Design Meets Business

Ryan: I think that there's this
stall out that kind of happens mid

career where that the stakeholder
management, the communication skills,

the storytelling, and the MBA level
business understanding and business

skills become really, really relevant
if you want to either participate more

holistically as an IC or become a leader.

And so my theory is that
there's not enough resources

to help people bridge that gap.

Christian: The discipline of design
is now key to building great products.

More and more companies are making
space for it at the higher levels.

More people than ever
want to become designers.

And most of us who already do the
job wants to find ways to have just a

little bit more impact in our teams.

Welcome to design meets business.

I'm Christian Vasile and on this
podcast, I bring you world class

product and design leaders who found
ways to shape products, companies and

entire industries, and who are now
sharing what they know with you and me.

My hope is that we all get to learn
from the experiences, ideas, and

stories shared on this podcast.

I'll see you next time.

In the process.

Become better designers on the show today.

I'm chatting with Ryan Scott, the
founder of accelerate design company.

Ryan is helping designers develop
business skills to do more influential

work and have more meaningful careers.

Before that, Ryan worked for some of the
biggest companies around, whether that

was leading the redesign of the booking
flow at Airbnb, bringing food photography

to DoorDash, or designing for Salesforce.

Ryan understood and always put an
emphasis on the importance of marrying

design with the business goals.

In this episode, we're talking about
how to think of failed experiments,

how different companies think of
design and why, about why incremental

optimization might not always be the right
approach, and about why it's important

to consider saying yes to work that
you might initially want to say no to.

I hope you're gonna enjoy my
conversation with Ryan Scott.

Ryan, welcome to design Based Business.

Over the course of your career,
you've managed to work with some

cool companies and big projects uh,
with big tangible results, and some

of your achievements at Airbnb are
worth spending hours discussing.

Unfortunately, we don't have
hours, but hopefully just enough

time to scratch the surface.

Uh, You're also an avid design
coach talking about how to

link design with business.

So it makes a lot of sense
for you to be on a show.

And I'm really excited to have
some of these conversations

before we go a bit deeper.

Let's begin with some cliff notes of
who you are and how did you start in

design and where you are right now?

Ryan: Perfect.

Firstly, thank you so much for having me.

This is an exciting topic to talk
about, I think is becoming even more

necessary in the industry with so
much change happening in the industry.

So this is really good timing.

So a bit about me, I think a couple
of things that make my background

unique are that I've always been a
designer and I've always run a business.

So I accidentally tripped into
design when I was in high school.

So this is, I don't want to date myself,
this was years ago but many years ago.

But I had a teacher that really encouraged
me, I took a graphic design class, and I

just liked it, so I just started doing it.

And I didn't know what it would become,
but I liked it, so I kept doing it.

At the same time, I was about to go
to university, and university in the

States is extremely expensive, and I had
no idea how I was going to pay for it.

And so I just started doing freelance
design and running my own independent

agency, which I did throughout my entire
undergraduate university career and

managed to pay for that schooling with
debt free by just doing design work.

So for me starting design at a very
young age I think I realized I've

been a designer for about half my
life now, so it's been a minute.

But it's always been tied to running that
business as a designer and working with

many businesses As they are freelance
consultants I think a couple other things

that have been different for me is that I
went in house in tech, but I've worked at

so many different types of organizations.

So I've worked at Seed Stage Startup,
Series A, DoorDash was Series

B through D while I was there.

So very early days.

Airbnb was right, it was a couple of
years pre IPO and Salesforce was already

well public by the time I was there.

So I've seen design teams operate at
all of these different stages of a

business, which has really influenced
how I think about approaching design.

And the culture is that those
businesses were also very different.

So some were sales led, eng led,
product led, and Airbnb was design led.

So I've also seen different functions
take point and how does that then

trickle back down to how they use
design and what they think about design.

Christian: Thank you for the intro.

I think we'll definitely go back to
Airbnb being a design led company

and how design is seen there and
compared to some of the other ones.

But before that, I just want to
real quickly draw some sort of

parallel because I have, I didn't
realize, but I have a very similar

story, I've also been running my own
business while I was studying design.

And I'm curious, how did you
find doing both at the same time?

Because what I found was that
the curriculum was a few years

behind what I was already
practicing with some of my clients.

So school for me, for example,
design school wasn't really,

this hasn't really taught me so
much from a design perspective.

It taught me more around working with
other people and, discipline and sending

things on time and all of these things
that school generally teaches you.

But in terms of design, it
just hasn't taught me that much

because it was slightly backwards
compared to the industry.

What were your Uh, What
was your experience there?

Ryan: That's interesting.

I think similar.

I still feel like I gained some
technical skills and some coaching

that I wouldn't have just working
independently with the clients.

But I think the clients really
augmented what I was learning.

One of the tricks that I did while I was
an undergrad was, maybe I was a freshman

or a junior, so first couple of years.

And I would talk to the seniors about
what they were learning, and then I would

go get a client to go learn that thing.

So by the time I got into those
courses a couple of years later,

I'd already done multiple branding
projects or multiple website projects.

And so school became a
lot easier in some ways.

My professors were very gracious about me.

I think I did have actually
a client at one point in my

senior year who was in England.

And so I'm like building this website for
them and we're having late night calls

and I kept skipping some of my classes.

But my professors were really
gracious and understanding about

that because they wanted to encourage
me to do the real world work.

I feel like they augmented each
other, but the schooling go as far.

In developing the skills that I
would actually need in a professional

environment as doing as much freelance.

Christian: So what was missing there
when you said it didn't go as far?

What exactly did you think?

Where was it falling short?

Ryan: I was just such a difference
between doing something hypothetically

and doing something for real
in terms of how many things can

happen that you don't anticipate.

So I've taught, actually I've
given lectures at that university.

I've worked at bootcamps and taught
design, and a lot of that curriculum

is teaching these technical skills, and
you want to understand how a project

might work end to end, you want to
understand when to do user research,

you want to understand how Figma works,
and all of these technical things

it's really hard to simulate What
happens if the client doesn't like it?

What happens if the client's
wife doesn't like it?

Okay like, you're not trained to handle
these totally crazy and absolutely

realistic curveballs that might happen.

In UX, it might be this test fails.

And the change we thought was
going to be really successful

Wasn't in the way we thought.

What's the next step because now
the ceo is looking at us Like you

guys just wasted a bunch of time.

