Join us for this week's podcast episode, where we sit down with Miguel Fernandez, Slack's VP of Product Design, to discuss the art and science of creating products that resonate on a deeply human level and leading effective product design teams.
Featured Links: Follow Miguel on LinkedIn | Miguel's website | Slack
Episode Transcript
Randy Silver: 0:00
Lily, have you ever had a launch go sideways? Like you know, people just did not respond to it in the way that you hoped.
Lily Smith: 0:08
That's the way Luke always responds to my cooking. He just throws it sideways against the wall and, oh, hang on. Did you say lunch or launch?
Randy Silver: 0:20
Yeah, what the hell. Today's guest has a doozy of a story. Miguel Fernandez is a VP of Design at Slack and he's looking after the teams that, among other things, did last year's redesign.
Lily Smith: 0:34
Ah, yes, there was definitely a big reaction to that one. But really, Randy, a doozy.
Randy Silver: 0:41
Well, whatever you call it, it was a great chat about product design and how to do lots of things better, so let's get right to it.
Lily Smith: 0:53
The Product Experience Podcast is brought to you by Mind, the Product part of the Pendo family. Every week we talk to inspiring product people from around the globe.
Randy Silver: 1:03
Talk to inspiring product people from around the globe. Visit mindtheproductcom to catch up on past episodes and discover free resources to help you with your product practice. Learn about Mind the Product's conferences and their great training opportunities.
Lily Smith: 1:15
Create a free account to get product inspiration delivered weekly to your inbox. Mind, the Product supports over 200 product tank meetups from New York to Barcelona. There's probably one near you, miguel. Welcome to the product experience. How are you doing today?
Miguel Fernandez: 1:37
Good. Thank you so much for having me, Randy and Lily. I really appreciate the opportunity to be here to talk with you guys today.
Lily Smith: 1:42
It's really great to have the VP design of Slack. I feel like we've got a proper celebrity in the house, because I think everybody uses Slack right. Who doesn't know who you are? I mean, there's probably some people under a rock somewhere who haven't heard about Slack yet, but the majority of people in my world all use it, so it's such a pleasure to have you on the podcast with us today.
Miguel Fernandez: 2:08
Thank you so much. I feel very fortunate to represent a product that, like there's only a handful of products and software that people talk about with their feelings and express things like love for software, so I just feel very privileged to be able to be part of this product.
Lily Smith: 2:22
Oh. So before we get stuck into our topic today, it'd be great if you could give our listeners a quick intro to you and how you got into design. Oh.
Miguel Fernandez: 2:33
I got into design so I'll try to be brief because I could like go forever on this one, but it started really early in life. I always enjoyed like arts, craft making right, and I recall like sketching things out. I really love like sketching interface. You, I really love sketching interfaces. Yes, we're talking about video, but I was even referring to the fact that I would go and draw the car stereos and stuff like that just to see the interaction of the buttons, and I love to create things for people. And then, of course, when I started to get exposed into computers, that opened a whole new world for me, because when I started to see like graphical interfaces, that was kind of like there's something around here, so the fact that I enjoy doing things with people, and then like starting to understand that there was like this big unlock, I started to explore kind of like my professional career and I was very torn in between like doing something with computers or something around like design. So I ended up like studying computer science and industrial design, something around like design. So I ended up like studying computer science and industrial design but like very easily found out that like my passion was really about like human computer interactions. Like how do you actually like make things for people, how do you help them like interact better with computers and add value that way? So my journey, I think, like for people in my generation, was like around, like tinkering, right. Like multimedia was coming, the internet was coming, so you're kind of like testing different things. We're building website presentations, cd runs, like in the days, animations, right. So I've been privileged to be able to, to be exposed to kind of like every field of design. I've done like animation, like editing all those things.
Miguel Fernandez: 4:01
And that led me to the path where I'm at today, where I started working in some digital agencies first, and that was a very good moment to build skills and then move to the product side.
Miguel Fernandez: 4:10
I am from Colombia, worked initially in agencies there, but most of our clients were here in the US, so that gave me a lot of exposure to Fortune 500 clients. And then I moved to the product side and spent most of my career working on e-commerce. I worked to the product side and spent most of my career working on e-commerce. I worked for the two biggest retailers in the world like Amazon and Walmart, after a couple of acquisitions on the companies that I was in, mostly working on consumer products, and then I moved to San Francisco to work at Airbnb. I lead the design team for Airbnb Experiences and that was prior to Slack, so my journey was really more in consumer products. So this is the kind of like first enterprise product that I worked at and the motivation was precisely that right Like really learning about like a different industry and how to build products for the enterprise. So I now have been four years in Slack.
