Often times we think of our UX Deliverables as a checkbox or a level to pass. It’s in those situations you need to remind yourself of why that checkbox exists. Understanding the value of our deliverables starts with knowing what the deliverables are, and the value they can bring to the table.
Ana Santos is passionate about these deliverables, and on today’s episode, she’s going to coach you through how to make the most of them. Specifically, we will take a look at our portfolio case studies, and understand the value of each step along the process.
Ana’s background in UX Design is strong and includes a contract role with Google in her early career. Give this episode of Designed Today a listen and learn how you can strengthen your portfolio and case studies by understanding the value of your deliverables.
You can find and connect with Ana here:
Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/anaux/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ux.by.ana/
Website: https://ana-santos.com/
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Dillon Winspear: [00:00:00]
Let’s talk about our UX deliverables. What are they? How can we best showcase them?
Dillon Winspear: [00:00:13]
Hey friends, welcome back to design today. I’m your host, Dillon Winspear. Today I get to introduce you to one of my new friends Ana Santos. You can find her on LinkedIn and also on Instagram via @uxbyana, and that link will be in the show notes. Ana has had some awesome experiences in her career already, including an early contract role with Google. Today she coaches designers and consults for larger organizations on best practices around UX. Before we get into this episode, just a quick plug to remind you that design today is craving to have you join our slack community. Come join some 200+ designers who’ve found their way to share ideas that help each other out to receive your invite head to designtoday.com/community. There you will fill out a form and you’ll receive your slack email invitation right afterwards. I hope to hear from you soon. Come and join us. Now if you’re ready, let’s get into this episode with Ana Santos. Anna, thank you for joining me on the show. I appreciate your time, especially since our times are very different. You’re on the other side of the world for me. So thank you for joining.
Ana Santos: [00:01:19]
What is it all? Yeah, it’s a pleasure. Thank you. I reached
Dillon Winspear: [00:01:22]
I reach out to you. After following you on Instagram for quite some time. You’ve built a great UX following on Instagram and for those who are listening and they want to find it, I’ll leave the links everything that they can find in the show notes. But you’ve built something pretty amazing on Instagram and something that I’ve been following and admiring for a while now. And I really appreciate your willingness just to jump on here and say, yeah, I’m willing to do a podcast with you. So thank you.
Ana Santos: [00:01:52]
Thanks.
Dillon Winspear: [00:01:55]
Oh, absolutely. And I’m going to encourage those who aren’t following you to do so. We were able to chat last week and kind of get to know each other a little bit. But I want to give you an opportunity to introduce yourself, tell a little bit about your background, and help the listeners know why they should care what Ana has to say about UX because you do have a lot of credentials and your career journey has been pretty impressive. And we’re going to dive into that further as we get into the episode. But give us a little bit about your background. How did you get into UX design? And what’s your come up story?
Ana Santos: [00:02:31]
Yeah, thank you. So I started as a visual designer. So 10 years ago, more or less time flies. I actually finished my degree in design. And that was what I really love doing. So I always considered myself to be a very creative person. So that was what I wanted to do like designing. So I started more of a graphic designer visual design. I also did web design. And I think that’s when I actually got more interested in understanding better the user experience, because I thought there’s there must be something else to this. Like it’s not just looking pretty. So the interface design. So that’s pretty much how it all started for me. So when I started to design more interfaces, I was a bit of a generalist in the beginning, as many of us got started as well like a UI UX generalist. And I started to be more and more interested. And in the user experience side of things, strategy research, I started promoting and advocating in every company I was working for research, usability, testing, all of those things. And, and, and then I actually decided I wanted to be a freelancer, which was a big step. However, when I first started freelancing, it was not as easy as I thought. And I found myself going a bit back to the UI design side of things, which I was not. I mean, I love designing, but it was not really what I wanted to do. And then I got this amazing opportunity when I came back to Portugal. So I forgot to mention that I was living in the UK for many years as five, six years, something like that… [crosstalk] Oh, I didn’t know that.
Ana Santos: [00:04:23]
And I didn’t know. Yeah, I was in the UK, as well. Like, my accent is a mix of everything. Nobody can place where my accent is from.
Dillon Winspear: [00:04:34]
That makes sense. Okay, so you came back to Portugal and you continued UX and keep going.
