Progression Podcast
By Progression
With the help of regular contributors and special guests, we dig into why that is, tackling questions around managing vs making, missing manager tools, soft and hard skills and training, compensation and navigating a new job that's right for you.
Progression PodcastJun 13, 2019
#29 Jackie Bavaro (Asana, Google) on having impact as a Product Manager
Jackie Bavaro was most recently Head of Product Management for eight years at Asana, the well-loved work management software, where she joined pre-launch as the first PM. During her tenure, she grew the PM team to over twenty amazing people, helped Asana's go from $0 to more than $100 million in annual recurring revenue, and launched Asana's associate product manager program.
Jackie has since written two fantastic books on PM careers - 'Cracking the PM career' and 'Cracking the PM interview'.
In this episode we talk about Jackie's growth as a PM at Asana, defining impact in role, working with founders, navigating feedback and her 'Do, Try, Consider' framework which we've now implemented at Progression.
Links
Jackie's tweet referencing the framework we talk about in the podcast
Jackie's interview on Lenny's pod
Jonny can be found at https://twitter.com/jonnyburch
Who else should we be speaking to?
Be on the pod! Tell us about someone great! Just email hello@progression.co and tell us more.
Rate us!
It really helps if you rate us on iTunes. You can do that right here. https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/progression-podcast/id1435509539
Progression is free for your first team of 10
Sign up at progression.co
#28 Steve Bianchi (Beamery, Unilever) on the rise of the people-focused COO and a capability-based future
This week Jonny chats to Steve Bianchi, CHRO and COO of talent operating system Beamery. A real futurist and systems thinker, Steve gets into the future of the people team, why people leaders make good Chief Operating Officers and imagines a future where we’re hired not based on our university and CV but by our skills and ambition.
Links:
Steve on Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stevenbianchi
Beamery: https://beamery.com/
Jonny can be found at https://twitter.com/jonnyburch
Who else should we be speaking to?
Be on the pod! Tell us about someone great! Just email podcast@progressionapp.com and tell us more.
Our lovely sponsor: Progression!
We're tackling meaty problems around career growth and hiring engineers and designers at the moment. Read more and find our open roles on our careers page: progressionapp.com/careers
Rate us!
It really helps if you rate us on iTunes. You can do that right here. https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/progression-podcast/id1435509539
#27 Lucas Coelho (Roam Digital) on building an academy, leadership lessons and how to run a happy team
In this episode Jonny chats to Lucas Coelho — VP of design at Roam Digital — about growing as a leader, his thoughts on how to build a bench of good junior folks, being honest and learning from failure and his experience building progression frameworks and using Progression. Lucas is a Progression customer, but we try and steer well clear of that until the very end.
Lucas Links:
https://twitter.com/coelholucas
Lucas's talk at Figma Config: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YCsSKDh8gBg
Jonny can be found at https://twitter.com/jonnyburch
Who else should we be speaking to?
Be on the pod! Tell us about someone great! Just email podcast@progressionapp.com and tell us more.
Our lovely sponsor: Progression!
We're tackling meaty problems around career growth and hiring engineers and designers at the moment. Read more and find our open roles on our careers page: https://progressionapp.com/careers
Rate us!
It really helps if you rate us on iTunes. You can do that right here. https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/progression-podcast/id1435509539
#26 Brian Lovin (Github, Spectrum, Design Details) on the rise of the senior IC
In this episode, Jonny chats with Brian about the rise of the very senior IC (Individual Contributor) - a subject close to our heart at Progression. We also go into the process of creating a startup and Brian's experience building and exiting Spectrum, his mixed feelings about how much we should be optimising for titles and putting yourself out there on the internet.
Brian is a designer at Github, co-host of the very popular Design Details podcast and most recently published a collection of interviews with senior designers on staff.design.
Brian Links:
- https://brianlovin.com/
- https://twitter.com/brian_lovin
- https://staff.design/
- https://designdetails.fm/
- https://nav.al/principal-agent
Jonny can be found at https://twitter.com/jonnyburch
Who else should we be speaking to?
Be on the pod! Tell us about someone great! Just email podcast@progressionapp.com and tell us more.
Our lovely sponsor: Progression!
We're tackling meaty problems around career growth and hiring engineers and designers at the moment. Read more and find our open roles on our careers page: https://progressionapp.com/careers
Rate us!
