Micah Zender

🚀 Honoring My Innovation Journey with SUPER JTBD Statement 🚀 Inspired by the insights of JTBD/Outcome Driven Innovation by Tony Ulwick, I've been applying JTBD principles in my CX/Product Design projects for years. Through experimentation and refinement, I've developed my version called SUPER JTBD Statement, a mashup of insights and techniques that I've found incredibly powerful in driving innovation forward. With SUPER JTBD Statement, we can: • Confirm with the customers/users with unparalleled clarity • Unite the internal team with a crystal-clear perspective • Tackle the right problems to solve with precision • Come up with innovative ideas that truly resonate with users and drive impact SUPER JTBD Framework: - As a [User/Customer] - I want to minimize [Direction of improvement] [Performance Metric] of [Object/Aspect to Adjust or Control] - When [Situation/Context] - So I can [Desired Outcome] - Making me feel [Emotional Job] and seen as [Social Job] - Because [Underlying Reason for this job] Explanation: - User/Customer: Identify the target user or customer who is experiencing a specific need or desire. - Direction of Improvement: Determine the aspect of the user's experience that needs improvement, such as minimizing, maximizing, optimizing, etc. - Performance Metric: Specify the measurable aspect of the user experience that you aim to improve. - Object/Aspect to Adjust or Control: Identify the element or aspect of the user's environment or situation that can be adjusted or controlled to achieve the desired improvement. - Situation/Context: Describe the circumstances or context in which the user experiences the need or desire. - Desired Outcome: Define the specific outcome or goal that the user hopes to achieve by addressing the need or desire. - Emotional Job: Identify the emotional aspect of the user's experience that is fulfilled by achieving the desired outcome. - Social Job: Describe how achieving the desired outcome contributes to the user's social status or perception. - Underlying Reason: Provide insight into the underlying motivation or reason driving the user's need or desire. It's been an incredible journey of learning and growth, and I'm excited to continue pushing the boundaries of innovation with this powerful framework. #SUPERJTBD #JTBD #Innovation #CXDesign #ProductDesign #TonyUlwick

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Join me and my guest, Kareem Collie, for Episode 135 of the #DesignThinking 101 #Podcast: Leading Design + Collaboration + Why Design Thinking. #leadership #curiosity #creativity Listen to it here: https://bit.ly/3UIZnfP

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While we are in this transitional period before we republish Just Enough Research under Mule Design, I was able to set up a direct link to the current edition at the lower price of $24. https://lnkd.in/g4p2kzkw You can buy ten (10) for your team for less than one (1) full price seat in my workshop. (And you should still go to the workshop when you can because it's a good time.) This special direct link will be active for about the next month, so tell everyone with a corporate credit card. (It might be US only. Book distribution is wild. If you aren't in the US, you can order JER in a variety of other places, but you'll pay more and I'll get less. We are working on all of this stuff.) And, as a reminder, you can download a PDF of Conversational Design free: https://lnkd.in/gshMpzbm Truly a summer of bargains.

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How do you integrate design into business strategy? Often, the value of design gets lost between creative teams and executive leadership, hindering innovation and growth. Hiring a design leader will bridge this gap. These leaders advocate for design that aligns with business objectives and translates into tangible outcomes. They foster understanding and collaboration between creative and executive teams. At Upstory, we act as a fractional design leader that helps align design strategies with business goals. To be clear, we aren’t anyone’s boss. We simply come in with an objective point of view to help clear up the miscommunication that happens between the design and executive team. This has led to a more cohesive strategy, improved collaboration across departments, increased visibility of design’s value, and resulted in user-centric products aligned with business objectives for our clients. Whether it’s us or someone else, consider hiring a design executive or promoting design leaders who can understand biz objectives and translate them into design objectives. 🎨

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“…design thinking is the methodology that we teach [The Stanford d.school], that’s the secret sauce … The result of that is if you take students, or companies, or anybody, and you get them to use design thinking as a tool, my belief is that builds their creative confidence.”   Quote by David Kelley, precursor of design thinking, founder of IDEO and The Stanford d.school, on interview with Maria Camacho. https://lnkd.in/emErXWwM As the old adage goes, ‘Practice makes perfect.’ The same applies to design thinking with its focus on creativity, empathy, and systems thinking. The more you engage in ideating 💡 , building, testing, evaluating, and learning from positive failures, the more confident you'll become. This process encourages you to push boundaries, challenge paradigms, embrace openness, and drive change 😊 #DesignThinking #CreativeConfidence #change #PositiveFailure #creativity #empathy #systemsThinking

