O'Reilly Design Conference

Becoming a designer founder

November 14, 2019

The mindset, skills, and experience that make you a successful user experience designer can contribute to your success as an entrepreneur. Instead of working on a project defined by someone else, what would it be like to bring your own ideas to life? Lane Goldstone shares her journey from consultant to entrepreneur and explains how having a background in design impacts Brooklyn Copper Cookware.

Design for seven billion; design for one

November 13, 2019

Can one product be meaningful to billions of people? Humans have been at the center of design practices for a long time, yet technology is poor at adapting to their unique needs. Join Kat Holmes to explore how designing for human diversity can unlock more meaningful experiences for each of us and result in better technologies for all of us.

Design for sustainability

November 13, 2019

The internet is becoming the worlds largest source of CO2 emissions. 560,000 agencies around the world make daily design decisions on behalf of their clients, directly impacting internet sustainability. Tim Frick explains how to apply sustainability principles to the process of designing digital products and services, helping you make better decisions on behalf of people and the planet.

Design systems: Accounting for quantity and scalability

November 13, 2019

How did Forum One design and build a beautiful website for a service-based organization that had almost 30 unique pages in less than a year? Amy Vainieri and Courtney Clark explain how Forum One uses atomic design principles in its work and demonstrate how to make your website project more efficient, consistent, and scalable.

Designing connected experiences for 10 feet and beyond

November 13, 2019

Many people begin a show or podcast on their computer, continue it on their handset, and finish the experience from their home. Unifying the experience across the connected ecosystem is essential to maintain engaged and loyal users. Mark Wolfe discusses designing the experience for streaming devices and the connected experience for the entire digital ecosystem.

Designing conversational voice user interfaces

November 13, 2019

"Earl Grey, hot." We are closer than ever to the promised land of the Star Trek computer. There have been huge strides recently in the technology of speech recognition, but the new era of speech-enabled devices (such as those with Siri, Ok Google, or Amazon Alexa integration) is in its infancy. Cathy Pearl shares key design principles to help you design the best VUI possible.

Designing for intelligence augmentation: How to design products that use artificial intelligence effectively

November 13, 2019

Conversations about designing for artificial intelligence often start and end with replacing the humans, but few explore the potential of AI working alongside people to augment our intelligence. Aye Moah shares lessons learned from the design process behind Boomerang Respondable, the worlds first AI assistant that works with people to help them write better emails.

Determining success in design

November 13, 2019

In the design community, there is often an adverse reaction to the notion of being metrics driven. The term conjures up notions of soulless design and poor optimizations. But what are the alternatives? More broadly, how can we know if our designs achieve what we set out to do? Julie Zhuo explores the different definitions of success in design and shares a few principles on how to set clear goals.

Fireside chat with Irene Au and Ivy Ross

November 13, 2019

This fireside chat brings together two of Silicon Valley's heaviest hitters in design. Khosla Venturess Irene Au interviews Ivy Ross, VP of design and user experience for hardware products at Google. Expect a lively discussion about the future of hardware design, how to design products with soul, and lessons on design leadership that pulls on threads from both of their experiences.

Fireside chat with John Allspaw and Randy Hunt

November 12, 2019

Things changein the world around us, in our hearts and minds, in our organizations, in what to work on, in how to work together, and how to deliver that work. Etsys vice president of design Randy J. Hunt and CTO John Allspaw discuss the emergent and learned practices and behaviors that have enabled their teams to support one another and evolve together.

From 6 to 126 in four years

November 12, 2019

Within four years, Atlassian's design team has increased from 6 designers to 126. Building and managing a design team of this size is one thing; integrating it into a traditionally engineering-led organization is another. Alastair Simpson shares how Atlassian has successfully embraced design as a first-class discipline and is transitioning from an engineering- to an experience-led company.

Government services that work for people

November 12, 2019

Poor service design can have devastating consequences for vulnerable people in our country, but it doesn't have to be that way. Jennifer Pahlka explains why intentionally designing government interfaces, especially for low-income people, not only improves social outcomes but costs taxpayers dramatically less. Designing for users isn't just how to make great technology; it's how to govern.

Guaranteed successful design

November 12, 2019

Noah Iliinsky offers a quick survey of 17 design approaches and conversations you've never heard ofor aren't using sufficientlyenabling you to find the right problems to solve and solve them well. . .or at least better than you can now.