It really helps if you rate us on iTunes. You can do that right here. https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/progression-podcast/id1435509539
#25 Sarah Clatterbuck (Yahoo, LinkedIn, Google) on frameworks for startups vs large orgs and avoiding anti-patterns
In this episode, Sarah Clatterbuck, Senior Director of Engineering at Google sits down with Neil to discuss a whole range of topics including:
- What is was like in the LinkedIn engineering team as they grew from 300 to 3000
- How Sarah recommends startups and scale-ups think about rolling out progression frameworks for the first time
- How to think about and reduce unconscious bias and anti-patterns in frameworks
Links:
- Sarah on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/sarahclatterbuck/
- Sarah on Twitter https://twitter.com/girodchatterbox
- Neil on Twitter: https://twitter.com/ncameron
Who else should we be speaking to?
Be on the pod! Tell us about someone great! Just email podcast@progressionapp.com and tell us more.
Our lovely sponsor: Progression!
We're tackling meaty problems around career growth and hiring engineers and designers at the moment. Read more and find our open roles on our careers page: https://progressionapp.com/careers
Rate us!
It really helps if you rate us on iTunes. You can do that right here. https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/progression-podcast/id1435509539
Image credit: Kevin Scott
#24: Jessie Hayes (Whereby, Box) on treating people like a product and keeping frameworks light
This episode, Jonny chats to Jessie Hayes, VP People and Talent at Whereby, the London video platform.
As one of the first 'People people' on the pod, Jessie goes through her personal career journey to get to Whereby, through large companies (Goldman Sachs, Box) to small, then we dig into how to treat your people function like a product which your employees subscribe to (very novel and clever) and then get Jessie's thoughts on progression frameworks, where they've succeeded and failed and what they're doing about it at Whereby today as they scale to 160+.
Jessie's links:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/jessicamayhayes/
https://twitter.com/hijessiemay
Jonny:
https://twitter.com/jonnyburch
Who else should we be speaking to?
Be on the pod! Tell us about someone great! Just email podcast@progressionapp.com and tell us more.
Our lovely sponsor: Progression!
We're tackling meaty problems around career growth and hiring engineers and designers at the moment. Read more and find our open roles on our careers page: https://progressionapp.com/careers
Rate us!
It really helps if you rate us on iTunes. You can do that right here. https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/progression-podcast/id1435509539
#23: Gonçalo Silva (CTO, Doist) on building progression frameworks for a distributed team
We're back after a bit of a break with a new series of Progression Pods - this time we're mixing up the presenter so watch out for some new voices from the team.
In this episode, Gonçalo Silva, CTO at Doist (creators of Todoist and Twist) sits down with Neil to discuss the nine month process they went through to create a progression framework for their globally distributed team of 100 people.
They discuss building the framework transparently, iteratively gathering and incorporating team member feedback and how they use their framework to help determine compensation.
Links:
https://twitter.com/goncalossilva
https://doist.com
https://todoist.com
https://twist.com
Neil on Twitter: https://twitter.com/ncameron
Who else should we be speaking to?
Be on the pod! Tell us about someone great! Just email podcast@progressionapp.com and tell us more.
Our lovely sponsor: Progression!
We're tackling meaty problems around career growth and hiring engineers and designers at the moment. Read more and find our open roles on our careers page: progressionapp.com/careers
Rate us!
It really helps if you rate us on iTunes. You can do that right here. https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/progression-podcast/id1435509539
#22: Inside Progression Ep2 — Jonny and Neil catch-up
It's been a while since Jonny and Neil sat down to talk through Product progress, plans and strategy. This somewhat unplanned ramble-chat covers how we're thinking about high touch vs low touch go-to-market, COVID impact, honing the problem we're solving and for who.
Of course, Neil also reviews a biscuit.
We have no new guest interview episodes planned (it's been a busy few months) but if you like these team chats please let us know and we can do more of them!
Anti-racism statement
During this episode we reference a statement on anti-racism and our stance, that we planned to be an intro to the episode but we decided to make it its own episode. The audio and transcript of that is here: https://www.progressionapp.com/posts/anti-racism-statement/ — please do give it a listen, we're learning and would love your feedback.
Other links
As always, you can give Progression a try at https://progressionapp.com
All previous episodes now available on our blog: https://progressionapp.com/blog
Jonny on Twitter: https://twitter.com/jonnyburch
Neil on Twitter: https://twitter.com/ncameron
Progression anti-racism statement
A statement about our Anti-racism stance and plans for making Progression an anti-racist product and business.
