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Bring Your Strengths Into Focus as a Leader

2/21/2021

 
Strengths Based Leadership includes an access code for the Clifton Strengthsfinder, and is a helpful guide as you identify how your strengths are showing up, or where they could be showing up more.

Identifying Your Values To Make Successful Career Transitions

2/21/2021

 
Identifying our values is a critical part of making intentional decisions. Try this worksheet if you're feeling like you need some clarity around what is most important to you.

AOriginally published by Katherine (Kit) Prendergast, Career Connections of Sierra Nevada

The following list of 36 values (listed alphabetically) gives you an opportunity to identify which values are truly important to you at this time in your life

First, check off all the values that are important to you - check off as many as you want.  Be careful not to check off a value just because you think it “should” be important to you.  

  • Achievement/Accomplishment: achieving tasks/goals successfully
  • Advancement: consistently moving ahead to new opportunities
  • Autonomy: choosing own projects, setting own pace, minimal supervision
  • Belonging to a Group: being identified with a close-knit group working toward mutual goals (family, community or work related)
  • Building Something: creating or establishing a thing or idea
  • Challenge: involvement with stimulating or demanding tasks/projects
  • Competition: participating in activities that are measurable  
  • Community Involvement: contributing regularly to local, national or international well-being
  • Creativity: making, inventing or producing innovative things or ideas
 
  • Entrepreneurship: organizing & starting a new business or enterprise
  • Equality: having the same value or status as others
  • Excitement: engaging in continual change and variety
  • Fame: public visibility, being widely recognized and renowned
  • Family: time & energy for children, spouse, parents & relatives
  • Financial Security: pay/benefits that are satisfactory and predictable
  • Friendships: frequent and caring relationships outside the family
  • Fun: experiencing pleasure, enjoyment and delight
 
  • Happiness: feeling pleasure, contentment, well-being and joy
  • Harmony: sense of inner calm and tranquility
  • Health: positive physical and emotional health
  • Independence: being self-reliant, freedom from control of others
  • Integrity: adherence to personal code of ethics
  • Leadership: guiding, motivating or directing others
  • Learning: continuous drive to acquire knowledge and new skills
  • Leisure: pursuing non-work related activities
  • Physical Activity: active in regular physical work/challenges
  • Recognition: being positively acknowledged by others
  • Respect: being treated with consideration and fairness
  • Risk-Taking: willingness to push oneself to face challenges/demands
  • Security/Stability: predictability of routine, roles, life style
  • Self-Expression: ability to communicate personal ideas & feelings
  • Service to Others: giving assistance, support and aid to others
  • Spirituality: having a spiritual belief that influences one’s life work
  • Status: possessing a prestigious job title or position
  • Wealth: having significant financial resources and possessions
  • Work/Life Balance:  a positive balance of time and energy


Are there other values that are important to you but not on this list?  If so, write them down using your own words.
  • _____________________________________
  • _____________________________________


Second, sort the values that you have checked off into the following three categories.  Write the # next to the chosen value.  A good way to do this is to remember a time in your life when you were the happiest and then ask yourself, “Was this value being fulfilled during this time in my life?”  


#1s Must Have in My Work/Personal Life
#2s Nice to Have But Not Necessary
#3s Can Live Without 


Third, take your list of “Must Haves” and write them in priority order with the most important one first.  Try to limit your number to a maximum of six.  


1.   ___________________________________
2.  ___________________________________
3.  ___________________________________
4.  ___________________________________
5.  ___________________________________
6.  ___________________________________


Now you are ready to integrate these “Must Have” values into your career planning. You may want to modify your list as you move through the process which is fine. By incorporating your values into your planning you will be ensuring that you will be working at your very best and be the happiest. Enjoy!



The UX Cake Podcast & More Resources

8/5/2019

 
My publishing efforts are now focused on the UX Cake podcast. Launched in Feb. of 2018, we are now in the top 25% of podcasts, with a global audience that continues to grow!

UX Cake is a podcast for user experience professionals who want to be more effective and happy in their career. Every episode we deliver practical advise on how to get the best outcomes for our work, our teams, our users, and our careers in UX. Our guests include well-known leaders like Don Normanand Jon Maeda, as well as many less globally-known voices with fantastic insights to share, like disability designer & activist Liz Jackson, agile coach & ux champion Shayna Atkins, and UX team experts Mary & David Sherwin.

