March 29, 2022 • 24 mins
Al Lopez discusses their chapter Work Together to Create Include Products and provides tips on fostering a diverse work environment
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Episode Transcript
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Dan Berlin (00:14):
Hi everyone and welcome to another edition of
the 97 UX Things podcast. DanBerlin here, your host and book
editor. I'm joined this week byAl Lopez, who wrote the chapter
Work Together to CreateInclusive Products. Welcome Al.
Al Lopez (00:27):
Hey, Dan, nice to catch up with you.
Dan Berlin (00:30):
Yeah, likewise.
Thanks for joining the podcast.
Can you tell the folks listeninga little bit about yourself?
Al Lopez (00:37):
Yeah. Hi everyone. My name is Al Lopez, and I am an
experience and strategy designconsultant for a company here in
St. Louis. A fancy way of justsaying I do UX. I am
co-president of the St. Louisuser experience group where we
hold monthly meetings teachingfolks about what user experience
(00:59):
is and how to overcome barriers,get in the field, etc. I am also
queer non-binary, pronounsthey/them, proud Black Mexican.
In my spare time, I'm a fabricartist, dog parent, and student.
Dan Berlin (01:12):
Wonderful. Thanks for all of that. And do you tend
to focus on one area of UX overanother? Are you on the research
side? Design? Strategy? Content?
Where do you focus?
Al Lopez (01:23):
I would say my T-shape, my base is research.
But I'm more of a generalist atthis point. I off more on the
research, I actually have aPsych degree. I'm going back to
school now to get some of thosegraphic design things. So I
kinda am doing a little ofeverything. I'm trying to really
break into the strategy side.
That's what's been interestingmost, lately.
Dan Berlin (01:45):
Nice. As a researcher, who is very scared
of the visual design side I giveyou credit for for doing that.
And can you tell us about yourcareer journey? How did you
discover UX and how did you windup where you are today?
Al Lopez (02:01):
Yeah, so like I said, I have an undergraduate degree
in Psychology and I actuallydidn't discover what I wanted to
do until my senior year. I tookan industrial organizational
psychology course and fell inlove with it. IO Psych is the
psychology of business, the insand out. But that requires a
PhD, which I didn't see myfuture. So it just wasn't
(02:23):
feasible at the time. But one ofthe first jobs I had was for a
small IT company in St. Louis,right out of college. And they
had folks that did the hardwarework, but they didn't have
developers. I figured I would golearn some development so that
way I would be more valuable. Istarted through this local
nonprofit program called LaunchCode. And they actually teach
(02:45):
people without tech degrees, howto get into tech. But what I
found was that I really didn'tlike the coding side. And it was
just not my jam but I heardsomeone talk about UX and I was
like, oh my God, this combineseverything that I've always
wanted to do. It gave me thepsych perspectives of people and
having empathy and understandingpeople solutionize. But it also
(03:09):
gave me more like a rapidfeedback, we can go out and
discover if our product isn'tworking pretty easily. And so I
love that sort of rapidfeedback. And then combining the
business side as well justseemed like everything that I
was interested in. So I actuallyvolunteered for that speaker
said, hey, you know, I'm willingto do some free labor, I just
(03:32):
really want to shadow you andlearn about this. And he was an
individual that was working withcontractors and had his own
company, so someone saying freelabor sounds great. So it worked
out really good. I got to shadowsome research sessions for a
startup and I just fell in love.
It just felt so right. It is socrazy to me, because I went to a
(03:55):
liberal arts college, I had totry so many different sort of
things like running sound at aplay or doing economics courses
and nothing ever felt like, oh,I want to do this. It just kind
of felt like just getting thatgrade. But when I started
learning about UX, I felt like,no, this is where I belong. So
that's what happened for me.
Dan Berlin (04:19):
Great. And I love what you mentioned about
volunteering. That's somethingthat is great for folks who want
to break into the field. Andthere's no better way to not
only build your resume or buildthe experience, but just to
experience the UX field. Govolunteer and note take for
someone.
Al Lopez (04:40):
And even now, I'm five years into my career, and I
still find myself volunteeringsometimes. For instance, there's
a program in St. Louis that I'mhelping with to rebuild their
site. And I understand at thispoint that I could be getting
paid for my work, but thisprogram is just so important to
me that I think it's valuable tojust give back some of our time.
Dan Berlin (05:03):
Right.
Al Lopez (05:03):
So I still recommend that... not necessarily a full
on year-long project, but acouple consultation hours here
and there goes a long way.
Dan Berlin (05:13):
Yep. Yep. And to your point, it's so important to
remember that there's a finebalance between volunteering to
get experience and ensuring tobe paid for your work when
interning, for example. So folkswant to keep that in mind - you
don't want to over volunteerbecause there are opportunities
to ensure to get paid for yourwork.
Al Lopez (05:34):
Right.
Dan Berlin (05:35):
Great. Cool. So your chapter here Work Together to
Create Inclusive Products. Canyou tell us about that, please?
Al Lopez (05:44):
Yeah, so my chapter is all about why we need diverse
spaces, what that actuallymeans, and creating those
diverse spaces. And once youcreate those, how to keep those
diverse spaces.