Read the full statement and more detail on our action items here: https://progressionapp.com/posts/anti-racism-statement/
#21 Cap Watkins (Primary, Buzzfeed) on helping new managers and the problem with taking other people's career ladders
Cap Watkins is CXO at Primary, where he's responsible for Design, Product, People and engineering (oh my!).
In the recent past, he was a professional leadership coach and organizational consultant at Practical Works, helping senior contributors, first-time managers and managers-of-managers grow and evolve in their roles. Previously, he was VP of Design at BuzzFeed, where he managed Product Design.
While at Buzzfeed Cap also created one of the most popular design frameworks on progression.fyi – https://www.progression.fyi/f/buzzfeed, which he then blogged about warning people not to use it directly. We talked about that along with several of his blog posts, including:
https://capwatkins.com/blog/skip-the-shortcuts
https://capwatkins.com/blog/two-questions
I'd been following and nagging Cap for an interview for months, so it's funny that it then took me six months to get the resulting interview out. It's a great and very much evergreen interview though, so lots to dig into.
Find cap on:
Who else should we be speaking to?
Be on the pod! Tell us about someone great! Just email podcast@progressionapp.com and tell us more.
Our lovely sponsor: Deliveroo
Our wonderful sponsor Deliveroo is looking for loads of designers, researchers, writers as well as leaders and managers. Go check them out at https://deliveroo.design
Join the waitlist
We’re aiming to launch soon, but if you want to jump the gun or just be in the loop, get involved in our waitlist. progressionapp.com
Rate us!
It really helps if you rate us on iTunes. You can do that right here. https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/progression-podcast/id1435509539
#20: Irene Au (Khosla Ventures, Google) on scaling design teams and practices, scaling yourself and finding your why
About Irene
Irene is a designer and veteran design leader, leading design and user experience at Google, Yahoo, Netscape, and Udacity. She was once even the most prolific hirer of UX talent in silicon valley.
She now works as an operational partner at Khosla Ventures, working with fast growing portfolio companies on design and strategic problems at the highest level, as well as teaching yoga.
Our conversation covered scaling design across some of the most well known and iconic companies in the world as well as extrinsic vs intrinsic motivation, using envy to identify what you enjoy and finding the thing that gives you joy.
I loved this conversation – Irene absolutely (but politely) schooled me on some of my assumptions about the evolution of design and I learned a ton. I hope you do too!
Irene's website: ireneau.com
Irene on Twitter: twitter.com/ireneau
Design your Life – Irene's medium blog: https://medium.com/design-your-life
Who else should we be speaking to?
Be on the pod! Tell us about someone great! Just email podcast@progressionapp.com and tell us more.
Our lovely sponsor: Deliveroo
Our wonderful sponsor Deliveroo is looking for loads of designers, researchers, writers as well as leaders and managers. Go check them out at https://deliveroo.design
We're looking for new sponsors! hit us up: podcast@progressionapp.com
Join the waitlist
We’re aiming to launch soon, but if you want to jump the gun or just be in the loop, get involved in our waitlist. progressionapp.com
Rate us!
It really helps if you rate us on iTunes. You can do that right here. https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/progression-podcast/id1435509539
#19: Ryan Carson (CEO, Treehouse) on a winding journey to training 100,000 new software engineers
About Ryan
Ryan Carson has been a huge figure in tech and online learning for a long time now through his company Treehouse, but his journey to get there and onwards from this success story is a journey of learning about himself, what he loves and also his privilege. From Carsonified, his tech conference startup based in the UK through Treehouse to Project unlock the American dream (training 100,000 Americans from diverse backgrounds into software engineering apprenticeships), he talks through his biggest challenge yet.
Ryan on twitter: https://twitter.com/ryancarson
Treehouse: https://teamtreehouse.com
Project unlock the american dream: https://projectunlocktheamericandream.org
Ryan's book recommendations
The New Jim Crow: https://www.amazon.com/dp/1595586431
Seeing White: https://www.amazon.com/Seeing-White-Introduction-Privilege-Race/dp/1442203080
Who else should we be speaking to?
Be on the pod! Tell us about someone great! Just email podcast@progressionapp.com and tell us more.