Lily Smith: 4:56
So one of the things we were going to talk about today is what a good relationship looks like between design and products. I feel like this is a kind of a massive question but in your eyes and in your experience, like what are the things that you look for or try to nurture between those three different functions in order to have a really high performing?
Miguel Fernandez: 5:23
team. So I think that the most important thing is that, like, we need to understand that we cannot build anything without each other, right, like, maybe engineers can't build stuff without us, right, like, and that's a given right. But it requires, like, acknowledging, like, the contribution of each of the functions and kind of like their superpower and even though, like, in the process you may wear a little bit of different hats, right Well, you're building products. You have to start with that place, that is, respecting each other's craft and understanding that there's been a lot of experience and thought in the way that people work. So I think that that's really important leaning into each other's strengths and understanding that at some moments, you're going to challenge them, not because you're challenging the function or the individual, but because, like you're, you're really like looking to build the best product that you can. Sometimes it it pushes you in that direction.
Miguel Fernandez: 6:13
So I think that that's the the most important thing to kind of like acknowledge first, and there's like certain dimensions, and the first one is alignment. Right, like, if you can really work with people and, like, talk things through and and make sure that you're building alignment up front, like and like understanding like, why is it that we're here doing this thing. It helps you like really build trust. And the second one I would think like it's like really like having a clear expectations and how to work. Right, like every, every function has like different working style. They have kind of like different tensions throughout, throughout the product process, so you have to like like be upfront and like tell what are your expectations and the way that you like to work so that people can really understand like why sometimes you can't be there and not be there working a certain way.
Miguel Fernandez: 6:54
Transparency is crucial, right. Like it's like people won't know what they don't know. And if you cannot kind of like create an environment where people are being very transparent about, like how they work, what are they doing, like why are they doing the things in a certain way, people will know. And this is the way that it helps people to get a little bit more critical and open. Right, if you're being open, then it's reciprocated with openness. And I think the last two things are kind of like ensuring that you're working as a team, so it's no finger pointing. You cannot be in a team where it's like oh, product said this, like engineering did that, like design did this. It's more like we're all working together towards the same goal. So how can we support each other? And lastly, like I think that you see high performing teams when there's kind of like a lot of like that, like healthy debates, but like people are having fun. That's when you can like see like the team is in a high performing state.
Randy Silver: 7:42
Fantastic. Miguel. I'm going to ask you something slightly different, because normally we're talking to product people and they have their view on the world. And I'm curious you, as a design professional, how do you judge designers? When you're hiring people, when you're evaluating their performance? What's the difference between someone who's not really cutting it, someone who's doing fine, and someone who's an absolute rock star?
Miguel Fernandez: 8:08
yeah, it's a great question and one that we have to ask ourselves all the time, right, I think, like, the first thing it's important is to like acknowledge that there's different types of designers, right, and like they may excel, like in certain dimensions and not on others. So, you know, like we have like storytelling, like people are great facilitators, people are really great in interaction design or visual design or coding. Right, so you have to really understand the individual, understand their strengths, like helping, like build the skills that they don't have, but that's to say that all not all designers are the same, right, so you have to evaluate it from that angle. Now, but to your question about, like, what is amazing design? Like, I think there's like certain treats that like are carried amongst like designers and depending on on exactly like where they excel and and one is a little bit of cliche, but it's like falling in love with the problem and not with the solution, right, like I think that if you see designers are like too close, like, and it happens, right, because you're crafting, you're doing something that is that is like it starts to like feel a little yours if people can. Really, you're crafting, you're doing something that it starts to feel a little yours. If people can really detach from what they're doing and understanding what they're doing for a user, a customer, right, that's a good trait to see. When you start seeing people that are getting too close to their work and defensive about the work, that's something to take note on right.
Miguel Fernandez: 9:20
Another one that I think and this is the hard one, I think with product managers is balancing kind of like that obsession for craft, like I think, like good designers really like pay attention to the big things and the little things equally, like the strategy to the execution, because, at the end of the day, like we are building products so we need to like make things happen Right. So good designers can have that conversation but like push towards action. Good designers are very humble and self-critical, like they kind of like, are always kind of like, even if they do great work, they feel like they didn't do as well as they could have done and they challenge their own ideas and, as I said, like they're they're, they're really like pushing forward, like pushing progress, not just talking about things, that making, making sure that things are happening. And, as you said before, I think like one thing that is very important to note is like we. We wouldn't be able to do this with each other, right, so they have to be great collaborators.