I don't think the educational program
really Prepares you for that stakeholder

management and to expect the unexpected
I also don't think most educational

programs talk nearly enough about the
business side of design, which is a

huge failing, I think in academia.

Christian: Let's talk about that because
you are putting together a course for

which the tagline is describing the ROI
of design master the business fundamentals

to persuade stakeholders, gain influence
and level up your design career.

And only from that tagline, I think we can
have a conversation for a few good hours.

So tell me how this idea of
coaching designers came, how

the idea of the course came.

And then how did you end up actually
building this curriculum that I

assume you see as a better fit for
someone who might want to level up?

Ryan: Yeah, so I think we have to go
further back and a lot of it's rooted

in that running a business while running
a design business while learning design

and realizing where there were some gaps.

And then going into the industry and
realizing that I didn't feel always

very equipped to have influence, change
the roadmap, or even understand why am

I working on this project when I am?

What's the timing?

What's the goal?

I maybe have some sense of, oh well,
the PM wants to hit this metric.

But why?

If you think about putting on your
user research hat and asking five

whys, I realized I could only answer
maybe the first one or two whys.

Because my PM wants it because
they want to hit this metric.

But what's their motivation?

Who's their boss?

What does that person need?

What does the business need?

Where are these things coming from?

And why now?

And why me?

And what am I really trying to solve?

And so I felt like I was not going to
be able to be a very successful leader

in design without having a deeper
understanding of those fundamentals.

The kind of framework that's guided
a lot of my thinking is, I think you

have art on one side of the spectrum
and you have pure business on the

other, and design is in the middle.

A lot of people think that design is
art, and I think that's wrong where art

is really about, self expression and
communicating a feeling, but there's

no like, business objective to that.

Design is a lot of the same
compositional features.

You're thinking about layout, color,
typography, illustration, iconography,

a lot of these types of things.

And that's on the artsy side of design.

And it's, those things are often the
visual things that a non designer

can interpret and see and understand.

And so a lot of people think that's
what design is, are these visual things.

But design is always applied to a
business and that's what makes it design.

On the opposite end of that spectrum,
you have like PMs or marketing people

where it's all about business strategy,
but there's no visual execution

necessarily to that, to make it real.

And so design exists within this
spectrum and as a designer, you can

totally have a fulfilling career as
a person who does icons or a person.

I think there being be hired
someone who just specialized

in gradients at one point.

So you can absolutely specialize in
these areas, but a lot of designers

want to move up in their career and
get more businessy and start to have

more influence and either ask those
deeper questions or start to influence

the answers to those questions.

But designers are not taught business.

We kind of learn it through osmosis
by just being in the environment

and working with stakeholders.

And that's very inefficient.

You're doing like bumping
around in the dark, trial and

error as a way of learning.

And your career is sometimes on the line.

If you make a mistake, it's a great
learning experience, but stakeholders

don't want to work with you now,
or you lost your job or, some other

kind of consequence, maybe not that
dire, but those things do happen.

So for me wanting to understand
business led me to get my MBA.

And in doing that for three years
at UC Berkeley, I realized designers

are missing a huge amount of context
and the people that I'm working with

on the business side have no idea
what design is or how to leverage it.

And I think a really good case study
of that is during my first year at Haas

design thinking was a required course.

But our year was the last year the design
thinking was required, because so many

people complained about it being quote
fluffy and Unnecessary that the university

had to back off and make an elective.

So the business people aren't learning
about design and aren't really

understanding it are actually starting
to push back against it, and designers

aren't getting that, So I wanted to with
this course in describing the ROI design

bridge that gap and give designers a very
specific curriculum of just the things

that I learned from all of these courses
that would be necessary for a designer

to move the needle at their organization.

Christian: Do you think it's enough that
just half of the room does the work.

If designers become really good at
talking about the value of design, but as

you said earlier, the other side in the
room, they might not be interested in it.

They might not understand it.

They might push back against it.

Is it then enough that design
can do a better job and try

to persuade the other ones?

Or is it also a matter of perhaps
trying to educate the other, perhaps

the other people also trying to educate
themselves on what design can do?

Ryan: that's a great question.

I think there's the ideal answer
and there's the realistic answer.

And the ideal answer is that business
people are looking at these industry

leaders like Airbnb and Tesla and Apple,
which is the most valuable company on

the planet and saying design is a core
part of all of those companies DNA from

like the most foundational level design
has been very successfully leveraged

to create value for these companies.

We should know more about that.

We want to do that too.

Ideally, every business leader
would come to that conclusion by

looking at these case studies.

But for whatever reason, they're not.

And so I do think it often falls on
designers to have to articulate the

value in a way that resonates with them.

So they are become open minded to, okay,
this is actually something I can see this.

I understand what it specifically
means to my business.

It's not just, Apple does
a lot of great design work.

We should too.

But how does that play out for us
on the ground making decisions?

Operationally, I understand what
that means and I'm excited about

trying it out and seeing what
the value is to our business.

So I do think it falls on design
more often than not, which is why

I started creating a course for
designers to articulate and not trying

to train the business people yet.

Christian: Yeah.

I also think something else plays
in here, which is uh, you can only

focus on what you can control.

The fact of the matter is that you
can't control what the other people

know, but what you can control is
how you can try to persuade them

with the knowledge that you have.

So perhaps it makes sense that's
where you should focus on and be a

bit less concerned about what the
other people do and more concerned

about how you can bring design in
the highlight design in the room.

With that being said, I was taking a
look at the syllabus for your course

beforehand, and I've if that's okay
with you, I'd like to dive in a

little bit deeper into some of these
because first of all, I'm interested.

And why you think all of these four
are the important ones that that

you want to teach people for the
course, but also for each one of

them, because some of them might seem
a bit fluffy, as you said earlier.

And I think it would be interesting
to bring them down to earth a little

bit and understand how does this
translate into what I do as a designer

on a daily basis with my team.

So the first one is gain credibility
by connecting design value to business

metrics and financial outcomes.

What is this all about?

Ryan: Sure.

So this is really where designers
focus often, but I think there's a

different way of thinking about it.

I think there's different levels and I
teach this framework where you've got

a design outcome, which is the work
you did, like we launched a component

library or something like that, right?

And you have the customer outcome, which
is maybe this reduces cognitive load

because we've created more consistency.