Our lovely sponsor: Deliveroo
Our wonderful sponsor Deliveroo is looking for loads of designers, researchers, writers as well as leaders and managers. Go check them out at https://deliveroo.design
Join the waitlist
We’re aiming to launch soon, but if you want to jump the gun or just be in the loop, get involved in our waitlist. progressionapp.com
Rate us!
It really helps if you rate us on iTunes. You can do that right here. https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/progression-podcast/id1435509539
#18 Anne-Laure Le Cunff on mindfulness, burnout, writing every day and building a business
Today’s guest: Anne-Laure Le Cunff
Anne-Laure is a prolific writer, thinker and learner. From a background in tech at companies like Google, she's spend the last year or so focused on entrepreneurial projects, culminating in her own Venture Studio Ness Labs, dedicated to products that help people be happier and healthier. She's hugely active in the online entrepreneurial community, championing learning and personal development with a broad set of 6000+ folks following along through her newsletter.
As a fellow maker and founder, Anne-Laure and I talk less about team building and more about the journey of starting something new, compound interest when it comes to writing, being an active learner and a company of one.
Anne-Laure's company: https://nesslabs.com/ and newsletter: https://nesslabs.com/newsletter
Maker Mag: https://makermag.com/
Anne-Laure on Twitter: https://twitter.com/anthilemoon
Our lovely sponsor: Deliveroo
Our wonderful sponsor Deliveroo is looking for loads of designers, researchers, writers as well as leaders and managers. Go check them out at https://deliveroo.design
Join the waitlist
We’re aiming to launch in the first quarter of next year, but if you want to jump the gun or just be in the loop, get involved in our waitlist. https://progressionapp.com
Rate us!
It really helps if you rate us on iTunes. You can do that right here. https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/progression-podcast/id1435509539
Who else should we be speaking to?
Be on the pod! Tell us about someone great! Just email podcast@progressionapp.com and tell us more.
#17 Kara DeFrias on changing careers, curing cancer and being a sponsor
I loved chatting to Kara back in August, excited to finally get this episode out to your ears!
Kara started her career as an instructional designer, eventually working her way to leading user experience design through experience at (amongst others) top-flight companies in sport (the Super Bowl), Film (Oscars) and politics, both as senior advisor to 18F and as Biden's Director of UX during Obama's cancer moonshot. She was also one of the first Presidential Innovation Fellows.
We talked about Instructional design, meeting Obama, pale males, career progression of a person vs a professional and where you can use existing skills in new ways and readjust your career to suit the things you’re good at AND the things you love.
We also covered attempting to cure cancer, doing user-centred design in government, being a good sponsor and our mutual love of the West Wing.
Show links
Obama announcing the cancer moonshot: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-W2Fl_X_6I4
Kara's article on how to care and feed a team: https://medium.com/@karadefrias/the-product-managers-guide-to-the-care-and-feeding-of-humans-ee2854bc5944
Find Kara on the web at https://www.karadefrias.com/, and on twitter at https://twitter.com/karadefrias.
Who else should we be speaking to?
We have a fantastic set of interviews already recorded so we're sorted for getting into your ear-holes for this year, but we're looking for guests for 2020 episodes, so if you or someone you know is doing great work, let us know! Even better if it's someone who might not be regulars on other podcasts or stages.
Just email podcast@progressionapp.com and tell us more.
Our lovely sponsor: Deliveroo!
Our wonderful sponsor Deliveroo is looking for loads of designers, researchers, writers as well as leaders and managers. It really is an exciting and fun place to work (I should know as an alumni).
Go check out the team, blog and open roles at deliveroo.design or follow them on twitter: https://twitter.com/deliveroodesign
#16 Dave Malouf on Design Ops and the power of speaking on stage
Dave Malouf is a veteran design leader, strategist, facilitator, researcher, and educator who has worked with some of the largest and fastest growing organizations globally. He's probably best known for his work around Design Ops, that slightly nebulous set of practices that help design organisations to scale.
We get right into defining then pulling Design Ops apart, as well as touching on how speaking globally informs his practice and gives him energy.
Dave on Twitter: https://twitter.com/daveixd
Worth watching: Dave's keynote at IxDA Rio
Who else should we be speaking to?
We have a fantastic set of interviews already recorded so we're sorted for getting into your ear-holes for this year, but we're looking for guests for 2020 episodes, so if you or someone you know is doing great work, let us know! Even better if it's someone who might not be regulars on other podcasts or stages.
Just email podcast@progressionapp.com and tell us more.
