Rosenfeld Review Podcast

The Lens of Language: authors Andy Welfle and Michael J. Metts on why Writing Is Designing

Order Writing Is Designing: https://rosenfeldmedia.com/books/writing-is-designing/
Michael Metts and Andy Welfle, authors of the new Rosenfeld Media book Writing Is Designing, get meta and discuss writing about UX writing with Lou Rosenfeld. They also stress the importance of looking through the “lens of language,” when solving problems – reworking your existing language to make things clear from the outset, rather than fixing problems by adding more copy later. Their book will help those responsible for digital copy communicate more effectively—from designers to marketers who might never have considered themselves “UX people.”
Andy Welfle and Michael J. Metts are the co-authors of the upcoming Rosenfeld Media title, Writing Is Designing, available January 14, 2020. Order Writing Is Designing: https://rosenfeldmedia.com/books/writing-is-designing/
What Andy’s reading: Strategic Writing for UX https://www.amazon.com/Strategic-Writing-Engagement-Conversion-Retention/dp/1492049395
What Michael’s reading: Content Strategy is Boring (and that’s okay) https://www.braintraffic.com/blog/content-strategy-is-boring-and-thats-ok

Silos, Chauvinism, and Insight: A discussion with Christian Madsbjerg

Christian Madsbjerg is the cofounder of ReD Associates, and author of Sensemaking: The Power of the Humanities in the Age of the Algorithm and The Moment of Clarity. We’re also so pleased to announce that he’ll be speaking at our inaugural Advancing Research conference (March 30-April 1 in NYC).
In this episode of Rosenfeld Review, Christian and Lou discuss the differences between social sciences research and data science, and the challenges that arise when organizations try to align them. Christian and Lou also touch on academic chauvinism, the shortcomings of anthropology (despite how much Christian appreciates the subject), and the importance of looking at “people as people.”
Register for Advancing Research 2020: https://rosenfeldmedia.com/advancing-research-2020/register/
Christian’s recommended reading: Radical Empiricism by William James and The Coddling of the American Mind: How Good Intentions and Bad Ideas Are Setting Up a Generation for Failure by Jonathan Haidt and Greg Lukianoff (the book is an expansion on an article of the same title which appeared in The Atlantic in 2015 https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2015/09/the-coddling-of-the-american-mind/399356/)
More about Christian:
In addition to working closely as an adviser to senior executives, Christian Madsbjerg writes, speaks, and teaches on the practical application of the human sciences in business. His work has been featured in publications such as The Wall Street Journal, Financial Times, The Washington Post, Der Spiegel, and Bloomberg Businessweek. His latest book, Sensemaking: The Power of the Humanities in the Age of the Algorithm, was published in the spring of 2017 by Hachette Book Group. His book The Moment of Clarity, co-written with ReD partner Mikkel B. Rasmussen and published by Harvard Business Press in the fall of 2014, has been translated into 15+ languages. Christian is currently teaching at The New School in New York City and working on a new book about the power of observation. He studied philosophy and political science in Copenhagen and London and has a Masters from the University of London.

Researching the Researchers: From 721 responses to 5 personas to a new conference

Four members of our Advancing Research curation team join Lou to discuss the research they did to help shape our inaugural Advancing Research conference (New York City; March 30-April 1, 2020). The team analyzed over 700 survey responses (including about 10,000 answers to open-ended questions!) to learn about user and customer researchers, their learning behaviors, and what they want from conference experiences. Read their summary of the results here: https://rosenfeldmedia.com/advancing-research-community/archive/who-does-research-and-how-do-they-learn/ ; you can also explore the study’s quantitative data yourself via Tableau: https://public.tableau.com/profile/lou.rosenfeld.rosenfeld.media#!/vizhome/WhoDoesResearchandHowDoTheyLearn/StoryDraft1
Podcast guests:
Abby Covert (principal investigator), Staff Information Architect at Etsy
Sean Oslin, Consultant at Aventine Hill Partners
Rocio Werner, Senior User Experience Researcher at ZS
Patricia Thommi, User Experience Researcher at ZS
The rest of the team:
Johan Sarmiento, Steve Portigal, Natalie Hanson, Lou Rosenfeld