Miguel Fernandez: 10:12
Design is a team sport and you cannot ship just things with design, so that's one of the things I always encourage people when, like in cross-functional teams, that is like we are. We have the privilege to be called the designers, but at the end, everybody contributing in the design process is a designer, and that's something that, as designers, we have to acknowledge and embrace, right.
Randy Silver: 10:31
Yeah, makes perfect sense. Okay, this one. I think there's an obvious answer to this, or at least there's the answer that we all believe that there should be, but lots of companies still don't approach things where there's a designer on every team, or on every product development team, let's put it that way. So is that a prerequisite? Should every development team have, or must every team have, a designer embedded, or does it work okay sometimes, where you have an internal agency model or a designer spread across a couple of teams?
Miguel Fernandez: 11:08
Yeah, that's a great question, one that happens often and, like me, even being part of like companies, you know from like inception to like growth and acquisitions and IPOs and whatnot. I think that that's to be evaluated depending on the moment of where the company and the team is right. Obviously, like, it will be much beneficial to bring a designer as soon as possible, but it has to be understood that there's like certain like cycles in companies where design may not bring as much value as it can. But, of course, like my advice would be, if you can bring a designer as early as possible, do it. But it's to be understood, right, like sometimes it's better to have, like we have, like, for instance, a product principle that is like prototyping, the path. You just need to have like a prototype to get a feel first, to know if the idea is even worth pursuing before like you commit to like making it like feel really good, right? So I think that you have to acknowledge that.
Miguel Fernandez: 12:01
And the other thing to be clear is that even in design, mature organizations where design plays an important role, the product development process there's certain products or certain teams that don't have as much of a need for design, right, and that is okay.
Miguel Fernandez: 12:16
Like you have to evaluate it on the business need how much is really like are you interfacing with a customer and it could be an internal user too right, like?
Miguel Fernandez: 12:24
You have to be very clear about like okay, how much do I want to facilitate that experience of this user, even if it's internal right or if there's like certain things that you're like it's not worth investing design because they're not going to like produce the best business outcome. So you know, as a designer, it's like that's a hard question to ask because, as I said, like I definitely know the benefits of having design earlier in the process. But you have to understand like design, the design maturity of our organization like changes over time and as the business evolves. So that's something that like I think it's part of the education in the journey and making sure that people are start seeing the value of design. Obviously, like there's organizations that understand the value of design like really early, so they invest early and they can see the returns very early. But most organizations you kind of have to work with them on building that understanding.
Lily Smith: 13:12
And I guess one of the things that's a bit of a challenge for you guys is you have a lot of people using your product on a daily basis, and not even on a daily basis, probably on an hourly basis and so when you want to make quite big changes and it might be a little bit controversial and it's funny because Randy reminded me of the big overhaul that you had was a year ago, which actually I can't remember what Slack looked like before the change was made. All I remember is that the logo, or the yeah, the logo changed. I was like I forgot the old logo.
Lily Smith: 13:53
So, yeah, how was it kind of being in the business at that time and how did everyone respond to the feedback that you got during that big change that you introduced?
Miguel Fernandez: 14:04
that you got during that big change that you introduced. I think, like it's important to acknowledge that, like all big changes come with like some suffering, right, like to your point that you were talking about, like Slack and this is why I'm like so passionate about Slack is that this is something that people use multiple hours a day, right? So any like small change that you make can have cascading effects on, like people's workflow. So you have to really be empathetic about that. If you move a little button, it's not like other products. When people have a need, they go to the product and they are like, okay, they figure it out If they haven't been there in a while. It's like you're building muscle memory and you're, in unconscious mode, going your way around the product in unconscious mode, like going your way around the product, right. So you have to like really be empathetic that that is the case and, like that every change that you introduce is going to is going to have like that type of reception, like visceral, like it's going to be very visceral because, like you're talking about like people's work, right. So, yeah, we did this change like about like a year ago, and it's primarily motivated because, like as you've seen, like Slack was. It's kind of like mostly understood as a messaging app, but it's like this does much more than that.