Our lovely sponsor: Deliveroo!
Our wonderful sponsor Deliveroo is looking for loads of designers, researchers, writers as well as leaders and managers. It really is an exciting and fun place to work (I should know as an alumni).
Go check out the team, blog and open roles at deliveroo.design or follow them on twitter: https://twitter.com/deliveroodesign
Join the waitlist
We’re aiming to launch in the first quarter of next year, but if you want to jump the gun or just be in the loop, get involved in our waitlist. progressionapp.com
You can also follow us on Twitter: https://twitter.com/progressionapp – send us a tweet with your thoughts on the pod!
#15: Inside Progression with Jonny and Neil – teamwork, a new feature and biscuit reviews
Hey friends! It's been a while...
We're having a mini-break from regular episodes for the summer, but to celebrate Neil officially joining the team (about 4 months ago) as a cofounder, we decided to chat about working together and finding each other, our new feature 'check-ins' and our favourite office snack, the mighty Choco Leibniz.
We'll be back with a new season, fantastic guests, a shiny new sponsor and more great interviews in a couple of weeks.
Neil can be found at:
Jonny is, as ever, at
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Remember to join the Progression waitlist for all the latest on our product, including invites to the product before anyone else.
#14: Todd Zaki Warfel (Leadership coach, Design Career Index report) on frameworks and job satisfaction
Todd is a Design leader, leadership coach and lifelong learner. He recently released findings from a survey of over 800 design teams globally, with a focus on career growth and team health.
We dive into his findings- getting through everything from hiring to attrition and the relative importance of different factors in someone's decision to leave. And the results are interesting: it turns out that 35% of people list lack of career growth as their reason for leaving a company, but under 4% of design teams have a progression framework.
We also dig into some of the stats around progression frameworks – when do companies roll them out and when should you start considering one for your team.
Enjoy!
Todd online:
On Twitter: https://twitter.com/zakiwarfel
Todd's site: http://zakiwarfel.com
The report: http://zakiwarfel.com/dci-report/
His great talk at Leading Design last year: https://vimeo.com/297967955
Progression
Get your waitlist spot at progressionapp.com (we're going into Beta now so many more invites coming soon)
Me and progression:
#13: Sana Rao (Twitter, Deliveroo) on life changes, sponsorship and scaling design teams through change
Sana Rao was born in India, educated at the School of Visual Arts in NYC and spent 4 years at Twitter designing a bunch of the mobile experience we use today.
She's now Interim Head of Experience at Deliveroo, working out how to support the designers, researchers and content writers on their journey with the company as it grows.
Sana has taken huge risks, experienced twitter abuse, seen companies successfully improve diversity and has a fascinating story of her career to date. She's also a great friend and really interesting person!
Sana's links:
Sana on twitter: https://twitter.com/sanarao
Redesigning the content research and design org on Medium: https://medium.com/deliveroo-design/redesigning-the-content-research-design-org-50a204425b5c
Course materials from SVA: https://postindustrialdesign.school/#resources
SVA: http://www.sva.edu
Sponsor: Progression (har har)
This episode is sponsored by Progression, because why the hell not. Get your waitlist spot at progressionapp.com (we're going into Beta now so many more invites coming soon)
(A real sponsor will be back next episode)
Me and progression:
#12: Peter Merholz (Adaptive Path, Org Design for Design Orgs) on org design and ethics
In this twelfth episode of the Progression Podcast I'm chatting to Peter Merholz, co-founder of Adaptive Path, long time speaker and blogger on design scaling and co-author of Org Design for Design Orgs (2016).
We get into the weeds on his back story, including learning how to write and speak confidently. We then got onto managing up, down and across, his book and the ethics of design (and a designers' role within it). Finally we got to some listener questions from various Slack channels that I hang out on.
Peter's links:
Twitter: https://twitter.com/peterme
Peter's blog: https://www.peterme.com/
Org Design for Design Orgs (Amazon) https://www.amazon.co.uk/Org-Design-Orgs-Peter-Merholz/dp/1491938404
Coach, Diplomat, Advocate, Architect. Peter's talk at Leading Design: https://vimeo.com/243666544
Sponsor: Onfido 🙌
This episode is sponsored by Onfido! They're ruddy great, and are looking for a VP design (amongst other interesting design and product roles). Check out their open jobs here: onfido.com/jobs
Want to sponsor an episode, or suggest a guest? Email podcast@makegrow.co to get straight to me.