And so I think designers feel very
comfortable talking about their

work in the customer outcome lens.

And I think that's right.

Someone needs to do that and always
root their value and the work

they're doing in that customer lens.

And I do think that a lot of business
folks don't go deep enough and always

read things back to the customer.

From that it can be difficult
for business minded folks.

Or executives to understand, okay,
you reduced cognitive load, which

is a very designer way of thinking
about a solution or an outcome.

But what does that mean to our business?

How does that actually level up
to something that I can measure?

And I can say to my board,
this is valuable to us.

That's why you spent time
and money doing this.

And so I think the next steps we go
from kind of the design outcome, which

is the project, the customer outcome,
which we talk a lot about as designers.

To the business outcomes, and
then ultimately have to connect

that up to the financial outcome.

And so a lot of executives
are going to be thinking about

that financial outcome level.

A lot of teams will work with like
marketing or sales are gonna be

thinking about their business outcomes.

And designers think about
the customer outcomes.

So if you can tie all those things
together and say we reduce cognitive

load, which increased conversion,
which increased sales, it creates

this really strong narrative where
everyone at every level of the

business, regardless of their Different
interests or goals can understand how

these things connect to each other.

So I think designers often don't go
far enough into saying this is the

relationship between cognitive load
and conversion and then everyone should

have a pretty good understanding on
the business side of the relationship

between conversion and sales.

So if you can start bridging those gaps
for people, it helps frame things in a

language or connect things to the language
that the business stakeholders understand.

Christian: So I think in theory,
a lot of people would listen to

this and would nod their heads and
say, yeah, this fully makes sense.

I think in practice, sometimes when
you sit in your design team on a

daily basis and the PM prioritizes
your work and you're just being

given here's the next piece of work.

Here's what we're working on next.

And you as a designer don't seem
to have that much influence, you're

just doing what you're being told.

How do you bridge that gap between what
you've said, which is the ideal state

and what I've presented, which is what I
think a lot of people are struggling, not

struggling with, but that's the reality
of a lot of people on a daily basis.

Ryan: Yeah, I think what you're describing
is such an interesting and pretty typical

relationship between product and design,
which is unfortunate, which is design

as this service of product, you see a
lot of design teams report into product

teams, which is strange because it would
be weird if product reported to design

and it's uncommon for engineering to
report the product or product report

to engineering, but it design reports
the product everyone's fine with that.

It's this strange relationship, this kind
of sometimes subservient relationship of

design as a function that hits metrics.

And I think that's true in
some sense, and that is part of

the value that design creates.

And that's why I start my course with
that module, is because that is the

reality, and you are going to have to
tell the story about hitting certain

product metrics, and that is realistically
probably the thing you're gold upon.

However, the kind of next thing that
I talk about is we should zoom out and

think about the value that design creates
to the business more holistically.

Yes, you contribute to
product value, but what else?

I teach a framework that we look at from
the market level to a company function,

product, team, and individual level.

What is the potential value to the
business in a project that you're doing?

So if you create a completely
new paradigm or convention.

You've potentially added value to
the entire market and now suddenly

everyone's using the hashtag.

For example at a company level, you
can create all kinds of value that

is specific to your business in terms
of making it more competitive or

increasing certain financial outcomes.

You might make engineering work faster
or easier if you have a design system.

And so there's other elevations in which
you can talk about the value of design.

And that can change the
level of influence you have.

The case study I like to talk about in
thinking bigger is when I was at DoorDash.

So I started at DoorDash and
there were eight engineers

and no PMs and four designers.

The company as a whole was
under a hundred people.

And so it was very early days.

We worked in an animal
hospital in Palo Alto.

And one of the projects I had was to
bring food photography to the app.

And if you look at the app today,
there's food photos everywhere.

But in circa 2015, that wasn't the case,
and we were the only ones without it.

And so I was tasked with bringing food
photography to the app, including all

the operational aspects of that in terms
of hiring photographers, signing up

merchants, getting those people connected,
getting the photos, editing the photos,

getting the photos uploaded into the
product and creating that end-to-end

flow, in addition to thinking about
where should photography be in the app

and how should it look and all the kind
of traditional designery aspects of it.

One of the first experiments we did was
negative and we were questioning, is

this something that's actually valuable?

And so we were able to look at
other metrics to determine this.

It didn't move the metric we
thought it would at first in that

first experiment, but it did create
impact in the product in other ways.

And then by starting to ask that
question and pulling that thread of.

What other types of value
might this be creating?

We realized that, oh, the marketing
team is very excited about having

hyperlocal photography for all
of its marketing campaigns.

The business development team is
really excited because they can go

to some of these national partners
and offer this as a service to them.

And those national partners are
really excited to sign with us if

we can provide this value to them.

So thinking outside of just the product
metric that we wanted to hit, we really

realized this had so much more value
to the business holistically that it

allowed us to continue on the project and
figure out how to refine our execution

so that the product metrics aligned.

But we were able to keep up that
momentum because we assessed that

it had value in many different ways.

Christian: And those secondary metrics.

that you've managed to hit?

Were those something that you were
actually tracking from the beginning

or when the first metric looked
like it didn't really hit the mark

you then started looking at is
there any other impact we're doing?

Who, how did you start looking at
those secondary metrics and when?

Ryan: Yeah, that's a great question.

So we tracked a wide variety of
things, but the team was pretty

focused on just conversion, right?

Is this increasing our revenue?

And I think we were probably
really hyper focused on that.

And so when we didn't hit that number
that we wanted to, it created this

conversation of is this still worth doing?

Do we still believe in this?

As a designer, I was like, yeah, of
course this is an industry convention.

It's pretty standard for
any e commerce thing.

And as a designer, I'm looking at the
kind of human evolution lens of this.

You're about to eat something.

You're about to put it in
your body and consume it.

If it looks bad, it could kill you.

We assess everything we eat as to,
I don't know, is this safe or not?

And that's baked into our biology.

So as a designer, I just felt like
there was this intrinsic value,

but we did have to still make that
argument back up to the business.

And so when that experiment, didn't
deliver the value that we thought,

the next question was, okay, but
we still believe this has value,

so where might that value be?

And we realized that it was
affecting a different piece of

conversion in a different part of
the funnel than we were expecting.

And that was able to influence our
overall product strategy and keep going.

Christian: I love that.