Miguel Fernandez: 15:09
We knew that, like we started to introduce a lot of features and one of the things that you've probably heard is a lot of people complain about like hey, slack is noisy and like I cannot focus right. So that was kind of like the primary motivation is like how do we build a more focused slack? Understanding that, like people struggle a lot with a lot of notifications and alerts through the day and, at the same time, acknowledging that work comes in different ways, not just messaging. People want to do different things for work. So that's why today, as I was talking about, we have lists, we have canvases, there's other ways to work at Black.
Miguel Fernandez: 15:40
So we had to really think about the product lifecycle and its maturity and we started to really like think about kind of like the product life cycle and its maturity and, like we started to like bring up so many like new things into Slack that were challenging kind of like its interaction model that was primarily made for just messaging. So it starts to actually become detrimental to the user experience because you're trying to like fit all those things that don't fit in, kind of like just the messaging construct, don't fit in, kind of like just the messaging construct. So you start like to have to think about like, okay, how do we create a better navigational models that will help people focus which is the primary goal here and start like helping us like bring all these new capabilities in a way that that's still like simple, pleasant and productive. So that's what we um set ourselves to do a while ago and and, as I said, like every redesign is is challenging because, uh, no one was like what we say, like no one's achieved to be moved right. So you know that you have to go through this process, like I'm being like understanding, being very empathetic and and trust that like if you're doing a good job over time, like you see, like people like getting back into the rhythm.
Miguel Fernandez: 16:42
So there were like particular things on the design that like people were saying like this is great and some things that people were like why are you doing this? I don't understand that over time, like now, people are kind of like, oh, okay, I get it, I know what you're doing. There were some couple things that, even as a robust process that we have in terms of like testing and validating that we're doing the right things and checking with the diversity of our users. That we didn't hear loudly enough, only heard until we launched. But the good thing is that we work in pixels so at the end of the day, like when we realized like that we might have missed something that was very important for customers, we can correct that like hopefully soon, and that's one of the things that I think is like is really great that we work really really fast in like building product.
Randy Silver: 17:29
I'm really curious about that. So so, when the redesign started rolling out, the biggest frustration that I saw among lots of people across many different groups was I'm representative of a community that is in a lot of different Slack groups, so losing the switcher between the groups, between the different instances, was a very big deal for a lot of people. So the thing that came out very quickly was oh, there's a shortcut, there's a keyboard shortcut. You can bring it back. You just have to know what it was, and that calmed a lot of people down. But I'm curious what was it like internally when you rolled this out? Were you expecting this kind of feedback and how did it feel? How did you respond?
Miguel Fernandez: 18:12
Yeah, that's an interesting one. It's actually one that I keep to heart because it's one that we actually I think we didn't hear as loudly. We did hear some of it, but not as loudly. So, and just to like give you some perspective on our, on our kind of like, the way that we test our product is, it starts first with a working team, then we start expanding it internally to like a bigger audience of the team, then to the whole company, and then we have like pilot customers that are representative like that, like in some ways, like help us like understand like the different archetypes of companies for us to like really gauge. Like that we are covering our bases Right.
Miguel Fernandez: 18:45
So the workspace one, it's kind of like one that was kind of like a little bit at odds with, kind of like the design kind of like intentions, because, like we're always trying to simplify, right, like we're trying to simplify, and in this case, we were bringing like one layer of navigation that didn't exist at Slack. So, for instance, like we're talking about focus, we bring like a new way to kind of like have all the, all your activity and notifications in one place, and that was something that we didn't have before. So I think that, like we were thinking a lot on how to solve the issue of focus and noise for someone that is in a single organization, right, and that's probably like where that design was mostly optimized for, and even internally, and like with the organizations we tested, like some people like flagged it, it's like okay, what happens if you're like in multiple organizations? And in our mind we were kind of like, okay, you do still have a way to do it right, like it may be like buried on one more click, right, but what we quickly realized is that, like that's such a very important use case that like it wasn't okay. Like we have one product principle that is called be a good host, and it didn't feel like it were being good host with that user base by talking that under another click.
Miguel Fernandez: 19:55
So at the end, we had to work really fast, work in another version that you can now actually leave the workspaces exposed and, even though it may look a little noisier, because now you have the workspaces and then you have your workspace navigation, it's one of the designers we have to acknowledge right, that it's like in this case, the simplest experience for the user is actually having that there, that not having it right, like.
Miguel Fernandez: 20:18
So that's the tension. Sometimes, as designers, we think like, oh, it's simpler to have like less UI, but if you really think about people's workflow, it's like no, it's actually simpler to have like everything at hand so that I can choose my own path. So, yeah, I think like we heard it not as loudly and as soon as we went to GA with general audience, we heard like very loudly and like socials and whatnot, and unfortunately, the team had like already spent time thinking about it. Right, so it was not like something that caught us like completely out of surprise, but we had like some work done, so it was very relatively easy for us to like get on it and like fix it and launch it.
