specially, so you can have it framed. 495 00:50:47,745.4022381 --> 00:50:49,425.4022381 If you'd like more information please. 496 00:50:49,665.4022381 --> 00:50:54,825.4022381 Subscribe to Corporate Underpants, leave a comment on Apple Podcasts, or visit me at Adlininc. 497 00:50:54,845.4022381 --> 00:51:01,255.4022381 com to learn more about maybe being a guest or recommending a guest or learning more about my own alignment process, Align Before Design. 498 00:51:01,645.4022381 --> 00:51:06,705.4012381 Jared, I love you with the passion of a thousand suns. 499 00:51:07,295.4022381 --> 00:51:07,745.4022381 Thank you. 500 00:51:08,195.4022381 --> 00:51:11,135.4032381 I, I love you second to my wife. 501 00:51:11,165.4032381 --> 00:51:12,251.1015927 How's Oh my God. 502 00:51:12,261.1015927 --> 00:51:14,551.1025927 That's pretty high up there, given that you have, all right, I'll take it. 503 00:51:15,181.1025927 --> 00:51:15,801.1025927 I'll take it. 504 00:51:15,801.1025927 --> 00:51:16,911.1025927 Thank you so much. 505 00:51:16,971.1025927 --> 00:51:18,231.1025927 And I'll talk to you again soon. 506 00:51:18,681.1025927 --> 00:51:19,541.1025927 would be lovely. 507 00:51:19,991.1025927 --> 00:51:21,96.8019472 I'll be right Okay. 508 00:51:21,596.8019472 --> 00:51:25,666.8019472 Thank you for joining me for another episode of corporate underpants, and there's lots more to come. 509 00:51:26,6.8009472 --> 00:51:30,916.8019472 If you have any projects that you need my help on, if you're interested in coaching to become a senior. 510 00:51:31,236.8019472 --> 00:51:40,186.8019472 Product leader through understanding alignment and politics, or if you're interested in any of the classes or books that I'm developing, please visit my website, adlininc. 511 00:51:40,776.8019472 --> 00:51:42,716.8019472 com and get in touch.