The Bigger Picture: DesignOps Panel Discussion

Current Design and Research Operations practices face three huge, overarching challenges:
•Proving value and measuring outcomes
•Partnering outside design
•Change management
In this episode of Rosenfeld Review, four DesignOps and ResearchOps leaders—Jose Coronado, Crystal Yan, Guneet Singh, and Rachel Posman—tackle these challenges from a rich set of perspectives, ranging from heading up DesignOps at a large, long-established corporation like JP Morgan Chase, to launching a whole new department at a young company.
Panel Members:
•Jose Coronado, VP Design Operations | Head of DesignOps at JPMorgan Chase & Co.
•Rachel Posman, Head of Design Operations, UberEats
•Crystal Yan, Product Lead, New Initiatives, Remitly
•Guneet Singh, Director of Customer Experience Programs, Docusign

Amplify, Not Optimize: Dave Malouf Returns to Rosenfeld Review

Our closing keynoter at DesignOps 2019, Dave Malouf a veteran design leader, strategist, facilitator, researcher, and educator who has worked with some of the largest and fastest growing organizations globally. He was also one of the creators of the very first DesignOps Summit in 2017. Hear from him about the evolution of DesignOps, and his belief that we need a new framework that emphasizes the topline—the creation of value—over bottomline fixation on resource optimization. This new framing is at the root of DesignOps framework that Dave Malouf will share in his closing keynote. Get a taste of what’s in store for Dave’s keynote “Amplify, Not Optimize” at this year’s DesignOps Summit in New York City, October 23-25.
• Hear from Dave in his past appearance on Rosenfeld Review:
https://soundcloud.com/rosenfeld-media/malouf-podcast
• Follow Dave on Twitter: www.twitter.com/daveixd
• Dave’s shoutout: Harry Max, upcoming Rosenfeld Media author! Sign up for updates on his book “Prioritization” https://rosenfeldmedia.com/books/prioritization-book
... AND Kristin Skinner, who has been “a pioneer in putting theory to practice.”
•More about DesignOps Summit: https://rosenfeldmedia.com/designopssummit2019/

Operating Design Systems: Curating a Product, Serving Products with Nathan Curtis

Managing an effective design system program is a challenge. In his new workshop “Operating Design Systems” at this year’s DesignOps Summit (October 25), design systems guru Nathan Curtis will explore the operational topics that matter most: defining a system’s vision, forming a core team, scoping and making features, and communicating and contributing across a community. He’ll also zoom out, taking on higher-order challenges of multiple systems that overlap and conflict with one another, and the competition for capacity and attention that every system craves.
On this episode of Rosenfeld Review, you’ll get a taste of Nathan’s workshop on operating design systems. Learn more and register here: https://rosenfeldmedia.com/designopssummit2019/sessions/operating-design-systems-curating-a-product-serving-products/

Productive Discontent: a Conversation with Amy Thibodeau

Our opening keynoter at DesignOps 2019, Amy Thibodeau is a UX director at Shopify, where she’s responsible for UX Operations. In four years there, her role has changed dramatically, broadening from an initial focus on supporting content strategy. Hear her story, and get a taste of what’s in store for Amy’s keynote “Process and Ambiguity” at this year’s DesignOps Summit in New York City, October 23-25.
Follow Amy on Twitter: www.twitter.com/amythibodeau
More about Amy: https://rosenfeldmedia.com/designopssummit2019/speakers/amy-thibodeau/
Amy’s shoutout - Lara Hogan, author of Resilient Management https://larahogan.me/

Designing your Design Org with Kristin Skinner and Peter Merholz

Kristin Skinner and Peter Merholz, co-writers of Org Design for Design Orgs, are teaching a full day workshop at the DesignOps Summit this year. On this episode of the Rosenfeld Review, they discuss the career milestones that brought them to the realization that there was a book to be written about the challenges they faced when coordinating and managing across teams.
What Peter’s reading: Uday Gajendar’s “Rise of the Meta Designer” in Interactions Magazine https://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=3338285
What’s inspiring Kristin lately: Scott Berkun’s work http://scottberkun.com
More about the workshop:
As the move to establish in-house design teams accelerates, it turns out there’s very little common wisdom on what makes for a successful design organization. In their full day workshop at the DesignOps Summit on October 25 in New York City, Peter Merholz and Kristin Skinner will draw from their groundbreaking book Org Design for Design Orgs, and address this lacuna by shining a light on the unsung activities of actually running a design team, the organizational and operational challenges and considerations, and what works and what doesn’t.