Randy Silver: 20:54
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Lily Smith: 22:09
Randy's just reminded me that actually the logo design was about 10 years ago, not last year, which I get these things conflated in my brain, but anyway, I mean it sounds like it was kind of quite a huge sort of process for you and that you do have like a really thorough regime for testing and everything. But is there anything that you've changed like since that experience that you've changed in order to try and avoid as much sort of fallout, I guess, from a change like that? And I suppose actually now that you've made that change.
Lily Smith: 22:43
you probably won't do such a big change again anytime soon, but yeah, is there anything that you've changed in your processes?
Miguel Fernandez: 22:51
from that. Well, I think the first thing is that in retrospect, you would want to have done things different. Every time that you can look in retrospect, it's easier to think about how to do things differently at the moment. So there was definitely a learning experience there. That is like we didn't hear the feedback so we probably didn't think it was as loud, but maybe it was as loud as it was before going to GA.
Miguel Fernandez: 23:16
But to your point about like doing changes like this, this type of changes like don't come often, like this big redesigns like don't come often, you, you hopefully like don't need them. They only come like if, if the product is building way too much design debt, that like the team has to be like, okay, we have to like fix like this core things on the product. Or if you are going through a process of, okay, we have to like fix, like this core things on the product. Or if you are going through a process of maturity, as we were going, that is like we're actually introducing a lot more functionality, so we need to like be ready for that. So we did that then to, as I say, like address both like focus and knowing that we had like some things down the line that were coming.
Miguel Fernandez: 23:56
But, like we, there's no need to like redesign a product Like this is. This is not like a thing that you do because it's like oh, redesigning it's, it's fun. It's more about like what is really the business and the user need here and back in the days was preparing the land for like things like what we have today. We've launched things like canvases, like lists and a couple more things to come, like all our AI efforts, and without doing like, without preparing the product to support all those features, you would probably have like a lot more complaints of it than with the redesign.
Randy Silver: 24:25
Miguel, I work with a lot of places that are either providing utility type products or B2B SaaS type things. They're things that people use for a purpose they don't want to spend. You know, the users themselves don't want to spend that much time on the platform. They want to get something done, and you've done a lot of that in your career, but now you're working on something. As you said, people spend hours a day on this. They spend it in a work context and in a personal context. What's the difference in your approach? What kind of principles are different when you're catering to people spending a lot of their time on a platform rather than just as a means to an end?
Miguel Fernandez: 25:02
Well, I think, like even the journey of what we're talking about, like the workspace switcher, is like. I remember, even when I was coming to Slack I coming from products that came more from like I have a need, so I'll go to this place to like fulfill my need, to like I in this place because I'm doing work, I have now a lot more empathy on like what, what, how to bring these types of changes right. You were asking about like a redesign, like. So I've learned at slack how thoughtful you have to be in moving a button right, like in other products you you make you a b test and you do a bunch of like things to like move, like buttons, but in here, like it's that you have to be a little bit more mindful. So I think, on a personal level, that has been actually my, my, my biggest learning, because I came really hot to like try like quote-unquote him through some of the things and then I realized really fast that it's like to your point, it's like no, no, people don't want this thing to move because this is part of the workflow. So that's on a personal level. Like on a level, we have a set of principles that really help us guide decision-making cross-functionally, mostly on the product team, but also help us make decisions as a company. And like some of them and they kind of like allude to what you were talking about and like maybe not changing things it's like one of them. It's like don't make me think. It's like we don't want people to stop in the user interface to think about what is it that they need to do to accomplish their goal. So that's a principle that we use.
Miguel Fernandez: 26:21
The other one that I mentioned before is being a great host. We want to make sure that we're acknowledging, understanding what is it that you're trying to accomplish and doing the best to be a good host. Another one is don't reinvent the wheel. Right, it's like there's things that don't need to be reinvented. There's already mental models, wheels for certain things. So we try to capitalize and leverage that as much as possible. And then the other ones that are a little bit more about the way that we work are really around like prototyping the path. That is like let's try these things like really fast and get a feel. And in some cases it's like, okay, let's do like bigger bets, like what we did with that redesign, where you, where you have to like, know what you're doing and make the bet and know that it's going to pan out later down the road how did you come up with your principles?