The reason I asked that secondary question
is because I think this is very important.

Not always the experiments that you run
will be successful, but that shouldn't

stop you from digging a bit deeper and
seeing whether although it technically

failed from the perspective of what we
aim to do in the first place, Perhaps

this helped us succeed somewhere else.

And I think digging a bit deeper into data
and analytics and all of these is also

valuable despite an experiment failing, so
I like that you came up with that example.

Ryan: If I can add to that,
I think it's really important

how you define fails, right?

So we had a specific hypothesis and
we had a specific goal and we didn't

meet that specific goal, but was that
the appropriate goal to begin with?

I would argue maybe not, I think that
you should start with a hypothesis and

you should start with a goal, but be
open minded to potentially an experiment

delivering some kind of insight or
value to the business in a way that

you weren't expecting or weren't
necessarily incentivized to hit because,

you know, you want to deliver value
to the business holistically, right?

And so I think you have a
pretty compelling argument.

And we had to do this to go to the
CEO and say, look, it didn't do this,

but it did this and this and this.

We still feel like it's valuable,
worth investing in, let's continue.

So I think it's worth saying
this didn't do what we expected.

I don't know that's failure because we
learned so many different things that

did produce value to the business.

And so as long as it's producing
value to the business, I

would consider it a success.

Christian: You've covered the
first two parts of the syllabus.

Let's move on.

Next one is tailor tactics
to be successful within

your specific environment.

What does this mean?

Ryan: So I think this is about being
sensitive to the needs of the business

and developing a greater awareness
out of the needs of the business.

And I do think that designers,
like I said, develop business

awareness through osmosis, but
they're not getting structured

kind of formal training on this.

And so this whole section is just
about looking at the things your

business is going through and the way
your business is going to approach

things given different variables
so you can adapt and be successful.

When I've done a standard approach to
design, for example, it may or may not

be successful, because I've just taken
this one approach like this is the

way I think design should operate in a
business because that's what I learned

in school or that's just my belief.

You might get lucky and there might
be this natural alignment between the

business having the same philosophies
or operating in the same way or being

at the stage of its growth cycle
that's an appropriate way to operate.

But if you're not aligned, there's
no one size fits all to design and so

you're not going to be very successful
in your business if you're not

aligning to some of those deeper needs.

Christian: And the last one is go to
market with changes that will help

design succeed in your business.

Ryan: Yeah.

So that is all about you want to adapt to
the business, but you also will probably

need the business to adapt to design.

And so this is about creating
change in your organization to

help design have more influence.

And really what we teach in this is like
a go to market strategy in terms of how

do you identify early adopters of a change
you want to make and get them on board

with instituting that change, whether
it's we should have more user research

and listen to customers more, or we should
do more cross functional brainstorms and

have more collaboration between functions.

Whatever that change is what's your
backlog of changes as a designer

that you want to make to make the
business more design friendly?

How does that backlog intersect with
the needs of the business so you can

identify what's most likely to succeed as
you bring this change or idea to market?

And then how do you find those people
that are going to help you drive adoption?

Christian: I think this is such a key
point and I'd like to dive a little

bit deeper, because oftentimes we sit
in businesses and we think I want to

make this change or I want to make
that change or, and you can't make

it happen on your own as a designer,
it's much harder than some other cross

functional partners that we might have.

So then what you've just said there is so
key: how can you find some early adopters

or some allies in the company that could
help you on the way to making that change?

Let's talk a bit about that.

How do you find those people?

Ryan: So I think that's a great question.

There's a couple different dimensions
to identifying those people.

There's a model in marketing called
the diffusion of innovations, and

it's where the language like early
adopters or laggards come from.

And I think what's important takeaway from
that model is you're looking for early

adopters and that's a minority of people.

You shouldn't be trying to sell your
idea to everyone in the organization.

You should find the people that are going
to be most likely to adopt something

when it's not fully fleshed out yet.

And this group is technically
called like the visionaries.

They're people who are
excited to try new things.

But you don't have all the answers yet,
but they're gonna want to collaborate

and run a pilot and find out.

I would look for people who are, like,
highly collaborative excited by new

ideas, have this, like, how might we
attitude in a kind of more tactical way.

As anyone who's proactively
including you as a designer or

asking for your opinion already.

It's someone who might be an ally
that you can, bounce ideas off

of and is more likely to get on
board with trying something out.

And once you have that person who's
willing to help you run a pilot or

ask more questions or connect you to
more people or just be an advocate

for that thing, that's a little bit
of traction you need to help get the

next group of people on board who are
a little more skeptical and they need

a little more traction and a little
more evidence that this is a good idea.

And then those people get on board
and then the next group gets on board

and the next group gets on board.

So I think trying to find those people
who you have a strong relationship

with who are highly collaborative
and willing to try new things

is an excellent place to start.

Christian: If I may add something
there, I think oftentimes it's much

easier to persuade people who you
already have a good relationship with.

And you've already mentioned there.

And something that I believe in is
whenever you join the team, you should

try as much as possible to find the
people who think like you and create

connections and relationships in that
business with some of these people who

might not necessarily be designers.

They could be product people, they could
be engineers, they could be in marketing.

And then I think it makes much
easier this whole idea of persuading

or trying to change minds or
saying, Hey, I've got this idea.

What do you think about?

It's much easier to have the conversation
with someone you have a good relationship

with than with someone you don't.

So first of all, is that
something you agree with?

And if it is, how do you as a
designer build better relationships

with your cross functional partners?

Ryan: I mean, I Definitely
think that's fundamentally true.

If you have a good relationship with
someone, then things are going to be

a lot easier than if you have a bad
relationship or no relationship at all.

I think one of the things that, you
know, building those relationships

with cross functional teams, there's
so many variables to consider.

So I think it really
depends on the culture.

It depends on the individual but
I do believe that kind of the

designers have the key skills
to develop these relationships.

And I think a lot of those key skills
come from things like user research.

It's about active listening and trying to
understand what that person cares about.

In negotiation, you learn
about the difference between

positions and interests.

A position might be, in a negotiation,
the thing that someone says they

want or need and the interest
is the motivation behind it.

Someone might say, we need to run
A B tests, and they need to be

statistically significant, otherwise
we can't make any decisions.

That might be what they're saying.

What they might mean is I don't want
to be wrong and I need a greater degree

of validation so I don't make a mistake
and look silly or lose my promotion.