Dan Berlin (05:57):
Great. So let's dig in there. Can you tell us about
creating and fostering thesespaces for folks?
Al Lopez (06:05):
Yep. So I think first what we have to dig into is just
what does diversity mean?
Because when we talk about somuch, you know, DEI practices
and things, so we don't dig intowhat that actually talks about,
people just think off the back,you know, race or gender. But
there's so many different sortsof diversity paths, gender,
ethnicity, can be culture, age,religion, sexual orientation,
ability, lived experiences. Andwe want to make sure we have
(06:28):
representatives of all of thosesort of areas. And when we're
creating those spaces, ways thatwe can do that is including
diversity in our recruitingpractices, whether that is our
hiring practices, our studiesand our designs, and questioning
those services. And there arepeople out there that can help
if company is struggling withrecruiting process. There are
(06:51):
people out there that can helptake a look at your recruiting
practices and help you to figureout how to reach more diverse
populations.
Dan Berlin (07:01):
Yep. That said, regarding hiring practices... so
first off on the participantside, folks can actually go
listen to Megan Campos'interview on the podcast,
because we talk about inclusiverecruiting practices there. How
about recruiting employees,though? How can in can companies
(07:22):
and people look beyond theirimmediate circles to ensure that
their practices are moreinclusive.
Al Lopez (07:29):
So a big thing is just getting the word out. I have had
a lot of folks come to me...
I've had a lot of minoritymothers come to me and say, hey,
my child is in tech, but had noidea that this program was going
on. People aren't even knowingthat the opportunities are out
there, so that's a problem. Onething that you can do is you can
reach out to your localnonprofit boot camps, or HBCUs,
(07:52):
or reach out to your blackstudent unions or different
clubs or organization. And agreat thing... I understand not
everyone has time for this, butif you do have time, a great
thing would be to offer somesort of mentorship from your
current employees to those.
That, to me, is a great way toget folks into the field. I know
(08:15):
for myself, I take on menteesand help them to get into the
field. And it's about buildingthose connections and helping
people to understand what'spossible. Sometimes folks don't
even know to apply to yourprogram, and that's a problem.
Dan Berlin (08:31):
That said, it's all about building those authentic
relationships outside yourcircles, not just looking
outside your circles, butbuilding those authentic
relationships. And you mentionedmentorship, that's one great
way. But what are some otherways that folks can can do this?
Al Lopez (08:47):
A way that you can do this is to just educate yourself
on diversity issues. Whetherthat's reading up on the issues,
listening to a podcast thatdepict lives and experiences
that are different from yours, Ilove to read. Attend your actual
diversity and inclusiontrainings in your organization,
and actually listen to them. Iknow for me, when I go to those
(09:10):
sort of circles, I'm alwaysfinding people willing to talk
more about their livedexperience or willing to share
what ways I can help them tolower those barriers that
they're having. And it's a goodthing to surround yourself with
people that don't look like you.
There's things such as MeetUp,where you can go and find
different groups to hang outwith. LinkedIn is a great thing
to network in or you have...
(09:34):
Local St. Louis created 28 Blackdesigners, you can look at
places like that.
Dan Berlin (09:40):
What about resources for individuals? So you
mentioned making sure that yougo to your company's training
and using resources availablethere but for folks out on their
own or for folks who don't havethat company backing? Are there
other specific resources orplaces folks can look at?
Al Lopez (09:59):
Yeah, so Harvard actually has a thing called
Implicit Bias and it's rightonline, it's called the Harvard
Project Implicit. If you Googlethat, it'll pull up and you can
take a short quiz and it doesn'tgo to anyone else, it's just to
you so there's no judgment. Butyou can get a start to see over
(10:21):
what are some biases that youhave. And from there, you can
start to realize how you canbreak some of those down. Ways
that you can do that areincrease in contact with people
who are different from you,noticing those positive examples
of minority groups that pop up,and then really work to avoid
that confirmation bias.
Confirmation bias is, youalready have a belief so when
you see things that affirm thatbelief, they pop up a little
(10:44):
more, than things that counterconfirm that belief. So you want
to think about and questionyourself. And this is something
all of us can do with variousthings. I know, for myself, I
had to do this with saying yestoo much. So I'd have to think
and stop when someone asked meto do something. Is it something
I actually have time for? Or isit gonna stress me out later? So
(11:06):
something you do is stop andthink, is this a true fact that
I'm thinking about this group?
Or is this something that's madeup?
Dan Berlin (11:16):
That's a great point, taking a look at one's
own biases are a key thing here.
You mentioned confirmation bias,but are there other ways that we
can be mindful of our biases andnotice them within our own
actions?
Al Lopez (11:32):
Yeah, so I think we all come with biases, it's just
part of the human condition.
It's not going to be good tospend time to feel shame about
it, you know, we all have them.