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Renishaw is a global leader in engineering and scientific technology. The company’s legacy product information management tool was restricting product owners and e-commerce executives. So, we implemented Salsify and built a robust product experience management (PXM) program around it. Now, Renishaw’s teams can access rich product information in the company’s catalog on demand. That used to be a request that could take over a week to fulfill. Unlocking this kind of efficiency has had all kinds of positive impacts: Customers get richer experiences when browsing Renishaw’s products. Sales teams are freed from administrative work and empowered to do what they do best. Renishaw itself has a much wider horizon for sales growth. Learn more in our latest case: https://ow.ly/UAPN50RgaVA 📲

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PART 1 Can designers survive the Ai threat? Leading figures in the design industry discuss this important issue with T. K. Sajeev from NewspaperDesign.in. Renowned design consultant Dr. Mario Garcia is the first to share his insights. Mario Garcia TK Sajeev Kumar Newspaper Design

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Is the redesign of packaging driven by the real market need or by the boredom of marketers? 😤 In the latest BRANDERMAN episode, William Caruso and I delve into how some brands sacrifice recognition and familiarity for novelty. Necessary innovation or unnecessary risk? Share your opinion now! #PackagingDesign #ConsumerPsychology #Marketing

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Worth revisiting this article on the lessons of building products for mixed realities. https://lnkd.in/eaneMUK7 #design #designthinking #designbuild #designstrategy #product #producctdesign #productmanagement #productstrategy #designprinciples #innovation #designers #digitaltransformation #ux #uxdesign #uiux #uidesign #designinnovation #application #software #softwaredesign #usability #userresearch #research #usercentereddesign #productleadership #uxwriting #designsystems #empathy #interfacedesign #usabilitytesting #userexperience #productdesign #accessibility #ui

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Join me and my guest, George Aye, for Episode 136 of the #DesignThinking 101 #Podcast, the first DT101 Live! episode: Design Ethics. You can listen, AND watch the live recording. See link in comments. #design #ethics #EthicalDesign

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As a project advisor for RISD Terra Carta Design Lab, I want to share the RISD finalists that will now compete internationally. The program was launched by King Charles. BIOPODS: Biopods are human-scale ecosystem modules designed to remediate water quality, reintroduce vital fringe marshes into urban environments and engage the public in citizen science. FUTUREYARD: Revolutionizing our connection to earth, the community-focused FutureYard app simplifies regeneration and empowers people with access to green spaces to increase native biodiversity, soil health and carbon storage. MAP COLLECTIVE: Map Collective provides a software solution for corporate and government sustainability and supply chain teams to automate supply chain transparency, sustainability metrics tracking and decarbonization planning, and procurement decisions using AI and data mining. HOPPI: Hoppi is revolutionizing the toy industry by transforming brewery waste into 100% biodegradable, nontoxic toys, reducing the amount of plastic entering the environment and minimizing the toy industry’s carbon footprint. SHAPESHFT: Aiming to reframe the conversation about plastics manufacturing and new materials development in the 21st century, SHAPESHFT uses discarded mixed plastics to create a usable artistic medium for producing public art, sculptures and research materials helping localized arts production. SHELLF LIFE: Shellf Life transforms discarded mollusk shells into a groundbreaking biomaterial, offering a versatile, sustainable and aesthetically captivating alternative to conventional materials across diverse applications, fostering collaboration and redefining the relationship between the built environment and nature. SOILLESS: Soilless is an affordable, sustainable, indoor garden system that empowers everyone to grow their own fresh, healthy and sustainable food. SURPLUS: Surplus is a consolidated logistics platform revolutionizing the flows of surplus construction materials and addressing the critical issue of waste influx in the industry. By providing a peer-to-peer marketplace connecting buyers and sellers in real time, Surplus streamlines the process, allowing contractors to offload surplus materials efficiently. WASTE HARMONIZE WORLDS: The building industry faces entropy with abandoned buildings contributing to urban decay. Only 12.2% of brick and clay tile waste is recycled, with most ending up in landfills. This project explores biocements for binding these construction and demolition wastes, creating recyclable materials that enhance comfort while preserving traditional characteristics and extending the history of clay from a new perspective. WILD LIVES: Wild Lives is an interdisciplinary environmental education movement using trail cameras to encourage youth to actively observe, explore and connect to local ecosystems. As they gather footage of wildlife, students analyze their findings through creative map-making, scientific illustration and storytelling.