And so I think if you put on this kind
of user research hat and you actively

listen and you talk to those people you're
going to understand what's really driving

their positions and driving motivations
for the decisions that they're making.

I think the other benefit of like
really taking this user research

and active listening approach is.

You're going to have a better
understanding and you're just

openness to a better understanding
of their position leads to trust.

And then that trust becomes the
foundation of that relationship

that leads to influence.

Christian: Let's switch gears a little
bit touch upon something you've mentioned

all the way in the beginning where you've
said you've worked for all these different

companies, different organizations
of different size at different points

in the journey of the organization.

How have you seen design work at different
companies, whether that was Airbnb pre

IPO, whether that was DoorDash very early
on, how is design treated and how did it

work at some of these different companies?

Ryan: That's a great question.

And it actually, I've reflected a
lot on how these teams operated and

why they operate in different ways.

And the thing I found to be
the most highly correlated

with how design is used is.

Typically the background and
expertise of the founders.

You look at people that I've worked for,
like Mark Benioff or Tony shoe or Brian

Chesky, they all have extremely different
backgrounds and that changes the way that

they run their business, which then in
turn changes the way that they use design.

So I do think if there's a reason
that Google is a very engineering

led organization is because Larry
Page has a BS in computer science.

He's a computer scientist.

So his values, interests, his awareness
of computer science is deeper.

His preference for solving
things in that way is deeper.

And he's got some skills to
assess people that he's hiring.

And so he's going to hire this world class
engineering team and they're going to

solve world class engineering problems.

So they're going to use
design very differently.

Then Mark Benioff, who has a BS
in business administration and

is very, I'd say Salesforce is
a very sales led organization.

So that approach I find to be the
most correlated is that background.

In, at Salesforce, I'm going to
generalize, but my feeling at Salesforce

was design being something that brings
things to life so we can get it in

front of people and get them excited
about it and we can sell as much

as possible and the sales function
of Salesforce is really prominent.

At DoorDash, Tony's background
being operations, the way he would

approach many business problems
is with that operational lens.

How can we very quickly, very manually,
if necessary, Test something out,

try it, and see, and then maybe
we'll build a product around it.

And then we're going to use design,
in some ways if we need to increase

the quality of that product.

But there is a large bias towards like
moving very quickly and doing things

without building something very robust.

And then Brian's background is in
industrial design, and so his focus

is going to be, we want design at the
beginning of the conversation, we want to

involve them as strategically as possible.

We're not just using them as a function
to make things pretty, we want them

as thought leaders where we can bring
in the human element and bring in the

customer element to every conversation.

And it would feel weird if you had a
meeting without a designer in the room.

So I do think that the way those founders
run their businesses then translates

into the way design can be used and where
they feel like design has the most value.

Christian: And the culture of the
company oftentimes comes from the CEO,

which is what you've talked about.

So probably if you want to work in a
company where design is being seen as

a more important function, you might
want to look for a company that is not

necessarily where the CEO is a designer,
there's not a lot of those, but where

someone high up in the leadership
is a designer with influence that

can then push for design and for the
capability of design and all of that.

So I think sometimes we as designers tend
to get a bit deflated and disappointed

when we end up working, let's say
engineering driven organization or

sales driven organizations and then
we don't really understand why is

design not getting that seat at the
table, a proverbial seat at the table.

And I think what you're saying here it
is very accurate because the culture is

not design driven and there's perhaps
not so much you can do about that.

Is there?

Ryan: My whole course is about
trying to move that needle on that.

So I hope there's something
you can do about that.

And I think it comes back to that
aligning to the interests, right?

And demonstrating value where that
person wants to see value first, and

then when you can do that, you can
start to broaden the conversation.

And what you're saying is
exactly why I went to Airbnb.

I did Salesforce, then
DoorDash, then Airbnb.

And I saw how we operated in a sales led
environment and an ops led environment.

And it was really challenging in
some ways and didn't meet certain

expectations that I had, which some
of those might've been unrealistic.

But I wanted to go to a design led
organization and just feel how that

would be different and it was a totally
different environment because people

just intrinsically understood what
I did and intrinsically understood

the value of it and I didn't have
to advocate for it as heavily.

So I felt like Airbnb is this
pinnacle in some ways where I could

just say, I think we should do this
because of this and people were

like, yeah, okay, that makes sense.

Go do it.

Make it happen.

Uh, You don't have to advocate as
intensely, but what I appreciated from

especially DoorDash was I got more
rigorous about advocating for my work

and aligning it to different interests
and not just saying, look, design

is valuable because it's valuable.

We should do it because we should do it.

Airbnbs, everyone says, okay at
DoorDash Tony says, show me how

like, show me what that means, show
me the value and explain to me.

I think as long as they're open
minded to that, that's great.

And as long as you have a
culture that's willing to learn

and adapt that's what you need.

But you're going to have to align to
certain things and then push in certain

ways in different types of cultures.

And that's just part of the job.

Christian: Yeah.

And I think that also
teaches you different things.

So at Salesforce, you've learned something
about how to do design that was different

than what you've learned at Airbnb, where
design was seen in a different light.

If you probably, if you just work
in organizations where design is

being already seen as super valuable,
you might not learn to manage

stakeholders as well, or persuasion
or storytelling or all of that.

So I guess there's always something you
can learn regardless of where you work,

but perhaps the job is, I don't think
it's necessarily easier, but it's a bit

different, as you said, in a company like
Airbnb versus Salesforce or DoorDash.

talkin talking about this, you wrote a
post some time ago about this idea of

having to sometimes justify why you're
in the room, and I assume that doesn't

happen very often at a company like
Airbnb, but it might happen in other

companies, which might be more similar
to someone listening might be working

at a, in an engineering led company and
sometimes they might have to justify

themselves about why they're in the room.

What are your thoughts about that?

Ryan: Yeah.

It's not a great position to be in
as a designer, and it's a sign of

kind of immaturity on the lack of
the other stakeholders or the company

as a whole to, and in that example
too, it felt a little hostile.

Like why are you here ? Like we have
a bunch of engineers in the room.

Why are you necessary?

And it's a pretty extreme
example of someone being very

assertive about that opinion.

But there is this kind of undercurrent
vibe of needing to explain why design

exists and explain why design's valuable
and that perspective is valuable.