It's just better to confrontthose. So I think stopping and
pausing and seeing where thosethoughts come from. Or if you
have someone that is a close,trusted friend that has maybe a
(11:53):
mindset that you'd like to becloser with, maybe having
discussions with them, andasking them to help you work
through those. But we all havean opportunity to examine our
thoughts and decide what's trueand what's not. And sometimes,
what we're surrounded with,doesn't always allow us to have
a broader perspective. And soit's good to zoom out and see,
(12:15):
what do they say, see the forestinstead of seeing the tree. So,
I recommend that, get aroundmore diverse groups, get around
diversity of thought. For me,when I was in college, I went to
a school that mainly had folksfrom farm towns. And that was so
interesting for me coming fromsort of an inner city. But
(12:37):
getting to see that perspectivehelped me to understand why they
thought the way they did. And soI would recommend to other
people, switch up your circles,get learning, broaden your
opportunities, and make friends.
Dan Berlin (12:50):
Yeah. And one thing we as humans don't ask ourself
nearly enough is, why have Ireached this conclusion? Why
have I determined this is theanswer, if we started asking
ourselves that more, we canstart hopefully thinking about
our biases more.
Al Lopez (13:08):
And I would tell people to make sure you're
having grace with yourself. Weall have biases. So it's not a
time to have shame or be judgingyourself. It's the time to grow
and do better.
Dan Berlin (13:22):
Can you can you tell me a little bit more about that?
How can folks overcome that?
Because it's tough to overcomethese things that the folks may
have been thinking for a longtime and they have this
realization. How can how canthey move on?
Al Lopez (13:36):
For me, therapy has helped a lot, journaling, to be
honest. We're being real here,to be honest.
Dan Berlin (13:42):
Please.
Al Lopez (13:42):
But once you've gotten to a point where you've overcome
those biases, and you've becomea more complete human, and you
can look back on it, the journeyis really worth it. And you may
feel ashamed to start, it's hardto start change for anyone. But
Dan Berlin (13:54):
Yep. Great. Thanks for that. You also mentioned
once you're over that, not onlywill you become more enriched,
your experiences will becomemore enriched, your circles will
be more enriched, and you'llhave a richer life. So I think
it's better to just focus onwhere the end goals are and
understanding that we're all inthe journey. No one's perfect,
(14:17):
but we'll get there.
places where folks can look toincrease their circles to be
surrounded by folks who lookdifferent than them. And you
mentioned student unions andhistorically black colleges. I
know NSBE, the National Societyof Black Engineers, does some
(14:40):
great work. Any other placeswhere folks could be looking
into to form those authenticconnections?
Al Lopez (14:48):
I would totally use the internet to find what's
there. I have a friend that assoon as the pandemic hit and all
the UX meetings started goingonline, she attended meetings
all over the world, like allover. And that's something
that's so easy. We have a phonein our hand, we have a phone in
(15:10):
our pocket at all times usuallycan easily Google events that
are happening, or maybedifferent things that you're
interested in. For example,there's a meetup.com, which
sometimes I go to a Spanishspeaking group. I'm not good at
speaking Spanish, but I like tosurround myself with more
experiences, so I will go tothat. And that is a wide range
(15:34):
of people. So I suggest thingslike that, or networking through
on LinkedIn, or just looking atdifferent events or things that
are coming up. In St. Louis, wehave a lot of different
festivals, for instance, likeInternational Festival, the
Hispanic festival, we have thosewhere you can go and experience
those cultures. I'm sure lots ofother folks have things as well,
if you just put a littleresearch in.
Dan Berlin (15:55):
Yep, I guess we are kind of lucky in this pandemic
world, and that there are a lotmore of these virtual events
popping up, which allow us toparticipate more.
Al Lopez (16:05):
For one of our events coming up, we have someone
speaking from Poland, which isso great, because when would we
ever be able to get someone thatinternational without paying a
bunch of money?
Dan Berlin (16:16):
Right, right.
Something you and I have chattedabout in the past is creating a
safe space for discussion andfor expressing views. I wanted
to ask you a little bit aboutthat. In terms of whether folks
are at a small organization at alarger one, what are some of the
steps that folks can take forcreating those safe spaces?
Al Lopez (16:41):
I would say, first tackling some of those biases
within yourself. And if you'renoticing it within others, speak
on those. All of us can help.
And you may not know the powerthat you have when you're
speaking on those, someone maynot know that it's not
acceptable to speak up and youspeaking up helps a less
privileged person. And also wecan go through is understand
(17:03):
that in order to have thosediverse teams and cultures, you
have to actually make space forthose people, you have to allow
them to have a voice in yourteam, you have to allow them to
grow. And you also have to havepositions for them to advance
up. Lots of times what willhappen with companies is they
will get the diverse hires in,but they create no growth
opportunity for them, or no wayfor them to get leadership
(17:25):
positions, etc, etc. And sothose diverse populations will
leave for other places just getopportunity.
Dan Berlin (17:33):
Right. Just because you're hiring a diverse set of
folks, doesn't mean that yourcompany is diverse. Often
enough, it's the same folksleading and we need to find ways
to to alleviate that.
Al Lopez (17:49):
And it definitely...
it takes all of us. So just lookaround and notice and see what
things are like and we all haveways that we can help and
assist. For instance, one of thethings that I do is if I hear
that there's some job openings,I will post in my local groups
and things. So folks will knowlike, oh, there's there's some
openings up that I can apply tojust help out.
Dan Berlin (18:13):
What about the naysayers? You know, let's say
you're in a meeting and all ofyour personas are just the
typical names that we deal withand, and we want to try to make
them more diverse to speak to alarger audience and you have
some naysayers. How do we dealwith that?