Ana Santos: [00:04:39]
Exactly, yes. So I came back to Portugal. I was a freelancer back then. So that was my decision. I wanted to be a freelancer. I wanted to work in depth and monthly, like being my own boss. So I wanted to do all of that. However, for some reason, I was not happy yet. And there came this opportunity which I thought It’s really interesting to work for Google as… so the role, I think the type of role was what interested me the most about this opportunity, because it was not just a designer role. It was Marvel consulting role, really. It was for the mobile UX initiative based in Portugal, even though I had a chance to work with, like many people from everywhere in the world, really, when I was at Google, so that that was great. But yes, but I was, it really interested me because I had the chance to actually understand better the companies in Portugal, and how they were also different, even huge companies in terms of UX maturity, and how they were so different. And also learning a bit how to advocate user experience, like who should you talk to, should you go straight to C levels, should you actually speak to the actual designers, so I think that gave me a lot of experience being a consultant. And then it also made me understand this is what I love doing. Like I was doing lots of workshops and events a teaching. So I was Yes, this is what I love doing. And this is what I’m wanting to do next. I want to just work on my own and be an independent consultant. I don’t want to go back to the same style of freelancing. Yeah, as I did before.
Dillon Winspear: [00:06:23]
Yeah, that makes sense. So when you took on, if I remember correctly, when you took on this role with Google, it was a contract position. Is that right?
Ana Santos: [00:06:30]
Exactly. Yes. So it was a contract. And that was the main reason why I accepted it because I thought it would be much shorter. Yeah. And what actually was in the end, so I started with just six month contracts. And, I loved doing that work. It was really, really, amazing experience. And I actually got the chance to do it again. So I said, Yes, let’s keep going because I was enjoying so much the role even though I knew in the end, I wanted to do my own thing. So I continue going. And actually, by the end of the year, they wanted me to continue, as well there. And I also had a chance to apply for full time role at Google. So this was a decision that was mine, which is great because I, the first time I actually got that contract role at Google, I felt, you know, that imposter syndrome like I’m not good enough, or I need to prove myself, and I worked a lot to prove myself that yes, I can do this. And I’m good at this. So for me, it was great that I have achieved that. So I had the chance to stay there if I wanted. However, I made a decision that I want to do my own thing. It was great. But yeah, I wanted to do my own thing.
Dillon Winspear: [00:07:47]
That’s awesome. How does a Google contract come along? Because that’s not something that everyone gets the opportunity to do. So how was it that Google reached out to you and extended this contract?
Ana Santos: [00:07:58]
Yes, amazing question. So this is all about for me being discoverable and being visible. That’s a question I get a lot. Because to be completely honest, I don’t think my case is a typical case. Because in that moment in time, I was very visible on LinkedIn in disguise. So because I was visible, and I had contacts, even though I didn’t know the person who actually contacted me, but because I put myself out there, that’s why I say it’s important to put yourself out there. So I was visible. So I had the opportunity to…I don’t think it was like a role. It was advertised to everyone. Because at Google, there’s so many people applying. It’s very, very difficult as well like for them to go through everyone. But I did have that opportunity, which was amazing. And when I tell the story, people think it’s fascinating because even my colleagues, it was a bit different the process so most of them, were for recruiters. So to answer your question. I think that’s the easiest way, like to go through an actual recruiter, someone who is recruiting for contract roles at Google. But in my case, it was just, I was out there, I was visible. I had the opportunity. I still, you know, had to go through all the steps, all the too many interviews and all of that. But there was an opportunity. And you know, when you get an opportunity, you just do your best.
Dillon Winspear: [00:09:25]
Yeah, no, that’s really cool. And I like how you talked about how your journey was different than others. I actually wasn’t aware that Google had so many contract opportunities. I didn’t realize that that was something that they did very often. I want to ask, though, because you talked about being visible on LinkedIn, what types of things were you doing to be visible?
Ana Santos: [00:09:45]
What it was doing? Well, I was updating my profile I was posting I was connecting networking with other designers, because I was freelancing at that moment. So I was still figuring out my anger like my approach. So I was still pretty much on that scenario list angle generic list approach. So I was not as defined as I am today. Now that I figured out what I really want to do, however, even though I was still figuring it out, I was still putting myself out there, which I think is what so many people are afraid of, at least from the comments I get sometimes in Instagram, oh, I’m scared of sharing my personal view. I’m scared. I’m not good enough. I’m scared I don’t know enough. So I think that’s really important, like starting to open your network, even if you don’t start right away writing articles or anything, at least talk to people and in a real exchange of value, of course, like not just all about you, but give them something as well and create a relationship basically.