And that's really what kind of the
first two modules of my class are about

are, Okay, design is moving metrics.

We are seeing things from
a different perspective.

And we're contributing value in a
much more diverse way and holistic

way than just hitting the product
metrics that PMs want us to hit.

So I think that attaching value to
something that's a little bit broader

is a tactic that works really well for
people who are hesitant and aligning

to those interests and those priorities
and framing things in a way that they

understand as business stakeholders.

I also think it's important to
articulate why design is different,

that it's Not an operations function.

You can't just put inputs
in and get outputs.

If you design a machine and
you put in certain amount of.

I earned, you're going to get a certain
amount of nails out of it, right?

And that's just not how design works.

And, but that's how you teach operations.

Or, if you have a formula in
math, you put in these numbers

and you get those numbers out.

And if you don't get the numbers out,
it's wrong and you need to go back.

And there's a certain way of thinking
about business problems in statistics

or in maybe marketing or definitely
operations in that kind of linear way.

And so I think we need to understand
that's how some functions work

and think and that we need to
educate the design is different.

It's often non linear.

We don't know the answer until
we throw a bunch of things at

the wall and test it out and try.

And sometimes that iteration
and that process can feel a

little um, unfamiliar to people.

So I think there's a good amount of
alignment that has to be done, but then

also a good amount of pushing on why
we're there and why we think differently

and why we operate differently and how
that's valuable to have that diversified

opinion and diversified approach to
all the other functions that exist.

Christian: Yeah.

Talking about how we
operate a bit differently.

Let's unpack a little bit, this
idea of that sometimes it's okay

to scrap incremental testing.

And to go for something completely
different, you, there's another post

that you wrote you were talking about the
Airbnbs booking flow and how incremental

testing didn't do so much and um, you've
just changed strategy and did something

completely different, operated completely
different than how normally you would.

Tell us a little story there and
what the learning is from it.

Ryan: Yeah, this is a great case
study that touches on a few things

that we've spoken about today.

Yeah.

So the background of this is I was on
a team that operated outside of kind

of Airbnb's normal operating mode.

It was a little tiger team that
got to redesign the entire mobile

website from the ground up.

And so traditionally the business had
these silos and you've got the booking

team and they own Android and desktop
and iOS and all these platforms.

And so every team owned vertically
all these different platforms.

And so we spun up this team to say, we
need to redo the entire mobile website

and we're going to work horizontally.

We get to own the mobile website platform
and we just own every surface on that.

And so it gave us the ability to ask,
are all of these individual surfaces

that people have been optimizing?

Are they working well horizontally?

Do we need to change anything?

And we got to kind of go back
to every piece of Airbnb and

say, could this be better?

What should we do?

And so I started digging into the
booking flow and realizing that

there was a lot of optimization
that we had the potential to do.

And so this is a good example
of kind of building stakeholder

consensus incrementally.

I gathered an initial group of people
who were interested in having that

conversation from each of these
different teams that own parts of this

very long booking flow experience and
just asking the questions and doing

that active listening and starting to
understand what they cared about and

why and what their world was like.

But I got to be in the position of
that facilitator who's having all these

individual conversations horizontally that
weren't happening already organically.

From there we were saying, okay,
let's do a little sprint and

come up with some new ideas.

And just asking some of those questions
generated enough excitement that more

people started paying attention and
we're like, okay, that is a good point.

Yeah, we could do that better.

What happened was then Alex Schleifer got
involved and got on board and got really

excited about, okay, this could be better.

We could do something that's more
of a step function improvement.

Then more people got on board and then
we had Brian Chesky up at all hands

saying booking is one of the most
important things we can do this year.

And so then everyone was on board with
this vision that we were creating.

Through that process underneath,
we were always iterating and doing

research and doing some initial tests
to see where things were landing.

And a lot of these incremental tests
weren't coming back dramatically positive.

One of the nice things about Airbnb was.

We could say, look, we just know
what feels better as a designer.

And we could try to incrementally
test this to a step function level

improvement, but it's really difficult.

And sometimes you just need
to hit the reset button.

And even just from a thought exercise,
think of what if we blew this whole

thing up and started over, would we
arrive at the same place we are today?

And the answer was no.

And so what started out as a thought
exercise started to become the

reality of, we should just start over.

And just because we didn't incrementally
test this every little change A, B

tested to statistical significance
rigorously, doesn't mean we didn't

validate the things we were doing.

We were always talking to customers.

We were always looking at new
paradigms in the industry that

we could borrow that were proven.

So we're always doing things
that were backed in data, even

if it wasn't like testing so
rigorously and we still test it.

We still launch, but we launched
bigger things that we felt more

comfortable about because we
had spoken to so many customers.

And when we did this larger release,
it was very positive because we had

taken that time to back all the way up.

And instead of coming up with what
initially was this like very robust

experimentation plan, and largely that
experimentation plan was created to

get executives on board, once they got
on board and said, Let's just do this.

Go make it better.

We were like, great.

And we got to kind of remove
ourselves from that having to craft

this like Uh, the thorough narrative
to let's think a lot bigger.

And it was a really successful
project and a lot of fun to work on.

Christian: Yeah, I bet.

I know you talk a lot about the
quality of the team around you.

As a designer, you oftentimes are judged
by some of the work that you don't do

yourself necessarily, whether that's
engineering work, whether that's, a PM

product, marketing, whatever it may be.

And I'm wondering what are your thoughts
around, how do you assess the quality

of the team that's around you as a
designer, whether that's before you join

a company or perhaps when you're in the
company, or is that too late already?

Ryan: That's such a good question.

This is a struggle.

This is a challenge.

But to start, you're absolutely right
in that, and I've experienced this where

you might have the best user experience,
you might have the best design, you

might have validated it with customers.

But the back end isn't set up
correctly, and it's impossible

to build, or impossible to build
in a certain reasonable time

frame, or it costs too much money.

If the PMs, so many times I've
realized the user experience is really

dependent upon that experimentation
cycle and what's getting prioritized.

You could prioritize of a function
part of a feature or draw the MVP

line too low, and it's not really
MVP from a design perspective, from

a customer perspective, but it's
feasible to launch in a two week sprint.

All of those things that other teams
have control over change your ability

to do good work, change your ability
to ship bigger things, change your

ability to ask bigger questions.