Hard-learned lessons in leading design

November 12, 2019

As the first designer hired at MailChimp, Aarron Walter founded the product design practice and scaled it as the company grew from just 6 employees to 550. The waters were at times difficult to navigate for him and his team. Aarron shares hard-learned lessons, guiding you around the obstacles that tripped him up and exposing the shortcuts that helped his team succeed.

How is design driving outcomes?

November 12, 2019

Doug Powell explains how IBM's design transformation is resulting in real impact for the worlds most established and enduring tech company.

Making wearable tech wearable

November 12, 2019

Design is an increasingly important element in determining the success or failure of a wearable device. Darrin Caddes discusses the state of wearables today from a design and aesthetics perspective, covering societal drivers, motivating factors, UX trends, potential barriers for adoption, and core keys to success.

Mapping experiences: From insight to action

November 12, 2019

James Kalbach discusses the principles of value alignment through diagrams, sharing examples and practical advice and offering guidance on mapping experiences as well as how to become grass-roots strategic players.

Measuring adoption of design thinking in organizations

November 12, 2019

Creating a culture around design thinking in any company requires education, evaluation, and iteration. IBM has educated and activated 10,000+ of its employees in design thinking. . .but how do you know if it's having an impact? Using IBM as a case study, Jordan Shade explains how to measure the adoption of this new way of working, including common blockers and essential enablers.

Org design for design orgs

November 12, 2019

As the move to establish in-house design teams accelerates, there's very little common wisdom on what makes for a successful design organization. Design requires not just process and methods but savvy with organizational and operational matters. Kristin Skinner shine a light on the unsung activities of actually running a design team, exploring what works and what doesn't.

Should designers. . .? New design skills from coding to Agile, process, and more

November 11, 2019

It's no longer enough to be a Photoshop master. Designers need to grow their skills in order to stay relevant and effective. But which skills are worth focusing on? Drawing on his experience, Dan Mall shares stories and perspectives on whether designers should code, how designers can fit into Agile workflows, the role a designer has in creating, using, and maintaining design systems, and more.

The expanding perimeter: The evolution of design in Silicon Valley

November 11, 2019

The history of Silicon Valley Design is the history of the growth and expansion of design itself. Barry Katz explains how design has evolved from packaging electronics in sheet metal enclosures in the 1950s to grappling with some of the most fundamental problems of modern civilization: global poverty, urban violence, public healthin short, everything from the beginning of life to the end.

The future of enterprise software design

November 11, 2019

The future of enterprise design is one where users have a strong connection with the brand of the products they are using. At the same time, future enterprise products will make you feel closer to your coworkers, even as teams become more distributed across the globe. Amanda Linden explains what your product team should prioritize and how to ensure your user experience investments are successful.

The power of us: Empathy isnt enough

November 11, 2019

Brian Russel Davis shares a radical proposition: if we empower groups to understand design for themselves, we may be able to usher in a new era of UX curation, a space where groups design their own experiences without total dictation from designers and where designers learn new ways of interfacing with communities that may have been otherwise outside their reach.

The secret to strategic design: Mastering planning

November 11, 2019

In response to a managers question about how to plan products, Alan Kay famously remarked, The best way to predict the future is to invent it. His answer invokes a paradox at the heart of design: we cant know the future, yet its what we design for. Peter Morville argues that to practice strategic design amid disruptive innovation, we must get better at planning.

The UX of buildings, cities, and infrastructure

November 11, 2019

Dan Hill explores creating great user experience for buildings, places, infrastructure, and cities.

Uncovering need and validating ideas

November 11, 2019

Marieke McCloskey shares advice on how to build products that people love by spending time in the product discovery phase: understanding who your users are, what they need, and how they might use and react to your product. Along the way, Marieke outlines fast and affordable ways to understand your customers and validate design concepts through remote research.

User research war stories

November 10, 2019

War stories about contextual user research and the inevitable mishaps that ensue are in turn bizarre, comic, tragic, and generally astonishing. Steve Portigal shares some of the best stories he's collected, examining the patterns and lessons they reveal.

UX, brand, and crossing disciplines

November 10, 2019

While branding is often viewed as graphic design, it is intertwined with user experience: a brand identity is a tool that practitioners use when designing a range of experiences. Daniel Soltis explains how attitudes, skills, and practices from UX design can inform brand design and, more generally, what it looks like to take lessons from one discipline and apply them to a new context.