Dillon Winspear: [00:10:51]
And had you started your Instagram account already at that point in time.
Ana Santos: [00:10:56]
I had, I think I did because my Instagram account is…I think I started when I first Yeah, it was a long time ago. However, it was not again, it was all over the place. I was experimenting. I was posting some pictures here and there. So I wasn’t too very clear of what I really wanted to do yet.
Dillon Winspear: [00:11:19]
So it wasn’t what it is today is what you’re saying?
Ana Santos: [00:11:21]
Yeah, exactly
Dillon Winspear: [00:11:22]
Very good. Yeah, it makes sense, because right now is very direct and very geared towards it, you know, a single Pope purpose of helping UX designers. And I was wondering just how big that account was when Google contacted you, but it sounds like it was via LinkedIn that you’re doing most your visibility in your outreach?
Ana Santos: [00:11:40]
Exactly. Yes, Instagram. I was not… Yeah, into Instagram at all back then.
Dillon Winspear: [00:11:45]
Very cool. So how come you didn’t have a desire to jump into the corporate world? Why was it that you wanted to be a freelancer early on?
Ana Santos: [00:11:54]
That’s a great question. And for me, back then, It was not an issue because I didn’t feel I was enjoying the place I was at. But after Google, especially after Google, because once you have a big name in your track record, then, of course, like other opportunities come up and I had really good opportunity. So not just for Google, so actually other roles at Google, but actually, other companies like big companies, even here in Portugal. So it was a very, very difficult decision. Yeah, I’m not going to lie. But I feel this is not for everyone. I think everyone is different. And for me, it’s, I don’t know, it’s personal. It’s my own dream. Like my personal dream, I want to… It doesn’t mean you can’t make impact when you are working for another company. You can for sure, but I just felt I wanted to do something else. I wanted to have my own freedom in terms of the type of projects I really wanted to do. And um, yes, like just reached more people. Reach to, for example, the work I do nowadays, like with students, for example, for me, it’s really fulfilling as well. So I just had this idea that no, I want to do something else, I want to do something that I have full control of, like the type of projects I want to do. And yeah, create as much impact as possible.
Dillon Winspear: [00:13:18]
That’s awesome. I definitely can reciprocate that feeling in the fulfillment that you get and helping others. Your career has evolved in this time, going from where you’re at as a visual designer 10 years ago, to now consulting coaching workshopping. It’s been an evolving career. Was that an intentional evolution on your part?
Ana Santos: [00:13:43]
It was not, to be honest. It was not. I mean, I knew I wanted to progress in my career. So when I was a generic release, I knew at some point I needed to decide what is it I want to do. Of course, when I started, I don’t think UX was that much of like a burst worth, like it is now. So nowadays Yeah, it’s different. However, I did have that feeling that I cannot possibly master every single thing. Something has to go. And sometimes I even feel that when I miss, for example, designing something, I feel like I’m not keeping up because I’ve chosen that that’s not what I want to focus right now. But yeah, back then I didn’t really know what I wanted to do back then. So I kept exploring all the opportunities and I think it was really because of that role actually, that I found that I really enjoyed doing this like teaching and consulting and understanding the dynamics in different companies. So not just getting that in house or hands on role. And especially being a manager for example, I feel like when you like they say you are a senior designer at some point, progressing your career. So
Ana Santos: [00:14:48]
Either you go through in deponent role, a consulting role, or you go to manage your role, for example, and manager role was not something I, I don’t know, I really wanted to do for some reason, it was not something I imagined myself doing, managing a team or being more in charge of the team. And it’s also a less hands on role. So I want it to be handsome, but not necessarily at the same type of hands when I was before. So I wanted to be still involved in the process. And I feel consulting allows me to do that better than for example, I was manager or something like that. There’s no right or wrong, but…
Dillon Winspear: [00:15:40]
So you still do a bit of consulting now. And then you also do a lot of consulting I’m sorry, a mentoring for designers. Is that right?