Al Lopez (18:32):
So I understand that there will always be naysayers.
But if we're being honest, thisis really the ethical thing to
do. And past ethics, if we wantto get past just being a good
human, it really increasescompany's profit margins when
you increase diversity.
According to Forbes, diversecompanies actually produced 19%
(18:53):
more revenue in comparison tonon diverse companies.
Dan Berlin (18:58):
Yup.
Al Lopez (18:59):
And then having those diverse teams are going to
create diverse solutions with adifferent diversity of thought,
and create just overall betterproducts that are going to work
for more people. And thatdiversity of thought that's
going to come from that is goingto work for more users, which
again, leads to more profits.
And if we're not wanting to getinto ethics, money's talks. But
I do really believe that as UXprofessionals, we have to be
(19:22):
advocates for diversity to begood at our job. We want our
products to work for as manyfolks as possible.
Dan Berlin (19:29):
100% Thank you for that. You also mentioned boot
camps as a place to look forfolks because we want to make
sure that we are open to hiringfolks with different
experiences, right? But thereare so many boot camps out
there, especially these days,professing to make you a UXer in
a week for example. How do weknow which are the ones you know
(19:53):
where people are coming out fromboot camps ready to go for real?
Al Lopez (19:57):
I would say offer those folks apprenticeships,
internships, to give you a wayto determine if they're right
for your company or not. I dobelieve that you do have to take
a risk on folks. You might bethat one that gives that one
person a chance that no one elsewould give them a chance they
really deserve to be in thefield. So there's a local
(20:20):
nonprofit here in St. Louiscalled Launch Code, and I
actually went through them toget into the field. And after
your educational part of theprogram, they'll do a
three-month to six-monthapprenticeship where you can see
if you like the company and thecompany likes you. But it's
paid. So that's what I wouldsay, is to try to have a paid
(20:41):
because what you're askingpeople to do is arrange their
life. I understand that thisisn't available for everyone. So
if that's not the case, I wouldsay do more in depth interviews,
looking over their work, seeingwhat it is that they've done so
far in the field, those sort ofthings. But if at all possible,
I would say internships,apprenticeships.
Dan Berlin (21:01):
What a great idea.
Apprenticeship is almost not inour vocabulary here, at least in
America. What a wonderful way totry something to understand if
it works in both directions.
That's something that justdoesn't happen here. So Al, it's
been a great conversation. Isthere anything else about your
chapter that you were hoping toconvey here today?
Al Lopez (21:22):
Yeah, I would say all of us can address the systematic
issues that are existing in theworkplace. Those of us in a
position of privilege owe it toour UX cousins. If you see
something speak up. And forinstance, if your job only hires
people of a certain skin tone,ask why. If your job is not
releasing its diversitystatistics, there's probably a
(21:45):
reason for that, so look intothat. And then also to think
about who it is that you'reallowing to have privilege. And
what I mean by that is, when itcomes time to recommend folks
for a job, are you onlyrecommending a certain kind of
people? And that, for instance,could be only men, only white
people, only college educatedpeople, only people 30 and
(22:09):
younger? Any sort of thosethings, we have to broaden our
circles.
Dan Berlin (22:16):
Absolutely.
Absolutely. Thank you for all ofthat. This has been very helpful
and interesting. In our finalmoments here, we love getting a
piece of career advice. Do youhave a piece of advice you can
give for folks either breakinginto the field or who have been
around for a while?
Al Lopez (22:31):
Yes, one of my favorite pieces of advice is to
always negotiate. When I wasfirst starting out, I actually
got some really bad advice froman old mentor that told me to
just be grateful for getting myfirst job in UX.
Dan Berlin (22:45):
Oh wow.
Al Lopez (22:46):
To not negotiate for fear that they would be offended
of that. Well, now that I'molder, I know that's not true at
all. And it's actually supercommon to negotiate. And the
worst thing that will happen isthey'll just say no, but you'll
still at least have a job offer.
So from there, you can decidewhether or not you want it, but
they won't take the offer back.
So it's always great tonegotiate, it's common practice
(23:10):
in the field. It may feeldifficult to do at first, but
you can roleplay with friends ormentor to help you get through
that. Or you can definitelywrite out what you want to say
beforehand. But I would say getpaid, get paid.
Dan Berlin (23:23):
Absolutely. That is a wonderful piece of advice.
Always negotiate, because itdoesn't hurt to ask. Great. So
Al, this has been a wonderfulconversation. Thank you so much
for joining me here today.
Al Lopez (23:34):
Thank you for having me, Dan. This has been great.
Dan Berlin (23:37):
My guest today has been Al Lopez who wrote the
chapter Work Together to CreateInclusive Products. Thanks for
listening, everyone.
Al Lopez (23:44):
Thank you, everyone.
Dan Berlin (23:45):
You've been listening to the 97 UX things
podcast companion to the book 97Things Every UX Practitioner
Should Know published byO'Reilly and available at your
local bookshop. All bookroyalties go to UX nonprofits as
well any funds raised by thispodcast. The theme music is
Moisturize the Situation byConsider the Source and I'm your
(24:06):
host and book editor Dan Berlin.