Lily Smith: 27:07
are they things that you just carry with you in the businesses that you've worked with, or are these kind of specific to slack and the team that you work with now? Yeah, these ones are specific to slack and and as that you work with now.
Miguel Fernandez: 27:17
Yeah, these ones are specific to Slack and, as most things that we do, they're living principles, right, and they need to be checked once in a while. I think we've revisited since I've been here at Slack the past three years, we've revisited one of them I don't remember what it was before, by the way, but we've revisited them once. So they're living and they obviously depend on on the organization and like what, what an organization values, right. So, fortunately, like in all the companies that I worked out, like we've had like very clear like values and principles, right. Amazon, for instance, has like the tenants, like they have like some tenants, like when I worked at jet, we have the same and airbnb the same.
Miguel Fernandez: 27:51
So, uh, obviously, like they all depend on the organization around the values of of the company. But for Slack, they've been really fascinating to be part of this at Slack because I do believe that, for instance, the fact that we prototype the path it's embedded in our culture the fact that people move really fast and are very open to try something and acknowledge that it was not good and then move on it's a really good practice. So, yeah, I wish this would be my personal one try something and acknowledge that it was not good and then move on. It's a really good practice. So yeah, I wish this would be my personal one, but this were actually here at Slack when I got here.
Randy Silver: 28:24
Lots of companies have principles like this that best idea wins, and things like that. It's harder for them to actually embody them and make it part of the culture. What's the secret to doing that?
Miguel Fernandez: 28:35
well, what is the secret to doing product principles well? I think that, like, well representing, like the company values, right, and at that point, like it's up on the individuals to acknowledge if they kind of like identify with the company values, right. But I think that if they really start, like, from the company values and if you treat them also like a product in the way that, like you're bringing people along in the process, right, like this, product principles are part not just of like somebody came up with them, but it was like really like a process of like good collaboration, good feedback loops, right, like trying to like say, like okay, we care about these things and building the best product for our users. Like, how is it that we're going to like accomplish that? So things and building the best product for our users? Like how is it that we're going to like accomplish that? So?
Miguel Fernandez: 29:22
Uh, as I said, like we did like one one revision of these and it was a process where, like it's open to the company to give feedback, to make sure that they're like being represented in the process. So I would say that that's something that I would definitely suggest that you kind of like bring people along, like make sure that you're hearing, hearing from across the company how do they get referred you on a sort of daily basis, like, do you hear conversations where people are like oh no, hang on, don't make me think so.
Lily Smith: 29:44
Or like don't make the customer think so, let's just, you know, do this differently or change this, or like, how does it sort of come to life in your work?
Miguel Fernandez: 29:53
Yeah, no, it's literally like that. And, by the way, like in Slack, we have like reacties right and we have like a reactie for each of these. And sometimes, when people are kind of like provided in an argument, like people react with that like reactie around the principle so that you can map it back to that. Also, when we do our design crits, when we're talking about the design crits, we actually try to like, use them and like or use them as a framing to ask some of the questions, right, and it's like hey, do you think that you have you been the greatest host, that you can be designing this, right?
Miguel Fernandez: 30:24
Or sometimes, when teams are going through a more philosophical debate, what if we do this, this or that or this or that, and you can see the team started to go in a rabbit hole? You're like, hey, wait a second. You can see the team started to go in a rabbit hole. You're like, hey, wait a second, you can probably prototype a path in this one. I think, for instance, people's misunderstanding is like oh, prototype to get the answer. We use this principle of prototyping the path to help us answer questions. It's like, okay, we don't know the answer to this question, let's prototype this thing to get to the next hill. So yeah, we see them in practice all the time as we're building products, as we're doing design crits, as we're evaluating.
Randy Silver: 31:03
Even with our executives. They're like, hey, don't reinvent the wheel here. You've just brought up design crits a couple of times, which is a topic that I really love. I think it's something that designers go to school and they learn how to do crits properly, but product people we don't do them nearly as often. I've long thought it would be a good practice to bring into product management tribes and teams. What's the secret to doing a good crit? Have you ever done this on more of a product side than just a pure design side?
Miguel Fernandez: 31:29
Yeah, well, this is a great question Actually, like part of like how we collaborate here at Slack. One of the things that we've done is actually leverage Slack a lot for this type of process. So we use huddles and it's a great way to do crits because everybody can share the word, because you see them in video. But we have kind of like a thread going on and, as I was saying, we kind of have some emojis and reactions to kind of classify the type of feedback where you're saying like, hey, this is visual design feedback, product feedback, ux feedback, and one of the things that, as I was saying, what is important to build good cross-collaboration is transparency. So, first, we've invited product folks, engineering folks, into a design group.