Ana Santos: [00:15:49]
Yes, Yes, correct. So I do consulting, I do mentoring and I also have independence students, people that come with me, they want some sessions or they want a structural program, I don’t call my programs mentorship just because there are so many. And confusion, let’s say about what mentoring means, what coaching means. So I prefer to not call them mentorship. However, I do that as well. Yeah.
Dillon Winspear: [00:16:18]
What do you call it instead then is it a coaching?
Ana Santos: [00:16:21]
Yeah, I call my program in specific I call coaching and mentoring for a boot camp, for example. If they call it mentor, however, I do feel I do lot of different things as a mentor for these boot camps. But for my individual programs, I prefer to call it coaching because most of the time, that’s what I really do.
Dillon Winspear: [00:16:42]
Cool. How far along are these designers in their career that you’re coaching?
Ana Santos: [00:16:47]
So most of them are actually so they are not junior designers, at least they are not learning. So not that specific case of I want to get started in UX. What do I do? And there’s a reason why I don’t work individually with people who are still learning. Usually, unless they are, let’s say in a course already, so that’s different. But if they don’t have anything, and if they’re trying to get started, I prefer to recommend them to the course first, because at the moment, I don’t have a structured course. So this type of coaching this type of support, I don’t think it would add as much value. So, usually I do not do this with the petty beginners, or someone who doesn’t know the basics yet.
Dillon Winspear: [00:17:38]
Right, so you work with UX designers that are a little bit more advanced in their career there, they’ve got their feet underneath them, and you help take them through what type of coaching what type of things are you helping them create? What type of deliverables are you working with them on?
Ana Santos: [00:17:53]
So most of the time, I’m actually helping them in their career like progress in their career. What’s the next step? then it depends on the recalls. So some of them don’t really know yet, which is why coaching is great as well. Like, what is the next step? What do I want to do? Some others want, for example, to be independent freelancers as well. So they need that support as well. It doesn’t mean that once you think you know, for the coaching as well, like, maybe you will understand, maybe this is not what I want to do. Maybe I want to do something else. So that can happen as well. However, when I first started, I thought I would be helping mostly people during their actual jobs. For example, when someone starts a new job, I get this a lot as well. Nowadays, companies get their own mentor, and that’s great, but some companies don’t. So I’ve noticed that some people like even if they are already designers, UX designers, but they are not advanced, they feel a bit insecure, they get a new job, they want some feedback or even on their own projects. So that was my main goal in the beginning with this problem. And it was working well, but then I realized that people who are looking for my help, they were actually more interested in career stuff like in coaching. So it evolved. It’s still very tailored program. So it really depends on everyone’s goals.
Dillon Winspear: [00:19:16]
Yeah, that makes total sense. Because not everyone’s in the same position, they don’t have the same goals. They don’t have the same career projectory, or whatever it may be. So it makes sense that you tailor to them specifically. When you and I talked a week ago, when we were kind of preparing for this podcast, you talked a bit about helping designers with understanding UX deliverables. Will you help me understand and the listeners, why UX deliverables are something that you’ve kind of grown passionate about.
Ana Santos: [00:19:42]
Yes. So he likes to leave your boss, so he likes to leave your boss. So I have a very specific opinion about this topic. Because since I do work a lot with boot camps is something that many students and even companies are a bit aware of nowadays because they feel there are so many new designers, so many UX designers, there’s a lot of debates about portfolios. About how to actually showcase your process on your portfolio. And because they go through, let’s say, a step by step framework, but she’s getting started learning the basics, which is completely normal. It’s very normal for a student or someone that is new to focus too much on the actual deliverable, rather than let’s say, what does the deliverable bring to the project? How does that deliverable, move the project forward? So what happens is, in the end, every portfolio kind of looks the same, because they always have that step by step and the same deliverables. So for example, let’s say someone is doing a personal and then before the personal, they have this empathy map in maybe it’s just the screenshots, maybe it’s just an image. But it’s pretty much all of that step by step. There’s no fault process or they are not explaining properly why that deliverable is there. And many times I get this question like, how should I do it? Is this correct? Is this right? So they don’t have that perception that there’s no really right or wrong. It’s about how does the deliverable actually help move the project forward?
Dillon Winspear: [00:21:28]
Right.
Ana Santos: [00:21:29]
That’s something that was interesting.