Go to uxcake.co for all the episodes, or to whatever platform you use to listen to podcasts!

You can host a live recording of the UX Cake podcast at your event or conference! Connect with me to find out more!
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Double-down On Your Strengths For Better Outcomes

11/25/2017

 

It makes sense that we would see more effective outcomes and greater satisfaction from the same amount of effort by doing more of what we're good at, rather than always trying to shore up areas where we are weak. Sure we all have areas we can and should improve, but if we devote more time to fixing our shortcomings than to developing our strengths, we may end up with a job, or a life, in which our natural talents go untapped. Do you get the opportunity to do what you do best every day? If not,  the book Strengths Finder 2.0 by Tom Rath (Gallup), intends to help you change that, first by getting crystal clear on what your own strengths are, and then developing your goals around what you do best.

How clear are you on what your own strengths are? If you're anything like I was, you may feel like you generally could list off a few, but may wonder if you under- or over-estimate some of your own strengths, and feedback from other people doesn't always include a complete picture of you. That's why I keep recommending this resource to anyone who wants to design and develop their future based on what they do best.

The Strengths Finder 2.0 book - both the kindle version and the physical book - come with a code to take the Strengths Finder test (which is $25 by itself to take on their website, so the book is a good deal). The test is similar to the Meyers-Briggs personality test, but rather than focusing on personality traits it helps people uncover their talents, which is highly actionable for developing life-changing goals. I'm often skeptical of these tests (would I answer this question differently on a different day?) but I felt that my results were spot-on, and I found the advice in the book to be really insightful and more tailored to my experience than most books.

This is a great time of year to reflect on what we've accomplished and think about our goals, as we approach a new year. If you've ever wanted to get more clarity on your own strengths, I recommend this book as a first step to living a life designed around what you do best.
Strengths Finder 2.0
Tom Rath (from Gallup)
People who have the opportunity to focus on their strengths every day are six times as likely to be engaged in their jobs and more than three times as likely to report having an excellent quality of life in general.

Get More Effective With Earlier Ideation

10/30/2017

 
This article from Nielsen Norman Group offers really practical advise for getting more effective UX design by putting ideation sessions very early in the process. It also is clear that group ideation is much more effective than doing that work individually.

This has absolutely been my experience as well, which is why I bring that practice with me wherever I work. I also love helping product teams develop a good ideation process by facilitating their collaborative design sessions.

Read the article here on nngroup.com
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You 2.0: new podcast series on Hidden Brain

7/25/2017

 

Hidden Brain helps curious people understand the world – and themselves

I’m so excited about this new series of episodes on the Hidden Brain Podcast, called ‘You 2.0.’ Not because it’s a new subject — self improvement, personal growth… it seems every other article headline I see is about being a 'better you’ (or maybe it’s just my newsfeed). But if anyone can shed new perspective on a well-covered theme, it’s Hidden Brain’s Shankar Vidantam. Because understanding ourselves — our brains — is key to developing a fuller and happier life.

The Value of ‘Deep Work’ — and how to cultivate focus
The first episode in the series...
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Get Better Results from Design Feedback with These 8 Rules

7/18/2017

 
It can be SO hard to communicate your reaction to something visual using words. Whether it's negative, or positive, the words many of us come up with are often not very useful for creative direction.  But it is possible, if you can remember just a few rules (8 of them, conveniently listed here), to get the very best outcome from the feedback you give the designers you work with.
     Very few people - including designers - give really good design feedback. Good feedback should be actionable, but not prescriptive. Good feedback will help the entire team participate in the design of a product, and share the responsibility of  success, without creating ‘design by committee,’ which is a common way designs get derailed. Feedback that is given and received well should improve the customer experience, while allowing each person to add valuable insight.

The 8 Rules for Better Design Feedback
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Send some love - photo by Jay Mantri

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How to stay in control of crucial conversations

7/11/2017

 
So much of what moves us forward -- or holds us back -- in any job is about relationships. And core to building healthy relationships -- or repairing damage -- is about how we communicate. Inevitably in mentoring sessions, this book comes up as a suggestion for common problems that arise at work. Whether the issue at hand is with a managers or co-worker, a spouse or family member, the techniques in this book are relevant to every situation. I've had multiple people thank me for referring this book to them, and I am grateful to the wise person who referred it to me. This is one of those book I still return to, in fact I bought it in both kindle and paperback formats because I like to quickly thumb through paperback when I'm looking for something in particular, but I like having the convenience of Kindle with me everywhere.

