Design clarity through cadence: aligning podcasts, Substack, and a playbook for teams

Big changes, clearer focus, and more ways to learn together. We’re tightening our cadence to two episodes a month and building monthly themes that travel across the podcast, blog, and a new Substack home—so you can go beyond ideas and into practice with tools, Q&A, and live community sessions.

Here’s what’s new and why it matters. The podcast keeps its familiar format, but now each month has a focused theme that carries into Substack deep dives. Subscribers get comprehensive guides, open Q&A weeks where we answer your specific questions in the comments, and a one-hour live chat each month to pressure-test methods on real scenarios. It’s a smarter learning loop: listen, explore, apply—then come back with better questions. You’ll also get access to the strategy vault filled with templates, worksheets, and facilitation guides.

We’re also thrilled to announce the launch of Pierce the Design Fog, a practical playbook for product, engineering, and UX teams who need structure without losing speed or humanity. With models like the concept space and ADEPT framework, you’ll align cross-functional teams, turn insights into actionable design inputs, and make confident calls under uncertainty. There’s a companion card deck—Concept Quest: Design Discovery—that acts like a portable facilitator, with prompts and instructions to guide workshops. Pre-order before October 14, 2025, to enter the card deck giveaway and bring these methods straight into your team’s next session.

Subscribe to the show, check out the Substack at qualityduringdesign.substack.com, and leave a review to help more builders find us.

Are your teams struggling with poor communication and rushed timelines? Is your product vision clouded by a lack of clarity? It's time to find your way through the confusion and build products that truly resonate with users.

Introducing "Pierce the Design Fog" by Dianna Deeney, the essential guide to turning abstract ideas into high-quality products. This book offers a proven playbook with practical frameworks and tools to help you foster team synergy, lead with vision, and ma

JOIN ME ON SUBSTACK Subscribe today. Get themed Q&As, live chats, in-depth analysis, comprehensive guides, and access to my Strategy Vaults. Founding Member spots are open now.

PICK MY BRAIN Got a particular problem you’d like clarity on? Schedule a 60-minute virtual call with me - we’ll work through it together.

ENROLL IN MY COURSE FMEA in Practice: from Plan to Risk-Based Decision Making is enrolling now. Lifetime access, practical tools, and over 300 students already learning.

GET THE BOOK Pierce the Design Fog is your playbook for concept development to engineering design inputs.

VIEW MY OTHER SERVICES Visit my website to learn more.

ABOUT DIANNA
Dianna Deeney is a quality advocate for product development with over 25 years of experience in manufacturing. She is president of Deeney Enterprises, LLC, which helps organizations and people improve engineering design.

Episode Transcript

SPEAKER_00 (00:01):
Hello and welcome to Quality During Design, the place
to use quality thinking tocreate products others love for
less.
I'm your host, Diana Deaney.
I'm a senior level qualityprofessional and engineer with
over 20 years of experience inmanufacturing and design.
I consult with businesses andcoach individuals on how to

(00:21):
apply quality during design totheir processes.
Listen in and then join us.
Visit qualityderingdesign.com.
Hello, listener, I'm DianaDeaney.
This is a special updates andannouncements podcast episode
for Quality During Design.
Today is October 2nd, 2025.
If you're a longtime listener,you'll know that I rarely do

(00:44):
these kinds of episodes.
But this was a regularlyscheduled time for me to be
podcasting.
So if you're following thepodcast, you'd expect to get an
episode today.
And there are changes to thepodcast and some other things
with Quality During Design thatI wanted to let you know about
so that you're not surprised andyou know what to expect and you

(01:05):
know what other opportunitiesthere are for us to work
together.
Since you're listening to thepodcast, I'll tell you about the
podcast news first.
Right now, our podcast isbi-weekly, so every other week
there is a new podcast that'sdropped.
We're going to change this totwo podcasts per month.
That's not a huge change, but itis a change that I wanted to let

(01:27):
you know about.
The podcast topics and formatare going to be similar.
And I'll also continue to createblogs on my website.
So none of that is changing.
It's just the cadence of whenpodcasts are released.
When there are interviewepisodes, I'll likely treat them
as special episodes.
There may be a one-drop inaddition to the two per month

(01:49):
that I'll be releasing.
Now, why this change?
The change is because I'm goingto be switching to monthly
themed content.
Whatever we're covering on thepodcast is also going to be
covered in Substack.
So this is my second bit of newsfor today.
Existing subscribers know thatin September I moved away from

(02:11):
just email updates to Substack.
I've started to populate thingson Substack, and you can take a
look at it at quality duringdesign.substack.com.
Substack is going to allow us todo several things.
First, if you're a subscriber,you'll continue to get the
monthly digest and email, butthey're also cataloged in

(02:32):
Substack, so you can easily goback and view previous monthly
digests or posts.
You have a choice here.
You can continue to getnewsletters and emails, or you
can use the Substack app.
There's an app you can installon your phone, and there's also
a Substack website.
So in general, there aredifferent ways that you can
interact with the content thatI'm producing every month.