Miguel Fernandez: 32:10
I think some organizations say, hey, I'm going to talk with designers and you guys are not allowed. It's like no, this is open. You also have some perspective to share here and it's and it's important to hear that perspective, to be able to think about the problem. Right, obviously, like I work and we work a lot with, like, product managers and engineers to be hey, it's a forum that it's meant to, it's meant to like be thought provoking, challenging, so don't come here like kind of like to say like hey, you're blowing up my scope. If you do this, I will have to move timers. It's like really be open to have this forum to debate ideas and then we'll get into the scoping conversation.
Miguel Fernandez: 32:45
But this is really to poke on the idea.
Miguel Fernandez: 32:47
So one thing that we do is we use huddles, we invite cross-functional folks. There's ways to classify the feedback so that people can contribute. And the cool thing is that even if you cannot attend like, let's say, you're a product manager and you cannot attend to the crit you can always go back to the thread and get a summary. You can either go through the thread or get an eye summary of the thread so that you are up to speed on the conversation. So it's part of the practice of building good cross-functional relationships, building transparency, like good cross-functional relationships, building transparency. And I do think that we definitely love like having cross-functional folks, because sometimes, as I said, like designers can also like go into this like more philosophical quest, and that's where I said like it's important to leverage each other's strengths and like product managers can be really good at saying like hey, love that quest, pursue that quest, but like make sure that we continue on this path right, so that's been really, really helpful too for us when we do these crits.
Lily Smith: 33:42
Just coming back around to the question that we asked right at the top of the conversation, where we talked about sort of like you know what good designers look like, or kind of how you judge a good designer, and something that you said as well around. Like early on in your career, you did quite a lot of different things animation and working in agencies and exploring different things and when I think back to what designers had to do like when I first started working in tech companies, you know you had your designer and then you had your UX person as well and it was they were two different disciplines. I think maybe they still are in some organizations, but generally you get product designers these days who sort of cover everything. But is there something that designers should be sort of like trying to aim for? Like a level of understanding of you know, interactions, animations, information, architecture, like I feel like there's so much that you need to know in order to really be able to do an amazing design job.
Lily Smith: 34:48
It just feels like a lot for for designers. I mean, maybe they have a little bit more help these days, like the tools are a bit better, but what's your sort of tip for if you know if there are designers listening, or maybe even just for the product people listening like feel a little bit sorry for everything that the designer has to think about.
Miguel Fernandez: 35:09
Yeah, well, I think you're right, like the world has changed. And I remember, even when I started to think about like this profession, like it even called product design, it was very clear and it was very waterfall-y you do the requirements, you do this, you do that. That was the process. We've changed things in a better way. That's why I was saying everybody's a designer. In a way, it's much better to have a conversation with a product manager or engineer early on than until something is built. You're like, oh, this is actually wrong. Right, we made like some wrong assumptions here.
Miguel Fernandez: 35:39
So, in terms of like the skillset, I do think that these days there's like more companies and more expectations that design must do everything, but like you also have to be realistic that that is not the case for most people, right, like it is important to kind of like be well-rounded and understand like all the facets of design, like what it takes into the building, like a good product. And these days, like it's definitely you have to know a little bit of like motion, a little bit of coding, if possible. You have to become like the best coder. Maybe not to your point, there's like no tools for that, but when you're thinking about your design team. That's one of the things that you have to consider that you you can probably like find a couple like folks that are going to be like that. But then you also have to like have like some specialists right that are going to just like own their craft, let's say, like visual design, some in typography, right. So even though they are going to be like focused on that, doesn't mean that they not shouldn't be versed on the other facets of design.
Miguel Fernandez: 36:35
But as a leader and part of the organization and working with your product partners is understanding also who is in the right role. You cannot put that type of designer into this type of problem. You also have to make sure that you're placing the person with the right skill set into the right problem. But I just think that the advice is I would say that yeah, it's like keep curiosity, like people need to continue to be curious and learn everything that is out there and cause like the more that you know, it's like the more conversations you can have right. Like if you can really like go to an engineer and have a dialogue. Maybe you're not an engineer or like code as much, but you can understand like how things are built. You have, like, a higher likelihood of affecting that product if you do so.