​Crucial Conversations: Tools for Talking When Stakes Are High

Advise for designers... Design Matters

7/1/2017

 
If you are a creative who's curious and loves expanding your design horizons, you will probably really dig this podcast. Unless podcasts aren't your thing, but then you should give it a try, anyway. 

Debbie Millman has been creating her Design Matters podcast for 12 years, and her experience as an interviewer helps make this one of the best podcasts there is on the subject of creativity and design. There are 281 episodes available on the website (216 in iTunes). Debbie interviews top-shelf names in the large design world, plenty of recognizable names like Clement Mok or Jonathan Adler, but chances are that most of them are people you probably never heard of before, who are doing really interesting and creative things. It's also refreshing to hear a podcast with just as many talented women interviewed as men.

There is so much interesting content here to discover that I don't think I'll have a chance to run out any time soon. Check out the website or download on iTunes.
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How YOU Can Think Up The Next Big Thing

6/23/2017

 
What an inspirational book. If you consider yourself an 'idea person' but are waiting until you think up the 'next big thing' to take action on your ideas, you need to read this book! This book could help anyone though, because it turns out that what you need to come up with the 'next big thing' is curiosity, empathy, and imagination, and we all have the ability to cultivate those.
Some of my fave insights:
- Curiosity - Distraction reduces exploring our curiosity, and keeps us in our 'filter bubble'
- Empathy - whoever gets closest to their customer wins
- Imagination - are we so reliant on data that we become risk averse?
Curious? Read this book!
​

Hunch: Turn Your Everyday Insights Into The Next Big Thing

The Accidental Creative Podcast

6/22/2017

 
Since I just found yet another great resource to tweet about thanks to Todd Henry and The Accidental Creative podcast, I figured I need to give a shoutout and spread the word about this show that I recently just discovered even though it's been around since 2011. Todd talks to incredibly interesting people about creative-related things in most of the shows, and he's got great insights himself. I've found it to be a pretty inspirational podcast to listen to, and have gotten insights from every episode I've listened to. I never have enough time to listen to all the podcasts in my feed, but this one is worth making time for. Todd Henry writes books and speaks on creativity and creative-type stuff, and leads workshops with creative teams. If podcasts aren't your thing, he also has a few books to help you be more - you guessed it - creative.
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The (Original) Book On Design Thinking

6/7/2017

 
Tim Brown was one of IDEO's founders as well as one of the founders of the acclaimed D-School at Stanford. Some say they 'invented' Design Thinking, others call it a branded version of what many call 'User-centered design.' Regardless, for anyone who wants to get inspired and learn more about how Design Thinking could help them transform their organization, this book is a must.

Change by Design: How Design Thinking Transforms Organizations and Inspires Innovation

What's possible? A lot, it turns out...

6/4/2017

 
If you have ideas, you like doing things with ideas, or you want to generate more ideas... You should read this book. Scott Berkun is a 'Maker' thinker... which makes this book feel tangibly helpful. Thinking is great, but making, that's where we find our magic. Yet it sometimes feels harder than it should be, this maker-thinker tight-rope that we balance on.

It's a fun read, 'guaranteed' cliché-free, and will give you ideas to improvise, be a genius, and stay motivated. BOOM!
The Dance of the Possible: the mostly honest completely irreverent guide to creativity

Getting Unstuck - 5 Ways to Get Out of Your Own Way

5/30/2017

 
Do you have a goal or a project that you aren’t making as much headway on as you'd like? Or do you feel like you’re swimming in circles and not moving forward? Regardless of how experienced you are in your career, there will be times that you feel stuck.
​
5 Ways To Get Out Of Your Own Way (And Do Your Work) 
​I heard this fantastic podcast from the Accidental Creative recently, and thought I'd share it (and my own recap for those who don't listen to podcasts) because this is a topic that comes up frequently when I speak with other creatives (although you don't need to be a designer to find these ideas useful).
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Strategize Like a UX Pro

5/19/2017

 
If you're interested in getting more strategic with your UX, or helping your product or UX team get more strategic, you've got to read this book. Jaime Levy is an industry veteran who knows what the hell she's talking about. And that's putting it lightly!