So assessing when you go into a company,
I think a couple things, one, the

willingness to ask bigger questions,
that's where I've struggled is like,

I'm going to be the person who comes
in and says, what if we blew the whole

thing up and it's just started over?

I don't think that's a realistic
thing to do every time, but it's a

great question to ask just to shake
people out of kind of their thinking.

So are people accepting of that or,
you know, is the PM saying no, no,

no, like that is not on the roadmap.

We can't do that.

Or the engineer says that I've seen
engineers eyes just get wide with that

question and their faces just go blank.

So there's a little indicators and
you might not get a sense of this

perfectly until you're in a company
of like how things are set up.

And every company I've worked
at is like more chaotic when you

actually get into the company.

And you're like, Oh, like I thought
this was all really well figured out and

there's actually a lot of work to do,
which can be an opportunity to to, to

change things and make things better.

But I think that assessment comes down
to is this a collaborative environment?

Are people okay with asking big
questions or are they afraid

of asking those questions?

If we can make an argument that says
this is valuable to the business

because it's valuable to our
customers, are we willing to start?

Even if that starting point is not as
holistic as redo the whole thing, and

it is more incremental, are designers
is going to be involved in that process.

One question I would ask is what influence
does design have over the product roadmap?

Are you part of that conversation?

Are the PMs in a room by themselves
deciding the product roadmap?

And then they give it to you,
or are you participating?

The two factors I would look for are
that open mindedness to collaboration and

the willingness to ask bigger questions,
and the lack of risk aversion in terms

of at least just asking the question.

Christian: I really liked that
question of how involved is design

in deciding what's on the roadmap.

I think that oftentimes tells a
lot about how a company works and

how it values design more so than
their mission statement on the

website or whatever else it may be.

So I really liked that one.

Ryan: And what's interesting about
that too, is everyone's going to

have an opinion about design, right?

Everyone is going to see a design and
they're going to have some thought on

what you should do differently, the
PM, the engineers, the executives.

And so it should be fair that design
has an opinion on the roadmap or,

maybe if you're more technical, some
thoughts on the architecture and

whether it's going to scale, because
we might want to move the product

strategically in this or that direction.

So I think it's fair if everyone
has an opinion about design,

the design's also involved.

And when you get that asymmetry, that's
where you start to see there'd be

issues with the culture and it becomes
a lot more challenging to be a designer

.
Christian: Before we bring this one home,
I really want to touch upon accelerate

design company, which is your baby.

And you have a really cool mission
of of helping mid career designers

develop their business skills
to do more influential work.

It's really what we've been talking about
today, but I wanted to highlight that

then ask a couple of questions about it.

You know, How are you doing this?

How are you coaching designers?

Are they coming to you with specific
problems or are you helping them

figure out where they could improve?

How does that work on a daily basis?

How do you work with
designers to help them grow?

Ryan: Yeah, so there's a couple
of different ways and I'll start

with kind of the thesis for the
business, which is there are so many

resources for early stage designers.

There's a million boot camps, there's
a million videos, everyone will teach

you how to use the tools, you can take
all kinds of workshops on Figma, but

designers, I think, hit a wall around
their mid career, where, we talked about

this spectrum of art to business where
they might want to be shifting to be

more strategically- involved or have
more impact or at least have more self

determination over the work they want
to do and more opinion on that road map,

what's coming down and do I agree with
that being something I want to work with?

So I think that there's this stall out
that kind of happens mid career where the

stakeholder management, the communication
skills, the storytelling, and the

MBA- level business understanding and
business skills become really relevant

if you want to either participate more
holistically as an IC or become a leader.

And so my theory is that
there's not enough resources

to help people bridge that gap.

So that's what's really driving this.

The ways I I'm expressing that so far
and the strategy I'm taking is one with

courses that I'm launching that are
really hyper targeted towards senior

lead staff, principal level designers
in bridging some of those gaps and

developing some of those skills.

So that's where describing
the ROI of design comes in.

And what are the frameworks for us
to connect up to business value,

understand what businesses do.

And then on coaching, it's a lot more
like a managerial relationship where it's,

you know, my, my theory is that it should
be very tailored toward the individual

and understanding what their needs are.

And so some people are
going through job changes.

Some people have questions
about their career trajectory.

Some people have a meeting with the CTO
coming up and they need to come up with

a narrative and be able to feel a little
more confident going into that meeting.

And just having a sounding board
is really valuable to them.

And so I tailor all of my sessions
and tailor all of my direction to that

individual's unique needs on that week,
while also trying to weave in what is

your longer term career goal and strategy.

So we're we're doing some short
term work, but we're also keeping

an eye on that long term trajectory.

Christian: And if someone comes to you
thinking, Ryan, I need some help with

X, what could they then expect from you?

Is it a weekly relationship?

Is it a monthly?

Is it a call?

Is it?

How does that work?

Ryan: Yeah., it varies per person.

Usually it's one to two calls a month.

And we'll hop on for about an hour
people will come prepared and then maybe

send me in advance a few notes on what
they want to talk about, and we'll see

where the conversation goes from there.

Sometimes we uncover something that they
hadn't thought about before, and we'll

want to dig into some tactics, but I try
to bringing, and we'll want And every

month or every two weeks, give them
something tactical that they can react to.

And I describe it as a
very iterative process.

We're going to talk about your goals.

We're going to come up with some tactics.

You're going to take that back to work.

And you're going to try some of those
things and then see what happens.

And did the company receive it well?

Does it match with your culture?

Did you get some pushback?

Let's analyze the results we got.

Very.

It's very iterative and very experimental,
and then we'll pivot and adjust and

dial things in as we go from there.

Meeting every two weeks allows you to
shorten that iteration cycle, but once

a month is also enough when people have
these big moments they can prioritize

and say, I'm really stuck on this,
or I really need help with this.

And that, even just monthly, helps a
lot of people get through those things.

Christian: So tailored to you,
tactical, leave with something you

can apply tomorrow if you want to.

And then in a couple of weeks
come back and let's discuss how

that worked, whether it worked
and what if you had any pushback.

So it's a, it's this feed continuous
feedback loop of you feed in different.

ideas tactics, whatever it may be.

And then people, your coaching
would go in and apply that

in and try to make it work.

Ryan: The other benefit of coaching, I
think, is that that coach is not part

of the political scene in your company.

So this is someone you can share anything
with and get feedback from who's going to

look at things from an outside perspective
and bring in new types of ideas.