Dillon Winspear: [00:21:31]
Well, and we talked about the evolution of a UX designer, but now we’re talking about like the evolution of a UX project, right. Over the last couple months, I’ve been helping UX designers in their interviewing skills, doing these interview workshops, mock interviews, basically. And one of the things that they that I see pretty commonly as a theme is that as UX designers are moving from one part in the project to the next part, they hit these checkpoints that you’re identifying, like they know that I should probably have a personal and I should probably have a user journey map and I should probably have some wireframes. And they hit these checkboxes as they’re going down through their project. But what’s missing in the presentation is how did that personal impact your user journey map? And how did that user journey map impact your wireframes? Like, how did it evolve? And how did one piece lead to the next piece? And without connecting those steps, I believe what you’re saying is that we don’t get the story of why you did the things that we did. Is that right?
Ana Santos: [00:22:31]
Exactly. Yes. Yes, exactly. So in the end, it looks like it’s just a collection, let’s say of deliverables rather than a proper process, because it feels like they just did that because they needed to do it. And I’ve seen many cases they go back to the case study, and they need to add this deliverable just because it should be there, or they should prettify the deliverables and in the end is not a real reflection of your process is not a real reflection of a real project. So I think that’s pretty much the state we are at when it comes to junior portfolios, UX portfolios.
Dillon Winspear: [00:23:10]
So there might be a few UX designers who are listening to this maybe burying their head a little bit going, Okay, that’s me. What advice you have for them then to do.
Ana Santos: [00:023:21]
What I would recommend to do, is actually not being afraid of telling exactly what happened for the process. So even if you made mistakes, even if some things didn’t go as planned, so for example, most of the time, you don’t have the resources, you don’t have the users. That’s okay. That’s why there’s a reflections and key takeaways section that’s exactly for that. So don’t be afraid to actually put something out there. That is not perfect because design is iterative. So actually, that’s the point is not perfect is ongoing. What are the next steps? What could have been done better? What could have been done differently. So that’s pretty much that. Yes. So, yeah, don’t try to make it perfect.
Dillon Winspear: [00:24:07]
Well, and I love hearing these things come out of your mouth, you know, and having you phrase it the way you’re phrasing it, because I, too, have been an advocate of that for such a long time that UX designers aren’t hired to have all the answers. They’re hired to help discover the answers, right. And so in that process, we will make mistakes and making mistakes, not an issue. It’s about learning from those course correcting and then heading down the path to make better decisions. And so mistakes are a natural part of the UX process. And I think that’s something that people need to embrace and get comfortable with. But I found that specifically early stage UX designers, especially if they got hired for a job, or if they got contracted for position, they’ve got this fear of, well, I don’t want you to think I’m a bad designer, so I can’t make mistakes and therefore they try and cover those mistakes are hide those mistakes so that nobody can see them. Is that been your experience? Is that what you’ve seen?
Ana Santos: [00:25:05]
Yes, absolutely yes. I get this all the time, like, oh, but I did this mistake, oh, I shouldn’t have been doing like this or what should I should I go back and change? Or should I go to this? I don’t know, don’t share if that is great. What you’ve done is great, or even research, for example, it’s something really interesting. There is still this misconception that the research should validate your initial problem. And when students are surprised, which means you to do good research, if you are surprised and you get rich insights, qualitative research, I mean, and when the students actually are surprised, they’re like, Oh, I miss done something wrong, or I was wrong. I need to go back. I need to change. It’s so funny. But yeah, it’s true. I completely agree with you.
Dillon Winspear: [00:25:49]
It would be pretty funny if somebody was hiring or you know, looking to get hired for a job position and they were doing like a design challenge for the position and they start with saying well I did the research and turns out users don’t want it. So that’s the end of my project. That was funny situation to get yourself into.
Ana Santos: [00:26:06]
Exactly.
Dillon Winspear: [00:26:09]
So if UX designers and are validating their stuff, they’re accepting their mistakes, how can they frame this portfolio? Still to be a standout candidate? What do you think hiring managers are looking for that in those deliverables?