In this book, Jaime walks you through the process she uses with her clients, beginning with customer discovery and competitive analysis techniques, identifying unique opportunities, running experiments using lean methodologies, and mapping user actions to meaningful metrics. These methods work for enterprise as well as start-ups, and anyone can glean valuable insights for creating better products - that people want.
UX Strategy: How to Devise Innovative Digital Products that People Want

Design Innovation Starting With (the right) Constraints

1/23/2017

 
Most designers will say they produce better designs when they have constraints. And yet, the guidelines we use to kick-off design thinking & innovation sessions typically encourage thinking outside the known constraints.

This article by Lisa Kay Solomon showcases a great tool to use for understanding 'loose' vs. 'tight' constraints, and how to frame those constraints so you get not only big ideas, but the most effective big ideas.
Moments of Impact: How to Design Strategic Conversations That Accelerate Change
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Approach your life like a designer...

1/13/2017

 
Design the Life You Love: A Step-by-Step Guide to Building a Meaningful Future
(From the award-winning designer Ayse Birsel)

  • Think positively 
  • Put yourself in the shoes of other people and see things from their perspective 
  • See the big picture 
  • Collaborate with others, as this makes the ideas so much richer
  • Always ask yourself "what if?"

One key to launching well-designed products?  Hint: don’t put design in an ivory tower.

7/9/2015

 
Lego Tower
When Fast Company interviewed former apple designer Mark Kawano about his insights into why apple design is so great, the article went viral in the design community. His primary message was this — design can’t just belong to designers… for great product design, everyone throughout the product lifecycle has to want, understand, and contribute to great design. What Kawano was saying was so core to UX strategists and designers around the globe, why did it sound so novel, so different than the companies many designers work at, or products we produce? My experience is that it’s fairly uncommon to find UX really integrated with business and dev, especially at larger companies. If you have it, that’s something special (and I would love to meet you!).

‘us’ vs. ‘them’ mentality 
Designers like working in design teams, and developers like working in dev teams. PMs work in business teams, and marketers have their teams too. Having centralized functional teams can make for better morale, increased talent acquisition and retention, and can also help distribute specialization across workstreams...  
​

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UX PROCESS: THE UX BRIEF

3/1/2013

 
Having worked with dozens of companies in my design career I've gotten to see as many different approaches to project management as there are projects. Some work better than others. (Waterile, anyone? That's some hybrid of agile and waterfall methods, but I digress.)  Across the board what I often see is a lack of a structured approach to planning the UX part of the project specifically.

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DESIGNING FOR IMPROVED SEO

2/1/2013

 
Originally posted February 2013

I recently put together a few ‘best practices’ for a client. They needed a very short list of things they could do with minimal effort to improve the SEO of their site.

Make global nav items text, not graphics

Establish target keywords
- use google analytics to find top keywords

Include keywords in text & in page attributes

Make sure URLs are friendly

Name images with friendly filenames

Create a sitemap for the search engines: there does not need to be a link to it – it can be virtually invisible to users

Improve page load times

DESIGNING TO INCREASE CONVERSION

1/15/2013

 
I put together this list of industry ‘best practices’ which I culled from various sources (listed below). Although this was for a recent client, I realized it could be helpful for many teams to use this list when they’re thinking about how to improve their product design increase conversion.

While the articles listed below are helpful to read, I know most of my clients just don’t have the time, so I put together the top items to make a ‘checklist’ when the question ‘What could we do better?’ gets put to the design team.

Improve the clarity of your main homepage message. 
A clear headline is key.- Why and How will this site benefit the user?
- To sell effectively, you have to sell solutions, not products. You also have to sell benefits, not features.

Clear action text wins over vagueness
Look at target keywords in Google analytics

Improve the placement and clarity of the call to action
Is it really obvious on each screen what you want the user to do?

Reduce the number of options on the homepage
‘Analysis Paralysis’ – multiple choices lead to confusion

Improve user flow
Help users find what they’re looking for

Design & implement your site to be accessed from anywhere
Mobile experience has to be part of any strategy to improve conversion or traffic. Users expect websites to work wherever they access them from.

Design for context
Improve understanding of where users are coming from, and what they’re looking for based on where they’re coming from.  Researching Google analytics can help

Test with users
While google analytics is invaluable to know ‘what’ users are doing, that quantitative data does not answer ‘why’ users are doing what they are doing.  Surveys & user testing can fill in the picture

Sources
smashingmagazine.com

dtelepathy.com

http://blog.hubspot.com/blog/tabid/6307/bid/31097/12-Critical-Elements-Every-Homepage-Must-Have-Infographic.aspx

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