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Throughout my career, I've been a huge advocate of a "pencils before pixels" approach to design. When a stakeholder asks me about my preferred design tool, I answer with "research, followed by concept evaluation." Lower-fidelity wireframes and sketches are often overlooked (or actively avoided) by Stakeholders, Product Managers, Developers, and even, sadly, many Designers. With so many visual design tools and design-to-code systems available, it's easy to get excited by the visual polish of a high-fidelity prototype. But I've found that clients who really understand the problems they're trying to solve - and who are willing to evaluate potential solutions before jumping into development - end up seeing the design role as being far more valuable to their business in the long-term. As Pavel Samsonov writes: "the biggest value of design is not delivering a thing faster. It’s delivering the right thing faster." Real design value comes from identifying and creatively solving problems, not just cranking out beautiful screens. https://lnkd.in/e5fq55qV

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Announcing THE FUTURE OF... conference. September 18 & 19 in Chicago. More details & registration links to follow, shortly. (see some details, below). "Design is dead", they said. "What happened to Design?", they asked. “Reports of my death are greatly exaggerated.” . -- Mark Twain (... and apparently, "Design") We'll explore this very dynamic (& many others). Come join the conversation. Learn with (& from) each other. Come to inspire - and to be inspired. Limited seats available for each day - so register early so that you don't miss out. DAY ONE (Sept 18) - invitation-only, exclusively for client-/brand-side Design & business leaders. Curated for candid conversation & "so what's", related to YOUR key challenges & opportunities (submitted by YOU). DAY TWO (Sept 19) - open to all in the industry... DAY ONE participants, any other corporate Design & business leaders of all levels, and agency leaders, partners, principals, and practice leaders (no business development resources) Content determined & submitted by, participants. Some of the emerging themes, topics, & tracks include the following. > Design as a driver of growth; > articulating value, influence, & impact; > engaging and inspiring peers, colleagues, & senior leaders; > being people-centered (consumers, customers, colleagues, & communities); > technology & AI; > Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion; > sustainability; > “doing” the work (in-house, out-source, & client/agency relationships); > what clients want from agencies, etc. Hosted by: David Butler, John Gleason, and myself (Fred Richards) Contact us (directly) with questions, comments, ideas, or to explore/ensure your invitation. We look forward to your voice... and YOUR contributions.

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Great design leaders know that cross-functional collaboration is key to creating cohesive and innovative products. Here's the rundown: Facilitate Communication: Make sure there's clear, open, available communication between departments. Establish Common Goals: Get everyone aligned around shared objectives. Regular Interdisciplinary Meetings: Keep those check-ins and collaborative sessions frequent. Cross-functional collaboration creates more cohesive product development, leveraging each department’s strengths for better outcomes. Design leaders should actively promote and facilitate collaboration across all functions to drive innovation and efficiency in product development. 🤝

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I'm a creative and I think the ad is great. They incorporated an extremely popular type of video and were able to trigger an emotional response. Why is this good? Because you will remember it. Hydraulic presses crushing things gets a lot of views on YouTube and they turned it into a memorable advertisement. We packed all of this into the thinnest form factor yet! There is a lot of eye candy as things explode. The objects are meaningful, which creates an uneasy feeling, (emotion = remembered). They reinforce that feeling with the foam emoji ball right at the end 😳 When you're working on your next project, how can you trigger an emotion to help people remember it? It doesn't have to be an advertisement. You can use this for presentations or to help sell your idea.

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Do second chances exist? On episode 30 of the Design Imposter Podcast, Monique discusses stereotypes and navigating challenges in the workplace as a person of color in business. Click one of the links below for the entire conversation. 🎧 Listen on Apple: http://smpl.is/95ycd 🎙️Listen on Spotify: http://smpl.is/95yce #HiringAndFiring #TeamManagement #Internships #EmployeeManagement #Contractors #BusinessPartners #Leadership #CareerDevelopment #ProfessionalGrowth #TeamDynamics #WorkplaceCulture #Mentorship #ProjectManagement #HiringTips #WorkplaceSuccess

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Join me and my guest, Sarah Doody, for Episode 137 of the #DesignThinking 101 #Podcast: Designing Your Career + UX for Small Business. Listen to it here: https://bit.ly/45lUCgN #CareerPlanning #UX #UserExperience

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This week on the Designed By Poscast, Anna K. and I dive into a word a lot of us like to throw around: Leadership — specifically when you’re more in the introverted side of things. How do you lead if you’re not naturally outgoing? What does leadership even mean and how can you aspire to be one? What goes on in the mind of someone who wants to break out the social box people put them in? We dive into this as well as Anna’s origin story in this episode. Check it out! https://lnkd.in/gCAfXZMq

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