Me and progression:
#11: Braden Kowitz (Google Ventures, Range) on co-creating the Design Sprint, becoming a founder and his design journey
In this episode I'm talking to Braden Kowitz, an SF based designer and founder.
Braden's work has been hugely impactful on how we design today through his work on the Sprint book at Google Ventures. But his journey has also been an interesting one, leading from Google to working with startups to founding his own, Range.
We talk about finding meaningful work, bucking the trend of an expected design career, the dangers of a rigid ladder in a small team and much more.
Braden's Links
Range: https://www.range.co/
Braden's personal site: https://kowitz.co/
Braden on twitter: https://twitter.com/kowitz
The Sprint Book: https://www.thesprintbook.com/
Sponsor: Onfido 🙌
This episode is sponsored by Onfido! They're ruddy great, and are looking for a VP design (amongst other interesting design and product roles). Check out their open jobs here: onfido.com/jobs
Want to sponsor an episode, or suggest a guest? Email podcast@makegrow.co to get straight to me.
Me and progression:
#10: Jasmine Friedl (Intercom) on having a deliberate career and overcoming challenges
Jasmine Friedl is now Director of Design at Intercom in San Francisco, but has had an interesting, varied career, learning her trade at Facebook before some time at Udacity amongst others.
We talked about deliberately choosing a career that's right for you, learning from bad experiences, being lonely at the top, thoughtful leadership, privilege and much much more.
Links from the episode
Bad decisions and wrong turns: one girls guide to career success:
Women at Intercom microsite:
Find Jasmine at:
Sponsor: Onfido are great 🙌
This episode is sponsored by Onfido! They're ruddy great, and are looking for a design ops person (amongst other interesting design and product roles). Check out their open jobs here: onfido.com/jobs
Want to sponsor an episode, or suggest a guest? Email podcast@makegrow.co to get straight to me.
Me and progression:
#9: Kevin Goldsmith on the Spotify model and rolling out progression at scale
Back in January I chatted to Kevin Goldsmith, a very experienced technical leader with background at companies including Microsoft, Adobe, Spotify and more. He was at Spotify when they evolved their org, witnessing and helping to shape the 'Spotify model' which has now found so much popularity in teams around the world.
It's taken me ages to get this episode out, but it's a real corker for anyone thinking about scaling a team in tech. There's loads of lessons learned around parallel tracks, consensus-driven org decisions, managing a rollout of career progression in a company which had grown crazy fast with nothing and much, much more. Enjoy!
Links from the episode
Kevin on Conway's law (podcast):
The Spotify careers documentation:
https://labs.spotify.com/2016/02/15/spotify-technology-career-steps/
Kevin's current gig, Astrum U:
Find Kevin at:
https://www.kevingoldsmith.com/
https://twitter.com/KevinGoldsmith
Sponsor: Onfido are great 🙌
This episode is sponsored by Onfido! They're ruddy great, and are looking for a design ops person (amongst other interesting design and product roles). Check out their open jobs here: onfido.com/jobs
Want to sponsor an episode, or suggest a guest? Email podcast@makegrow.co to get straight to me.
Me and progression:
#8: Mills (ustwo) on having to change to stay the same
Mills is kind of a legend of the London product and agency scene and co-founder and cultural hub of ustwo, the company behind (amongst others) the multi-award-winning game Monument Valley.
Ustwo are now huge, with offices in several countries around the world and hundreds of employees, but 15 years ago Mills and Sinx, (the other one in us'two') didn't know what the hell they were doing.
Mills is now on his own journey of self discovery. We talk about what it means to have a good career, to build a business you want to work for, to find happiness and to recognise the need for change in order to get there.
Apologies for some wobbly sound, sirens and bumps - I wanted to get this pod out there in true JFDI (Just Fucking Do It, the name of Mills's pod) style.
Sponsor the pod!
I'm looking for sponsors for this podcast! I have a small but growing audience of designers and design leaders who may be looking for a new gig, or some new tools. So get in front of them for an absolute bargain basement price by emailing me at podcast@makegrow.co.
Mills:
https://twitter.com/millsustwo
https://soundcloud.com/thejfdicast
Jonny:
#7: Designing your design career, with Jonny and Austin
First podcast of the year! Took long enough...
Jonny and Austin chat about their upcoming workshop – a collaboration with General Assembly – for designers of all stripes to introspect about their design careers and set better goals.