Ana Santos: [00:26:24]
I think what they’re looking for is to understand how they overcome the challenge. So if something and especially how they actually adapt to the constraints, because even a personal project, it has constraints, they don’t have a budget, or maybe they have a timeline if they’re doing a course. So everything has constraints. So what they’re looking for is how can you help us even if we actually don’t have a budget or if we don’t have time? Or How can you actually help us like don’t tell us the perfect scenario? Tell us how can you adapt your process to the constraints, or to the circumstances. So they should be able to explain what were the challenges. How did they overcome the challenges? Or if it’s something they didn’t know, what did they learn? Because everyone learned something new from a project?
Dillon Winspear: [00:27:14]
Mm hmm. That makes a lot of sense. So, do you help with UX designers coaching through the portfolios? Is that something that you do with your coaching?
Ana Santos: [00:27:23]
I do that as well. Yes. So not every case. But I also do that and also do individual sessions. So actually, some people book individual sessions, like, for example, to raise your portfolio or give me your opinion, and I do that as well with the boot camps. So I gave advice about the portfolio. I always, like recommend people to not just take my opinion. For me critical thinking is really important. So we don’t know what each hiring manager is going to think. So actually, it’s important that they talk to other people, other designers, other senior designers. And especially to get feedback after each interview, for example, or if for some reason they didn’t get the job, because that’s how I feel it’s the best results because I was recently helping actually a designer as well to get to the next role. And she actually did that. So in the beginning, she wasn’t like getting any feedback because she was getting rejected. And she was just sending applications. So she was not progressing. Then when she started getting involved, actually asking feedback, and using her critical thinking skills, it’s very, very important, like do not just take one opinion, and apply everything because it can be exhausting. If you are a junior designer, and you ask someone give me feedback on your portfolio and I say, you should change these and this and this and then someone else, oh, you should change these as well or it’s just overwhelming. So it’s really important to develop this critical thinking skills, and I get any feedback. So of course, we never know what each company is looking for, especially as in UX, as you know; many roles are still not accurate. So we don’t know if they are hiring correctly even. However, from our experience, we can give the best advice. And it should really adapt and you should keep evolving your portfolio is like any other UX project, you should be always evolving.
Dillon Winspear: [00:29:21]
Well, I like how you’re admitting to the fact that as you’re going to help coach them through the portfolio, they should seek out other opinions as well, because I think a lot of resources that you’ll find online will say stuff like the ultimate guide to building a UX portfolio, and this can be written by a person who has an opinion, but ultimately, opinions are going to vary. And hiring manager to hire manager is going to vary and so seeking out other opinions in building this is important, but it can also be overwhelming. You might hear from Anna to do something with your portfolio and then you might hear something from Dylan to do something else which contradicts what Anna have Said, and so developing that skill of critical thinking is going to help you figure out how do you want to position your portfolio? I think that’s great feedback. Let me ask you another question. Because obviously, you help people understand where they’re at in their career and how to take the next step. As you start to work with designers who have been in the field for four, five years, where are they typically at? And what are they typically struggling with before they take the next step?
Ana Santos: [00:30:30]
Great question. I love that question. I feel like a designer that already has some experience, but for some reason, they feel stuck stagnated in the role. And this happens a lot. It doesn’t mean it’s the only case but I see this happening a lot. When they start with those. Let’s see if it’s more generalist roles in a company that is not really UX mature, so they struggled at beat selling their own process. So what happens is that they’re doing probably the same thing every day. And they don’t feel sometimes they’re even doing UX anymore because it just feels it’s the same thing every day, especially those who work in less mature companies. For those who actually are involved in research and are involved in a company that is more UX mature, I feel they are generally, I wouldn’t say happier. But I would say they are more fulfilled. However, it’s still the same thing. Like it’s still that feeling that you’re doing the same thing all over again, like what is the next step? So yeah, I think most of the time is that I hear this all the time. Like, I feel I’m not doing UX. I feel I’m a UX designer, but nobody listens to me. Nobody wants to know the research. I feel I’m doing this on my own. And this exact thing that happens in a portfolio is if you show your portfolio and you say I’m doing this on my own, I’m doing this personas. I’m doing this everything on my own. Then you go to the company, and you just keep doing the same thing. You just keep doing these personas, and nobody’s going to see them. So there’s no point. So you really need. I mean, sometimes you can’t, because UX maturity can take years to develop. But UX designer role is a lot about advocating. So being able to promote that user centered culture. And I feel that’s most of the case, that’s the issue. So they have two choices like they can continue advocating in the company they are asked, or they can seek a new role, a role that is more aligned with expectations.
