Put in a good day’s work, then close the damn laptop. Waste some time on the rest of the human experience. At this time of the year, eat some damn duck. Watch a shitty Xmas movie. Help decorate that stupid tree. Dare to be so bold as to embrace the ordinary every now and then.Let’s bury the hustle
There's a gap between thinking and doing. The gap grows through fears about building the wrong thing or not knowing how to start. It manifests through excessive research, questions to colleagues, and theories and predictions about how something should be built.Build as much as you can
By being connected to each other night and day and by consuming and sharing infinite and self-updating content, we are not only becoming more shallow ourselves. We are also willingly investing our time to help every person around us become equally as shallow.The Right to Stay Offline
Cargo cults describe situations where people emulate a set of behaviours, without understanding their underlying motivations. When this happens with data-science, organizations will emulate the technology behind data science, without creating a data-driven organizational culture.Cargo cult data science
Arc Publishing’s early success with external customers may give the Washington Post reason for optimism, but the effort is itself a beneficiary of the upbeat, can-do spirit which the company’s management has successfully cultivated in the age of Bezos.The Washington Post Is A Software Company Now
“You’re looking for three things, generally, in a person,” says Buffett. “Intelligence, energy, and integrity. And if they don’t have the last one, don’t even bother with the first two. I tell them, ‘Everyone here has the intelligence and energy—you wouldn’t be here otherwise. But the integrity is up to you. You weren’t born with it, you can’t learn it in school.”Warren Buffett: The Three Things I Look For in a Person
Investors typically don’t want to invest in companies too heavily dependent on a single individual, and will often insist on an external CEO as a condition of funding. It’s also an issue of skills: the traits and talents necessary to conceive and launch a product are often very different than those that help a business expand.We finally have proof that visionary founders make the worst CEOs
Taking external money comes with the pressure of delivering the right metrics (in the eyes of the investors). In most cases, it’s about the number of users. If we were raising money, we would have to get as many users as we can, as fast as we can.Our Thoughts On (Not) Raising Money
The reason Slack is defensible is its attention to detail. While the product itself is relatively simple, the design aesthetic, brand and user experience is unparalleled. You just can’t clone that. Design doesn’t just have to be a bonus on top of your features. You can use it as a point of differentiation to help you penetrate competitive markets, regardless of the size of your competitors.Minimum Beautiful Product
The overarching goal is to build a powerful “tree” of the mind with strong and deep roots, a massive trunk, and lots of sturdy branches. We use this tree to hang the “leaves” of experience we acquire, directly and vicariously, throughout our lifetimes: the scenarios, decisions, problems, and solutions arising in any human life.Mental Models: The Best Way to Make Intelligent Decisions (113 Models Explained)
When I noticed what that voice inside my head is comprised of, I immediately realized that all three cores (experience, intuition and reference) are necessary, and as a designer I should listen to that voice. Now that I know where he’s coming from, I can truly trust him, blindly.How Do You Make Design Decisions?
We like to think that we’re different from all those industries that judge people based on appearance, but we do the same thing, only instead of saying that people are a bad fit because they don’t wear ties, we say they’re a bad fit because they do, and instead of saying people aren’t smart enough because they don’t have the right pedigree… wait, that’s exactly the same.When we only hire the best means we only hire the trendiest
The point of these exercises, it turns out, is to make the abstract idea of “our brand” into something concrete. After doing the exercises, the team gets a common language to describe what their company is about — and all subsequent squishy decisions about visuals, voice, and identity become way easier.The Three-Hour Brand Sprint
This is similar to “What problem are you solving?” but the bar is higher. What I really want to understand is what you know about the problem that everyone else doesn’t. This is usually derived from multiple conversations with customers, deep analysis of current products in the space, and often personal experience.How to Pitch Your Company
Why does one choose to use Gmail over Yahoo, Medium over Blogger — if the features are 99% the same? It’s definitely not about disrupting usability standards. It’s about that additional layer of sophistication that can only be achieved when you put enough time and brainpower into the tiniest details, the most subtle animations, the most elegant transitions – not just for the sake of creating whimsical dribbble shots.The State of UX in 2017
The Web will have a profound effect on the markets and the cultures around the world: intelligent agents will either stabilise or destabilise markets; the demise of distance will either homogenise or polarise cultures; the ability to access the Web will be either a great divider or a great equaliser; the path will either lead to jealousy and hatred or peace and understanding.I Quit Facebook—and You Should, Too
In a roadmap first team, the missing link is Iterations. Great products are born only when the core features are the team’s main focus, and iterations and improvements are part of the team’s culture. The key is adding value, and not just marking more V’s in the checklist.The problem with ‘roadmap first’ teams
The first thing to say is — don’t go into design for the money. It’s true that some design careers are in high demand and can be quite lucrative — but to be a successful designer, first and foremost you need to have a real belief in creating product experiences that enhance people’s lives and help solve the problems they face.The Ultimate Guide to Becoming A Designer Without Going To Design School
No one’s stopping you from creating your own lettering club or starting a meetup or whatever you want to do in your community. No one gave me permission to create my own mini-lettering conference, but I did it. Why not? There are no rules.Stop-Motion Animation Good Enough to Eat
Then really importantly: Don't plan your route to the top. Simply don’t plan! Your mountain has never been climbed before. You just can't know the path. Or, in corporate land, you can’t know the budget and you can’t predict when your business will succeed. How Not To Climb a Mountain or How to Kill Your Start-Up
Now that great usability, beautiful UI, and lovely, delightful animations are a given, it’s easy for UX designers, once considered an integral part of the product strategy, to fall into pure production roles.The Golden Age Of UX Won’t Last. Here’s How To Prepare For What’s Next
I can't say bootstrapping works for every business and startup, but if you can afford it for the first year or two I think it's a fantastic way to build something real, learn how to make money early, and start scaling. With the cost of technology going down, bootstrapping becomes easier and easier.Everyone wants to code, but not everyone knows how. Read how two co-founders built and grew a solution to this problem which now generates $100,000/mo.