And I've had people say, I don't feel
comfortable sharing this with my manager,

but can you give me some perspective
on how to deal with my manager?

So I think that's really beneficial.

And then the other side that's
interesting about having a coach

is that person can transcend jobs.

And I've had managers who I worked
really well with that they leave or

I leave and you lose that rapport
and you lose that relationship.

And maybe that person you stay in
touch with a little bit, but they're

not able to coach you on your next job
and so I think having that person that

transcends jobs and is able to see
you from one job to another and talk

about it your overall journey and, what
can you learn from one environment?

I think someone talked to me about,
I need to figure out what my first

90 day plan is on my new job.

So how can someone transcend those jobs
and keep an eye on your overall, like

journey as a designer through your career.

Christian: Awesome.

That's great to hear.

I love this approach.

I think it's also super important for.

designers, cause you said you're focusing
a lot on that mi d level where these

things start to become very important.

But I think if I can add something,
I think mentorship and coaching are

important at every step of your career.

And it's, you can always learn something.

You can always learn from someone else.

So whether that's by listening
to a customer actually working

with someone like you, I think
these are all very valuable.

We're all we should all grow at all times.

So let's bring this one home.

I always ask the same two questions
at the end of the podcast.

I'm curious to see how every single person
answers that same question differently.

So I'm going to ask you the same.

If you would have to highlight one
action that you think led to your success

that in a way or another separated
you from some of your peers, what

would you say that would be for you?

Ryan: So early career when I'm in high
school and I'm interested in design,

the thing that was different was I took
every single project I could possibly

get, and it didn't matter if it was like
a 20 business card project redesign.

I think I got paid 20 bucks to redesign
a substitute teacher's business card.

I think there were classmates who
made fun of me, because I was like

hired to optimize web photos for a
website that sold GI Joes to hobbyists.

I took every single job.

And it had nothing to do with like how
glorious it was, but I was learning

graphic design, I was practicing image
optimization for web and photography.

I was getting all these little skills.

And so, um, you know, I've worked at
some organizations where I've given

learning opportunities to designers
and they say, Oh, I don't want to

do that project because my advisor
said I need to learn this specific

thing or have this on my resume.

So I'm not going to do that.

And they passed up this learning
-opportunity, which is okay.

Like sometimes you don't have time
or sometimes it's not the right fit

and you should feel empowered to
not take things that are exploitive

or not the right thing for you.

But I do feel like you
shouldn't over optimize.

You shouldn't try to like cherry
pick the right experiences.

What I did was just take as much as
I could possibly get my hands on.

And that gave me a lot of
kind of tangential skills.

So one, I'm learning all these design
skills because I'm so hands on so

many different things simultaneously.

But I'm also learning how to sell
to all these different clients.

I'm learning how to manage my
time as a full time student while

managing 15 clients at the same time.

And so I think there is a benefit
to if you want to do something, do

as much of it as you possibly can.

And not over optimize for what is quote,
like the right experience for your

resume because that will result in time.

Christian: I think it's also about
not getting precious about all

the work you do at some point.

Yeah, perhaps you can, but at least in
the beginning of your career, I also

find it very important to try to do
as many things as possible, because

otherwise, how will you find out what
you like when you haven't tried to

do different types of design work?

So I think that goes hand in hand
with some of my experience as well,

where I still remember as you were
talking, some of these projects had

flashbacks of websites that I spent
weeks on for 50 and things like that.

But yeah, I guess I am here now.

So if something has worked the last
question is what are we not talking

about when it comes to design?

Thank you.

Ryan: This is a big one.

I think there needs to be more
formal business education in the

design industry and I think that
starts at even the academic level.

So many design departments, in
universities are rooted in art

departments and I do think that creates
a misunderstanding for the business folks

who don't see design and aren't connected
to the art department in any way.

They're not witnessing design and design's
not talking to the business folks.

And it creates this misconception
the design is about art.

And it deprives designers
from the understanding of the

application of their work.

The expectation is that you,
as you grow in your career,

you'll impact the business more.

And you'll likely want to do that.

You'll want to have more influence and
you'll want to move down that spectrum.

Like we talked about, designers learn
business through osmosis, but that's

really inefficient, and that trial and
error can be really costly to your career.

In your career, you only
get so many at bats.

You can only have so many jobs and
then you retire and you can only make

so many quote mistakes on your resume.

And so you want to try to learn those
things in an efficient way as possible.

So I would love to see there
be more business curriculum

in every design department in
every university in the world.

Short of that, I think designers
need to go and educate themselves on

business more formally, whether that's
through classes like mine or, Khan

Academy or whatever, having a mentor
that's on the business side of the

organization, not just design mentors.

I spoke to someone and they're
considering a master's.

I said, don't go get
your master's in design.

You've got that box checked,
diversify, go study some business

in whatever way makes sense for you.

But I do think more formal business
education is really valuable.

I think it's a key that's missing.

I don't think a lot of people
have done it, so you won't hear

many people advocating for it.

But having done it myself, I
think it's really critical and

will change your perspective.

Christian: Thank you for that, Ryan.

What can people find more about
you, read what you write ,find the

course, where can they get in touch?

Ryan Scott: Yeah.

I'm on LinkedIn and would love
to chat and then my course is

currently being hosted on maven.

com in the design section.

So there's many, many great
courses on Maven and I've got

a great relationship with them.

So I highly recommend also
taking business courses on Maven.

Those are all great places to
connect and learn more and I am

always happy to chat with designers.

The best part of my job is talking to
just dozens of designers from around

the world all day long and always
happy to continue the conversation.

Christian: That's awesome.

We'll put all of this in the show
notes so people can easily find you.

Ryan, this has been hour that
has passed by very quickly.

So thank you for that.

I hope people have learned a lot
and enjoyed it as much as I did.

And I hope you enjoyed it as well.

So thank you very much.

And I will speak soon.

Thanks for having me.

If you've listened this far well, you've
made it to the end of season three.

We've learned so much from Alastair
at Dropbox walking us through his

great framework to present work.

Maria Pentkovski telling us about
the importance of coaching Tom Scott

shedding light on what we can do to
increase our chances of getting a job.

This has been such an insights back
10 episodes, and this is by far the

best season of the podcast, and I'm so
excited to try to best it once again

with season four later this year.

Catch you all then.