My thoughts on Design, Product, Leadership, and Management. I am Chief Design Officer at Toast and former Chief Design Officer and Head of Design at Splunk and VMware.
One of the most exciting and most challenging aspects of building AI-first experiences is keeping pace with an industry that evolves so rapidly. At Toast, we're addressing this challenge by sharing our insights frequently, tailoring our communication to reach different audiences effectively. Over the past few months,
Transforming experiences with an AI-first approach can start with building the end to end customer journey with a layer thinking through the ways AI can help remove the burden of administrative work and transform non-administrative work for customers. Here’s a recipe of how to make that happen.
Design leaders need to take an approach that focuses on customer-first impact with an AI-first mindset. The best to do this is to start with the small miracles.
Design teams can lead the way on bringing an AI-first mindset to their organization. It all starts with a culture of experimentation. Here are practical ways to making that happen.
One of the hardest parts about writing down principles is to ensure they’re opinionated enough to be helpful. Here’s is the one question that can you write better design principles.
There are a few emerging patterns in designing for AI-first experiences. Here are a few.
Design leaders who want to improve visual design in products should spend as much time advocating for better UI and front end engineering practices as they spend focusing on practices within their team. Many designers, within B2B and B2C companies struggle with translating what they design into the actual user
A common myth is that leaders make all important decisions. This assumes leaders should own decision making instead of focusing on what’s more important: the decision making process . The reality is that the best leaders I know are the ones that provide clear direction, hire the best people
A few months ago, I shared a view of the design of a scalable design organization . As design organizations grow, and quickly, there is a critical need for ways to ensure their operational excellence. Design Ops teams have existed for a while but they operate somewhat differently depending on the
Many organizations are hiring their first-ever design leaders. There are likely more VPs and executives leading design teams than ever before. The more I chat with design leaders across the industry, the more a specific question comes up: what is the difference between a VP of Design and a
There isn’t a work conversation I have had recently with friends, peers, or former teammates across the industry that does not include a discussion of the higher than normal attrition rate companies are seeing. Anecdotally, every single friend of mine that works in tech and is able to
Design is finally getting the spotlight it has deserved for a long time. Designers are in high demand at the moment. This is partially due to an overall strong market for tech talent. It’s also because companies are increasingly recognizing the value of design in shaping the experience
One of the most frequent and rewarding conversations I have with designers across the industry is around career growth. Design is at a unique crossroads today. Companies are quickly realizing the value design can bring to the table. That realization is causing explosive growth in the demand for designers and
One of the most challenging roles a design leader plays is scaling a team. The way you get to help shape the culture and execution of dozens or hundreds of people is one of the most rewarding things you can do. As part of that, one of the most important
Today, in every enterprise company, there is a discussion about the shift to a Software as a Service (SaaS) delivery model and the shift toward a subscription revenue model. Those two discussions are critical for design teams to understand and to use as a way to help drive a better