Please remember to find theneeds in your community and fill
them with your best work. Thanksfor listening.
Hi everyone and welcome to another edition of
the 97 UX Things podcast. DanBerlin here, your host and book
editor. I'm joined this week byAl Lopez, who wrote the chapter
Work Together to CreateInclusive Products. Welcome Al.
Al Lopez (00:27):
Hey, Dan, nice to catch up with you.
Dan Berlin (00:30):
Yeah, likewise.
Thanks for joining the podcast.
Can you tell the folks listeninga little bit about yourself?
Al Lopez (00:37):
Yeah. Hi everyone. My name is Al Lopez, and I am an
experience and strategy designconsultant for a company here in
St. Louis. A fancy way of justsaying I do UX. I am
co-president of the St. Louisuser experience group where we
hold monthly meetings teachingfolks about what user experience
(00:59):
is and how to overcome barriers,get in the field, etc. I am also
queer non-binary, pronounsthey/them, proud Black Mexican.
In my spare time, I'm a fabricartist, dog parent, and student.
Dan Berlin (01:12):
Wonderful. Thanks for all of that. And do you tend
to focus on one area of UX overanother? Are you on the research
side? Design? Strategy? Content?
Where do you focus?
Al Lopez (01:23):
I would say my T-shape, my base is research.
But I'm more of a generalist atthis point. I off more on the
research, I actually have aPsych degree. I'm going back to
school now to get some of thosegraphic design things. So I
kinda am doing a little ofeverything. I'm trying to really
break into the strategy side.
That's what's been interestingmost, lately.
Dan Berlin (01:45):
Nice. As a researcher, who is very scared
of the visual design side I giveyou credit for for doing that.
And can you tell us about yourcareer journey? How did you
discover UX and how did you windup where you are today?
Al Lopez (02:01):
Yeah, so like I said, I have an undergraduate degree
in Psychology and I actuallydidn't discover what I wanted to
do until my senior year. I tookan industrial organizational
psychology course and fell inlove with it. IO Psych is the
psychology of business, the insand out. But that requires a
PhD, which I didn't see myfuture. So it just wasn't
(02:23):
feasible at the time. But one ofthe first jobs I had was for a
small IT company in St. Louis,right out of college. And they
had folks that did the hardwarework, but they didn't have
developers. I figured I would golearn some development so that
way I would be more valuable. Istarted through this local
nonprofit program called LaunchCode. And they actually teach
(02:45):
people without tech degrees, howto get into tech. But what I
found was that I really didn'tlike the coding side. And it was
just not my jam but I heardsomeone talk about UX and I was
like, oh my God, this combineseverything that I've always
wanted to do. It gave me thepsych perspectives of people and
having empathy and understandingpeople solutionize. But it also
(03:09):
gave me more like a rapidfeedback, we can go out and
discover if our product isn'tworking pretty easily. And so I
love that sort of rapidfeedback. And then combining the
business side as well justseemed like everything that I
was interested in. So I actuallyvolunteered for that speaker
said, hey, you know, I'm willingto do some free labor, I just
(03:32):
really want to shadow you andlearn about this. And he was an
individual that was working withcontractors and had his own
company, so someone saying freelabor sounds great. So it worked
out really good. I got to shadowsome research sessions for a
startup and I just fell in love.
It just felt so right. It is socrazy to me, because I went to a
(03:55):
liberal arts college, I had totry so many different sort of
things like running sound at aplay or doing economics courses
and nothing ever felt like, oh,I want to do this. It just kind
of felt like just getting thatgrade. But when I started
learning about UX, I felt like,no, this is where I belong. So
that's what happened for me.
Dan Berlin (04:19):
Great. And I love what you mentioned about
volunteering. That's somethingthat is great for folks who want
to break into the field. Andthere's no better way to not
only build your resume or buildthe experience, but just to
experience the UX field. Govolunteer and note take for
someone.
Al Lopez (04:40):
And even now, I'm five years into my career, and I
still find myself volunteeringsometimes. For instance, there's
a program in St. Louis that I'mhelping with to rebuild their
site. And I understand at thispoint that I could be getting
paid for my work, but thisprogram is just so important to
me that I think it's valuable tojust give back some of our time.
Dan Berlin (05:03):
Right.
Al Lopez (05:03):
So I still recommend that... not necessarily a full
on year-long project, but acouple consultation hours here
and there goes a long way.
Dan Berlin (05:13):
Yep. Yep. And to your point, it's so important to
remember that there's a finebalance between volunteering to
get experience and ensuring tobe paid for your work when
interning, for example. So folkswant to keep that in mind - you
don't want to over volunteerbecause there are opportunities
to ensure to get paid for yourwork.
Al Lopez (05:34):
Right.
Dan Berlin (05:35):
Great. Cool. So your chapter here Work Together to
Create Inclusive Products. Canyou tell us about that, please?
Al Lopez (05:44):
Yeah, so my chapter is all about why we need diverse
spaces, what that actuallymeans, and creating those
diverse spaces. And once youcreate those, how to keep those
diverse spaces.
Dan Berlin (05:57):
Great. So let's dig in there. Can you tell us about
creating and fostering thesespaces for folks?