(02:54):
This move to Substack is alsogoing to allow me to do monthly
themed posts.
I will go deeper into thepodcast episode topics, and I'll
also include comprehensiveguides.
These guides are going to haveQA sessions to them.
So for one week out of themonth, I'll open comments on the
comprehensive guide or the deepdive episode, and we'll have QA

(03:18):
in the Substack comments.
You'll post a question and Iwill answer them in the comments
section.
And then you'll also have arecord of that.
As a subscriber, you can go backand take a look at the QA for
that post.
Substack will also allow us todo chats.
One hour per month, I'll have alive Substack chat to further

(03:39):
develop some of the strategiesfor the applications based on
the theme of the month.
This is why Substack is a goodmood for us.
It'll allow us to have themedmonthly content, allow us to go
a little deeper into thecontent, into actual application
and how-tos and strategies, andwe can use the Substack comments

(03:59):
and chat functions to be able todo this.
Subscribers on Substack willalso get access to my vaults.
These are worksheets, templates,strategic guides, all from my
work.
Some of them you can useimmediately, some of them you
can use to start planning.
And as we're developing thesemonthly themed content, I'll

(04:20):
keep adding to the vaults.
So the podcasts and the blogsand monthly digests remain free
and will largely remain thesame.
The Substack subscriptions arepaid subscriptions.
What you're paying for is theongoing mini consulting sessions
and services.
The subscriber fees pay for mytime and research tools to be

(04:44):
able to produce this contentwith you.
And it's a way that you can workwith me to get your questions
answered.
Since this is new, there's afounding member tier called the
Strategist Tier, which gives youaccess to the one hour chat, my
strategy vault, and savings onmy one-on-one Pick My Brain
sessions.
You can read more about allthese subscription levels on

(05:06):
quality during design.com slashabout and pick the one that's
best for you.
I look forward to seeing you onSubstack and working with and
interacting with you there.
Last but not least, October 15this the official launch date of
my new book, Pierce the DesignFog.

(05:27):
Develop high quality productsfaster through team innovation.
This is a practical playbookdesigned for professionals in
product design, engineering, anduser experience.
It will help you aligncross-functional teams for
better collaboration, prioritizeuser experiences to avoid costly
missteps, and transform insightsinto actionable design inputs.

(05:50):
I'm very pleased and honored toget an endorsement from Drew
Boyd, who is the co-author ofInside the Box.
Inside the Box has beentransformative for many teams
and companies that want to beinnovative.
Drew says, if you're seriousabout building better products,
Diana Deaney's book is a gamechanger.
With powerful tools like theconcept space model and adept

(06:14):
framework, she shows howcross-functional teams can
collaborate with purpose andclarity.
This is structured creativity atits best, practical, rigorous,
and deeply human.
A must-read for innovatorseverywhere.
You can pre-order Pierce theDesign Fog now.
When you pre-order by October14th, you can enter a giveaway

(06:36):
for a chance to win itscompanion card deck.
The card deck is titled ConceptQuest Design Discovery, and it's
a 52 card deck.
It just happened to work outthat way.
It helps you to execute on themethods in the book, especially
with the co-working sessions andworking with your team.
These cards can be used to helpyou plan out facilitation team

(06:58):
meetings.
You can also use them as guidesduring your team meetings to
help you keep on track with whatyou're supposed to be doing or
what kind of questions to askyour team.
There's a quick visual prompt onthe front, and on the reverse
side of the card are morespecific instructions if you
need them.
There's also cards that relateto prioritization methods that

(07:19):
you can share with your team tohelp them prioritize the ideas
that you're coming up with.
You can see more about the bookand the card deck at Piersthed
Designfog.com.
And you can enter the giveawayto win the card deck at
PierceThedesignfog.com slashgiveaway.
So that's what I wanted to sharewith you in this special updates

(07:41):
and announcements episode of theQuality During Design podcast.
There's been lots of activitieson the back end, and you'll be
seeing a lot more activity onSubstack in October.
Stay tuned for our October deepdive, which will be about design
decision making underuncertainty.
Ensure you subscribe so you caninteract with that QA and live

(08:02):
one-on-one sessions.
This has been a production ofDini Enterprises.
Thank you very much forlistening and continuing to be a
supporter of quality duringdesign.