Dillon Winspear: [00:32:33]
Yeah. I like how you say that, because I’m sure you get this question all the time, which is, my company doesn’t respect the UX process. They don’t want to listen to the UX process. And I get asked all the time, like, I feel like my role is more of like salesmanship. I feel like I have to sell UX to my executive team or to the management teams, and I don’t want to be in sales. Well, it’s not a sales role, but an advocate role and that’s kind what you’re seeing right there is that UX designers need to learn how to advocate the UX project process in the company. And ultimately you can decide if that’s worth doing it at the company that you’re at, or if it’s worth moving to a different company to advocate. Is that is the role of developing those advocates skills? Is that difficult to develop?
Ana Santos: [00:33:21]
It is, I do think it is because even myself, I struggle a lot with that. And I don’t think it’s something that I mean, there’s not a magic formula or anything like that. It’s something that you really need to be able to evolve the team basically everyone. I always say this, like, this is my favorite quotes is get a team on bars, because I mean, yes, it’s going to be difficult, especially if it’s someone that is not your UX related and maybe they are above you and they don’t even care what you do. However, if you start involving some people, even in your getting other advocates as well with you. And then, at some point everyone is advocating, but you really need to put the users in front of them. You can’t just treat, again, the deliverable. I am really passionate about the deliverable topic. You can’t just take a deliverable and just, you know, okay, that’s checked, that’s done with a persona, then just to show that you’re, you know, showing work. Now, you really need to make use of that deliverables, show them to your team, evolve them, make them changes, like it’s not just about you, or your opinion, especially if you are doing qualitative research. You need other people otherwise, you know, it’s going to be just your interpretation of the facts, which is going to be bias. So yeah, so basically, it’s something that he does require a lot of work. And sometimes I’m not saying that every time you’re going to be successful, again, depending on each company, but it’s really important to learn how to involve everyone and advocate start to the team sampling
Dillon Winspear: [00:35:05]
Yeah, I really appreciate that. I think that’s great advice. I’m running short on time here. So I want to ask one last question before we wrap up. And this is for those designers who have been in the fields, 567 years, whatever it may be. And they feel like they’re just growing stagnant. They feel like they’re just kind of plateauing. They’re not learning, they’re not growing. What advice do you have for them?
Ana Santos: [00:35:26]
I think it’s really important to try to understand what is your next step like what you want to do next? So if you are unhappy in your current role, what is it that makes you unhappy? Is it the type of work you do? Is it the type of let’s say the company the workflow, because as we discussed, maybe some companies are not there yet. And they may take years to reach that level of UX maturity. Is it because you’re a solid UX designer and you want to be involved in a team? Or is it because you feel you need to go in the next step in your career, maybe, you know, you just want to get to the next level. So even if you decide that the next level, you can be a manager, but not everyone like me, wants to be a manager, so maybe you want to do something else. So what is it, you want to do? So really stop and think about that.
Dillon Winspear: [00:36:18]
Self assess, reflect and figure out your next step for your game plan. And it’s interesting, because as you’re saying that one of the things that I was just thinking is that it’s easy for a early designer to figure that out. Because early on that path is pretty well defined, the path is I need to go to school and I need to get my first internship, I need to get my first full time role, like that path is really filled out. But then once they achieve that, then it’s like, well, now what do we do? We’re here now and it takes some reflection to get past that all over again. So I like what you have to share. And before we wrap, I want to give our listeners an opportunity to figure out how to get in touch with you. Where can they learn more about Ana and what you’re doing? What do you want to plug?
Ana Santos: [00:36:59]
Right Awesome, so you can find me @ana-santos.com. You can also find on my Instagram at UX dots by dots, Anna. And yeah, pretty much all my links are available through Instagram. So yeah, check it out.
Dillon Winspear: [00:37:18]
I’ll make sure I have all those links in the show notes so that people can find that. Other than that, and I appreciate your time. Thank you so much.
Ana Santos: [00:37:27]
Thank you. Thank you so much for having me. It was really great.
Dillon Winspear: [00:37:30]
This was great. And we might have to consider having you back on again a little bit later if you get follow up questions to this episode. So maybe we’ll look forward to that. Thank you so much. It’s been another episode of design today. Thanks for listening.