Al Lopez (06:05):
Yep. So I think first what we have to dig into is just
what does diversity mean?
Because when we talk about somuch, you know, DEI practices
and things, so we don't dig intowhat that actually talks about,
people just think off the back,you know, race or gender. But
there's so many different sortsof diversity paths, gender,
ethnicity, can be culture, age,religion, sexual orientation,
ability, lived experiences. Andwe want to make sure we have
(06:28):
representatives of all of thosesort of areas. And when we're
creating those spaces, ways thatwe can do that is including
diversity in our recruitingpractices, whether that is our
hiring practices, our studiesand our designs, and questioning
those services. And there arepeople out there that can help
if company is struggling withrecruiting process. There are
(06:51):
people out there that can helptake a look at your recruiting
practices and help you to figureout how to reach more diverse
populations.
Dan Berlin (07:01):
Yep. That said, regarding hiring practices... so
first off on the participantside, folks can actually go
listen to Megan Campos'interview on the podcast,
because we talk about inclusiverecruiting practices there. How
about recruiting employees,though? How can in can companies
(07:22):
and people look beyond theirimmediate circles to ensure that
their practices are moreinclusive.
Al Lopez (07:29):
So a big thing is just getting the word out. I have had
a lot of folks come to me...
I've had a lot of minoritymothers come to me and say, hey,
my child is in tech, but had noidea that this program was going
on. People aren't even knowingthat the opportunities are out
there, so that's a problem. Onething that you can do is you can
reach out to your localnonprofit boot camps, or HBCUs,
(07:52):
or reach out to your blackstudent unions or different
clubs or organization. And agreat thing... I understand not
everyone has time for this, butif you do have time, a great
thing would be to offer somesort of mentorship from your
current employees to those.
That, to me, is a great way toget folks into the field. I know
(08:15):
for myself, I take on menteesand help them to get into the
field. And it's about buildingthose connections and helping
people to understand what'spossible. Sometimes folks don't
even know to apply to yourprogram, and that's a problem.
Dan Berlin (08:31):
That said, it's all about building those authentic
relationships outside yourcircles, not just looking
outside your circles, butbuilding those authentic
relationships. And you mentionedmentorship, that's one great
way. But what are some otherways that folks can can do this?
Al Lopez (08:47):
A way that you can do this is to just educate yourself
on diversity issues. Whetherthat's reading up on the issues,
listening to a podcast thatdepict lives and experiences
that are different from yours, Ilove to read. Attend your actual
diversity and inclusiontrainings in your organization,
and actually listen to them. Iknow for me, when I go to those
(09:10):
sort of circles, I'm alwaysfinding people willing to talk
more about their livedexperience or willing to share
what ways I can help them tolower those barriers that
they're having. And it's a goodthing to surround yourself with
people that don't look like you.
There's things such as MeetUp,where you can go and find
different groups to hang outwith. LinkedIn is a great thing
to network in or you have...
(09:34):
Local St. Louis created 28 Blackdesigners, you can look at
places like that.
Dan Berlin (09:40):
What about resources for individuals? So you
mentioned making sure that yougo to your company's training
and using resources availablethere but for folks out on their
own or for folks who don't havethat company backing? Are there
other specific resources orplaces folks can look at?
Al Lopez (09:59):
Yeah, so Harvard actually has a thing called
Implicit Bias and it's rightonline, it's called the Harvard
Project Implicit. If you Googlethat, it'll pull up and you can
take a short quiz and it doesn'tgo to anyone else, it's just to
you so there's no judgment. Butyou can get a start to see over
(10:21):
what are some biases that youhave. And from there, you can
start to realize how you canbreak some of those down. Ways
that you can do that areincrease in contact with people
who are different from you,noticing those positive examples
of minority groups that pop up,and then really work to avoid
that confirmation bias.
Confirmation bias is, youalready have a belief so when
you see things that affirm thatbelief, they pop up a little
(10:44):
more, than things that counterconfirm that belief. So you want
to think about and questionyourself. And this is something
all of us can do with variousthings. I know, for myself, I
had to do this with saying yestoo much. So I'd have to think
and stop when someone asked meto do something. Is it something
I actually have time for? Or isit gonna stress me out later? So
(11:06):
something you do is stop andthink, is this a true fact that
I'm thinking about this group?
Or is this something that's madeup?
Dan Berlin (11:16):
That's a great point, taking a look at one's
own biases are a key thing here.
You mentioned confirmation bias,but are there other ways that we
can be mindful of our biases andnotice them within our own
actions?
Al Lopez (11:32):
Yeah, so I think we all come with biases, it's just
part of the human condition.
It's not going to be good tospend time to feel shame about
it, you know, we all have them.
It's just better to confrontthose. So I think stopping and
pausing and seeing where thosethoughts come from. Or if you
have someone that is a close,trusted friend that has maybe a
(11:53):
mindset that you'd like to becloser with, maybe having
discussions with them, andasking them to help you work
through those. But we all havean opportunity to examine our
thoughts and decide what's trueand what's not. And sometimes,
what we're surrounded with,doesn't always allow us to have
a broader perspective. And soit's good to zoom out and see,
(12:15):
what do they say, see the forestinstead of seeing the tree. So,
I recommend that, get aroundmore diverse groups, get around
diversity of thought. For me,when I was in college, I went to
a school that mainly had folksfrom farm towns. And that was so
interesting for me coming fromsort of an inner city. But
(12:37):
getting to see that perspectivehelped me to understand why they
thought the way they did. And soI would recommend to other
people, switch up your circles,get learning, broaden your
opportunities, and make friends.