Our first workshop is on the 14th of February, in London. Only 25 tickets total, grab yours (or gift to someone in your team) sharpish. jams.progressionapp.com
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Us:
Jonny: twitter.com/jonnyburch
Austin: twitter.com/austinkeeble
#6: Jason Mesut on Online Mistakes and Designer Shapes
As we know each other a bit, we glossed over some of the details of what we were talking about, so there's a list of useful links below to help you out.
The original design shapes article from a couple of years ago:
medium.com/amplify-design/shapes-of-ux-designer-ad047bddac7f
*That* linkedin post:
www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:6473433530352304128
Jason on Medium:
medium.com/@jasonmesut
Shaping design (Jason's recent December series): medium.com/shapingdesign
Resonant Design (Jason's company):
resdesin.com
Jason on the socials:
twitter.com/jasonmesut
linkedin.com/in/jasonmesut
**Please do leave this podcast a review on iTunes - it helps other people find me!**
Find me at:
twitter.com/jonnyburch
makegrow.co
progressionapp.com
#5: Lauren Currie and Bud Caddell on making work fair
We tackle a couple of meaty topics around diversity - how can we as an industry better empathise with and improve diversity in the workplace? Plus we get to hear about the inner machinations of NOBL and the other projects that Lauren is working on.
**Please do leave this podcast a review on iTunes - it helps other people find me!**
Find Lauren and Bud at:
twitter.com/redjotter
redjotter.com
twitter.com/bud_caddell
budcaddell.com
And NOBL at:
twitter.com/workNOBL
nobl.io
Lauren's other projects that we discussed:
weareupfront.com
pregnantthenscrewed.com
Find me at:
twitter.com/jonnyburch
makegrow.co
progressionpack.com
#4: Jonny and Austin chitchat
This episode we talk about the Progression Pack pilot, the importance of using data to power team growth, and the need for a more structured hiring process for diversity and the good of teams.
Also, the audio is gradually improving! By the tenth episode we'll be in This American Life territory.
I'm on a break now for a few weeks in India. Please do let me know what you thought of this episode and the pod in general, more in November.
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Useful links:
Austin:
austinkeeble.com
twitter.com/austinkeeble
Jonny:
progressionpack.com
jonnyburch.com
twitter.com/jonnyburch
Join the conversation:
progressionpack.com/chat
twitter.com/mkgrw
#3: Jen Dary on Becoming a Manager and Taking a Break
We talk about the strange need for managers and leaders to spend time creating physical things, the challenges of moving into management and how much it can help to chat things over with someone who can't fire you.
Jen is wicked fun, and a great guest. I hope you enjoy the chat as much as I did!
Any thoughts, feedback or questions - just email me: hello@makegrow.co. You can also record a message in anchor if you want to be featured on a future episode.
(I'm still working on sound quality - next episode won't sound like I'm in a bathroom or a record player, promise)
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Plucky: beplucky.com
Jen on twitter: twitter.com/jenniferdary
So Now You're A Manager: beplucky.com/manager
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Progression Pack: progressionpack.com
Join the community: progressionpack.com/chat
Me on twitter: twitter.com/jonnyburch
#2: Andy Budd on Ownership and UX titles
We talk about issues with designer titles, building an ownership mindset for your own career, agencies vs in-house, and bringing a new generation of designers into more senior design positions.
Got thoughts or feedback? Hit me up on twitter @jonnyburch or join the community at progressionpack.com/chat
Handy links:
- Andy on Twitter: twitter.com/andybudd
- Ladder of Accountability: bit.ly/2Nb580N
- Leading Design Conference: 2018.leadingdesignconf.com/
- Submarine Leadership: bit.ly/2xRbTQw
- The Peter principle: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_principle
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- Progression Pack: progressionpack.com
- Me on twitter: twitter.com/jonnyburch
Episode 1: Minimum Viable Podcast
Among other things I ask Austin for feedback on the work in progress intro to my upcoming course, and he gets into the weeds on the state of design short courses and bootcamps.
I'm looking for cracking guests and great topics to cover in future episodes. If you have an idea for either, or just some feedback about this episode, please get in touch on twitter (@mkgrw) or by joining the progression community at bit.ly/progression-chat
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Today's show with Austin Keeble www.allxdesign.com and Jonny Burch twitter.com/jonnyburch
Follow Make and Grow on twitter at twitter.com/mkgrw