UPDATE: (Jan 6, 2022) the position has been filled. Ill post more as they open. Thanks! Falkonry is growing and has several positions open! Product Designer Right now, I am designing alone, but the workload is too much. I need a full time design partner to work with me. Remote is OK, but Bay Area…
Often an organization argues about what the feature priorities should be. There is a simple framework that you can use to sort features in a backlog. This works best when you have a large backlog of features and limited engineering bandwidth. (So basically everyone) Backlog items A backlog item is usually a story or epic…
I’ve covered differentiation in detail before. There is one thing about it that I didn’t cover. I talk to design candidates about this all of the time. Premise: 100 people are looking at your product or site or portfolio. Case 1: It’s the same If everything you have is the same as the competition, then…
Life is funny. You make your decisions, but your predictions end up moving down a different path than you expected. I wish I had that magic crystal ball I’ve been asking for. TL;DR I’m stepping down as Head of Design at Warmly and will be a part time executive coach for them. Additionally, I will…
Over the years, I have had excellent luck hiring people right out of school and training them to design with my approach. With this in mind, I have a new job opening for a Junior Designer. Referral Fee: If you introduce me to someone who we hire, I will send you a $500 gift card…
My son just started an internship with our Congresswoman, Jackie Speier in Washington, DC. He arranged for housing and got himself settled there this week. This is the first job that he has where he needs to wear a suit and tie. We were on zoom and I was walking him through how to tie…
I’ve been talking with a few people about the concept of keeping in touch. Like most things, it gets more interesting the more you look at it. Keeping in Touch means meeting over video, phone, or in person at least once per year. Glen’s arbitrary definition There are multiple categories, I think. Personal, Professional, and…
Apologies: This is a super long post, but because of the details, I had to hold back for a few weeks. I have decided to move on from Treasure Data and join a small startup named Warmly. It’s an exciting change but I certainly have feelings of sadness for leaving people I have grown to…
Users are not reliable witnesses to past behavior of future preference. Glen UX Rule #81 The problem is that our brains are complicated and don’t work logically all of the time. They work emotionally. Luckily, there is a workaround. Body language and facial expressions. When you interview a user, don’t focus on their words. Watch…
I believe in work rituals. They create a sense of normalcy in the messy work of creating a product. One of the reasons I like Scrum is that it has lots of good rituals like Sprint meetings, the planning game, and retrospectives. One thing I do not like about Scrum is that most of the…
How many people do you introduce per year? For me, it’s about a dozen introductions. Introductions are much more powerful than a cold call to someone you want to meet. When a trusted third party introduces you, you are much more likely to connect with the other person. In business, many sales and marketing folks…
I’ve been thinking recently about how product companies are built from zero to initial launch. Everyone loves to focus on success stories, but most startups still make many of the same mistakes. I would generalize it and say they sell out their future to gain a short term benefit. Here is a grab bag of…
I’ve been managing people on and off for 25 years now. It’s hard to tell how I have evolved, but I am sure that I’ve changed some over the years. There are certain principles that I think about as a manager that have stayed with me since the beginning and others I have picked up…
Years ago, I used to write holiday cards for all of my coworkers. I would hand write the card and leave it on their desks. Now, in the age of Covid, we are all working from home. This presents a problem. How can I get everyone their holiday cards? I don’t have their addresses and…