Dan Berlin (12:50):
Yeah. And one thing we as humans don't ask ourself
nearly enough is, why have Ireached this conclusion? Why
have I determined this is theanswer, if we started asking
ourselves that more, we canstart hopefully thinking about
our biases more.
Al Lopez (13:08):
And I would tell people to make sure you're
having grace with yourself. Weall have biases. So it's not a
time to have shame or be judgingyourself. It's the time to grow
and do better.
Dan Berlin (13:22):
Can you can you tell me a little bit more about that?
How can folks overcome that?
Because it's tough to overcomethese things that the folks may
have been thinking for a longtime and they have this
realization. How can how canthey move on?
Al Lopez (13:36):
For me, therapy has helped a lot, journaling, to be
honest. We're being real here,to be honest.
Dan Berlin (13:42):
Please.
Al Lopez (13:42):
But once you've gotten to a point where you've overcome
those biases, and you've becomea more complete human, and you
can look back on it, the journeyis really worth it. And you may
feel ashamed to start, it's hardto start change for anyone. But
Dan Berlin (13:54):
Yep. Great. Thanks for that. You also mentioned
once you're over that, not onlywill you become more enriched,
your experiences will becomemore enriched, your circles will
be more enriched, and you'llhave a richer life. So I think
it's better to just focus onwhere the end goals are and
understanding that we're all inthe journey. No one's perfect,
(14:17):
but we'll get there.
places where folks can look toincrease their circles to be
surrounded by folks who lookdifferent than them. And you
mentioned student unions andhistorically black colleges. I
know NSBE, the National Societyof Black Engineers, does some
(14:40):
great work. Any other placeswhere folks could be looking
into to form those authenticconnections?
Al Lopez (14:48):
I would totally use the internet to find what's
there. I have a friend that assoon as the pandemic hit and all
the UX meetings started goingonline, she attended meetings
all over the world, like allover. And that's something
that's so easy. We have a phonein our hand, we have a phone in
(15:10):
our pocket at all times usuallycan easily Google events that
are happening, or maybedifferent things that you're
interested in. For example,there's a meetup.com, which
sometimes I go to a Spanishspeaking group. I'm not good at
speaking Spanish, but I like tosurround myself with more
experiences, so I will go tothat. And that is a wide range
(15:34):
of people. So I suggest thingslike that, or networking through
on LinkedIn, or just looking atdifferent events or things that
are coming up. In St. Louis, wehave a lot of different
festivals, for instance, likeInternational Festival, the
Hispanic festival, we have thosewhere you can go and experience
those cultures. I'm sure lots ofother folks have things as well,
if you just put a littleresearch in.
Dan Berlin (15:55):
Yep, I guess we are kind of lucky in this pandemic
world, and that there are a lotmore of these virtual events
popping up, which allow us toparticipate more.
Al Lopez (16:05):
For one of our events coming up, we have someone
speaking from Poland, which isso great, because when would we
ever be able to get someone thatinternational without paying a
bunch of money?
Dan Berlin (16:16):
Right, right.
Something you and I have chattedabout in the past is creating a
safe space for discussion andfor expressing views. I wanted
to ask you a little bit aboutthat. In terms of whether folks
are at a small organization at alarger one, what are some of the
steps that folks can take forcreating those safe spaces?
Al Lopez (16:41):
I would say, first tackling some of those biases
within yourself. And if you'renoticing it within others, speak
on those. All of us can help.
And you may not know the powerthat you have when you're
speaking on those, someone maynot know that it's not
acceptable to speak up and youspeaking up helps a less
privileged person. And also wecan go through is understand
(17:03):
that in order to have thosediverse teams and cultures, you
have to actually make space forthose people, you have to allow
them to have a voice in yourteam, you have to allow them to
grow. And you also have to havepositions for them to advance
up. Lots of times what willhappen with companies is they
will get the diverse hires in,but they create no growth
opportunity for them, or no wayfor them to get leadership
(17:25):
positions, etc, etc. And sothose diverse populations will
leave for other places just getopportunity.
Dan Berlin (17:33):
Right. Just because you're hiring a diverse set of
folks, doesn't mean that yourcompany is diverse. Often
enough, it's the same folksleading and we need to find ways
to to alleviate that.
Al Lopez (17:49):
And it definitely...
it takes all of us. So just lookaround and notice and see what
things are like and we all haveways that we can help and
assist. For instance, one of thethings that I do is if I hear
that there's some job openings,I will post in my local groups
and things. So folks will knowlike, oh, there's there's some
openings up that I can apply tojust help out.
Dan Berlin (18:13):
What about the naysayers? You know, let's say
you're in a meeting and all ofyour personas are just the
typical names that we deal withand, and we want to try to make
them more diverse to speak to alarger audience and you have
some naysayers. How do we dealwith that?
