Category: User experience, web, technology

  • On Leading Organization-wide Change

    In October 2014, I was asked to share how I have led organizational changes at Covenant Eyes. The following text is from an e-mail message I wrote in response to that question, covering design thinking, decision making, asking better questions, and influencing behavior in order to reach shared understanding.

  • In pursuit of paper

    I pay attention to paper that I use for printing. Trivial? Maybe, yet I do care. I care about the paper weight, brightness, dimensions, finish, and sometimes even what the paper fibers feel like. There seems to be a variety of fibers in paper, and, my, isn’t that interesting? Yet, although I care about these…

  • And this is what I get…

  • Five Whys, Socratic Method, and Dependent Arising

    Root cause analysis—jargon for managers in lean startups and Agile dev shops. In plain language, isn’t it “Well, I hear what you’re saying, but what’s really going on?” I feel a rambling, messy first draft coming on. Why in the world do we need jargon for such a common line of reasoning? This is every…

  • UX STRAT conference, day 2

    UX STRAT conference, day 2

    I just wrapped up the day by having dinner with Simon of Bristol (okay, Simon Norris of Nomensa) and Bob Royce and Dan Klyn of The Understanding Group. A relaxed conversation with three brilliant gentlemen—an excellent end to the day. So, the conference. First, I was glad to have met Josh Seiden in person so…

  • UX STRAT conference, day 1

    The first day of the UX STRAT firehose of talks is over. At the Barrelhouse, a nearby bar, there no doubt are still a few gathered after happy hour. I think Paul Bryan, the organizer, can count this first UX STRAT a success already. I’m not a huge fan of crowds, so instead of happy…

  • UX STRAT conference, workshops

    I’m at the UX STRAT conference in Atlanta, Georgia, having just finished a couple of half-day workshops. Here are a few observations. From what I overheard, attendees mostly have job titles including “manager,” “director,” “lead,” and “senior.” Oh, and owners of agencies/consulting firms. In spite of that (cough), like most UX people, they are interesting…

  • UX described by Socrates

    UX described by Socrates

    Lately I’ve been reading from Philosophies of Art & Beauty: Selected Readings in Aesthetics from Plato to Heidegger, edited by Albert Hofstadter and Richard Kuhns, and read a passage that sure sounded a lot like a premise of user experience work. This is from Plato’s The Republic. Socrates is dialoguing with Glaucon about art. Of…

  • Thinking: Taxonomy of shooting ranges

    I’ve been overwhelmed by feedback from a side project of mine, rangelistings.com, and am working on upgrading it so that site visitors can make some updates on their own without having to go through me. It’s great how even seemingly little projects like this raise information architecture questions so promptly. Wait…what the heck does “access”…

  • LinkedIn UX groups, data and questions

    Doesn’t it seem like there are a lot of user experience groups on LinkedIn? I’ve joined a few of them in hopes of staying up-to-date on topics, but after joining a couple groups, I quickly realized there were many more possible groups, and they all started looking pretty similar to me. Why would I join…