Al Lopez (18:32):
So I understand that there will always be naysayers.
But if we're being honest, thisis really the ethical thing to
do. And past ethics, if we wantto get past just being a good
human, it really increasescompany's profit margins when
you increase diversity.
According to Forbes, diversecompanies actually produced 19%
(18:53):
more revenue in comparison tonon diverse companies.
Dan Berlin (18:58):
Yup.
Al Lopez (18:59):
And then having those diverse teams are going to
create diverse solutions with adifferent diversity of thought,
and create just overall betterproducts that are going to work
for more people. And thatdiversity of thought that's
going to come from that is goingto work for more users, which
again, leads to more profits.
And if we're not wanting to getinto ethics, money's talks. But
I do really believe that as UXprofessionals, we have to be
(19:22):
advocates for diversity to begood at our job. We want our
products to work for as manyfolks as possible.
Dan Berlin (19:29):
100% Thank you for that. You also mentioned boot
camps as a place to look forfolks because we want to make
sure that we are open to hiringfolks with different
experiences, right? But thereare so many boot camps out
there, especially these days,professing to make you a UXer in
a week for example. How do weknow which are the ones you know
(19:53):
where people are coming out fromboot camps ready to go for real?
Al Lopez (19:57):
I would say offer those folks apprenticeships,
internships, to give you a wayto determine if they're right
for your company or not. I dobelieve that you do have to take
a risk on folks. You might bethat one that gives that one
person a chance that no one elsewould give them a chance they
really deserve to be in thefield. So there's a local
(20:20):
nonprofit here in St. Louiscalled Launch Code, and I
actually went through them toget into the field. And after
your educational part of theprogram, they'll do a
three-month to six-monthapprenticeship where you can see
if you like the company and thecompany likes you. But it's
paid. So that's what I wouldsay, is to try to have a paid
(20:41):
because what you're askingpeople to do is arrange their
life. I understand that thisisn't available for everyone. So
if that's not the case, I wouldsay do more in depth interviews,
looking over their work, seeingwhat it is that they've done so
far in the field, those sort ofthings. But if at all possible,
I would say internships,apprenticeships.
Dan Berlin (21:01):
What a great idea.
Apprenticeship is almost not inour vocabulary here, at least in
America. What a wonderful way totry something to understand if
it works in both directions.
That's something that justdoesn't happen here. So Al, it's
been a great conversation. Isthere anything else about your
chapter that you were hoping toconvey here today?
Al Lopez (21:22):
Yeah, I would say all of us can address the systematic
issues that are existing in theworkplace. Those of us in a
position of privilege owe it toour UX cousins. If you see
something speak up. And forinstance, if your job only hires
people of a certain skin tone,ask why. If your job is not
releasing its diversitystatistics, there's probably a
(21:45):
reason for that, so look intothat. And then also to think
about who it is that you'reallowing to have privilege. And
what I mean by that is, when itcomes time to recommend folks
for a job, are you onlyrecommending a certain kind of
people? And that, for instance,could be only men, only white
people, only college educatedpeople, only people 30 and
(22:09):
younger? Any sort of thosethings, we have to broaden our
circles.
Dan Berlin (22:16):
Absolutely.
Absolutely. Thank you for all ofthat. This has been very helpful
and interesting. In our finalmoments here, we love getting a
piece of career advice. Do youhave a piece of advice you can
give for folks either breakinginto the field or who have been
around for a while?
Al Lopez (22:31):
Yes, one of my favorite pieces of advice is to
always negotiate. When I wasfirst starting out, I actually
got some really bad advice froman old mentor that told me to
just be grateful for getting myfirst job in UX.
Dan Berlin (22:45):
Oh wow.
Al Lopez (22:46):
To not negotiate for fear that they would be offended
of that. Well, now that I'molder, I know that's not true at
all. And it's actually supercommon to negotiate. And the
worst thing that will happen isthey'll just say no, but you'll
still at least have a job offer.
So from there, you can decidewhether or not you want it, but
they won't take the offer back.
So it's always great tonegotiate, it's common practice
(23:10):
in the field. It may feeldifficult to do at first, but
you can roleplay with friends ormentor to help you get through
that. Or you can definitelywrite out what you want to say
beforehand. But I would say getpaid, get paid.
Dan Berlin (23:23):
Absolutely. That is a wonderful piece of advice.
Always negotiate, because itdoesn't hurt to ask. Great. So
Al, this has been a wonderfulconversation. Thank you so much
for joining me here today.
Al Lopez (23:34):
Thank you for having me, Dan. This has been great.
Dan Berlin (23:37):
My guest today has been Al Lopez who wrote the
chapter Work Together to CreateInclusive Products. Thanks for
listening, everyone.
Al Lopez (23:44):
Thank you, everyone.
Dan Berlin (23:45):
You've been listening to the 97 UX things
podcast companion to the book 97Things Every UX Practitioner
Should Know published byO'Reilly and available at your
local bookshop. All bookroyalties go to UX nonprofits as
well any funds raised by thispodcast. The theme music is
Moisturize the Situation byConsider the Source and I'm your
(24:06):
host and book editor Dan Berlin.
Please remember to find theneeds in your community and fill
them with your best work. Thanksfor listening.
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