Lily Smith: 37:22
Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. And one of the other things that I think is really different now is the expectations of the consumer in terms of design. Like we have so many really easy to use, beautiful looking products that we use on a on a daily basis, and I think there's like such a high expectation from a consumer of, like you know, if something doesn't feel right or flow right, it's so much more noticeable now than back in the old days. It was just, like you know, as long as it did the job that you needed it to do, then I mean, what was it? If you a hair on fire problem, it can be like a really rubbish solution and you can get away with it because it's just such an important problem to solve, whereas I think the expectation of consumer from a, from a design point of view, is just like the standards are much higher across the board.
Miguel Fernandez: 38:19
Yeah, absolutely that has changed. And if you think about like OSs, like have a ball, like now you have a phone in your hand that has like all these like beautiful interactions, right, like you didn't used to have that before. Just imagine like texting back in the days you had to like press the key like seven times to get like one letter, then the next one. Now you have like a full keyboard there. So definitely the expectations have changed and that's what has made it actually like pretty interesting right, like at airbnb and like here at slack too, like we had such like the design team is so diverse in terms of skills like you wouldn't imagine sometimes, like why would you need like a filmographer, like in a design product design team? And you're like, okay, actually, because they have they have like this ability to understand certain things that if you translate that into a product experience, you're actually making a much better experience. So, as you're also building a design team, it's like we were talking before like, okay, when do you bring a designer? Do all teams need designers?
Miguel Fernandez: 39:11
But if you can, actually it's really good to start like bringing a different mix of designers, like it's like we have like people are dedicated to motion right, and part of the things that we do in my team that is in charge kind of like design systems too, is kind of like look at the, at the interface, and say like, can we actually make it a little bit delightful, can we actually make it smooth and the experience right? And those are little things that sometimes like companies are not willing to invest, but because the standards are much higher now and now you have to be like playing in that game, like slack has has been differentiating here simple, pleasant and productive, right like the word pleasant is important here because we've been always very thoughtful and deliberate about that. But other companies are kind of like saying like, oh, why slack? Oh, because they care, because they care about crowd, they care about this. So it's definitely like something that now is, as you were saying, it's more expected than before.
Randy Silver: 40:04
You know, my son is 12 years old now and his school won't let them have smartphones, so he's got an old Nokia and he's experiencing the pain of texting Hates it. It's hilarious. No-transcript.
Miguel Fernandez: 40:38
I love that question and it's one that I always talk with product design leaders, and I mean we were talking a little bit about expectations, right. I think that sometimes product managers want things in a certain way right. It's kind of like they may see a through line to the end result of something. So they kind of come hop to a designer and say like hey, just do this Right. And they're less open to have a dialogue. But if you kind of like break that down and understand the why it's because I personally feel that the hardest role in a product team is the one of the product manager you have to be like managing expectations from the executives, like managing expectations from your customer, right. So you have to be like managing expectations from the executives, like managing expectations from your customer, right. So you have to balance a bunch of like different things from teams that may not even report directly to you. So the most important thing is like okay, how do you establish a relationship where you maximize, like the designer contribution right? Like how do you help the designer like have some room, some leeway to actually like propose right. And this is a hard thing to balance, obviously, because everybody is up to the timeline you will you need to like deliver.
Miguel Fernandez: 41:39
But I think the most important thing is like creating that space right, like creating that space and almost like you're thinking about like your product portfolio, you have to kind of like think about like different bets, ones that are high, like low effort, high return but there's like certain things that are like more like design investigations or problems that are worse, like doing some exploration and what I found is that designers, like if they are in a team where actually like enables a lot of that where they can, where they can like really like show, like hey, you're giving me like a problem space, right, and here's like how to think about it, and really work in collaboration, they tend to perform much better than if it's like you're giving me the solution and you just want me to like make it pretty Right, because it's that's a hard spot to be in for any designer and in a way like even we're talking about skills, like I also like tell designers like you can think about their intentions and their motivations Right, like on your, on your partners, but also we have the superpower of helping like communicate ideas.
Miguel Fernandez: 42:35
So this is like. The other flip side is, sometimes designers are like, oh, like the product or the engineer did a sketch Like why and it's like they're just trying to like have a conversation, so use that as a way to have that dialogue, actually, like give them tools to do so, right, like the more that you understand, the better that you can work together, right?
Lily Smith: 43:01
So that's on the designer side, but, as I said, like on the on the product side, I would definitely encourage more like room for people to be able to bring their craft right, their special power, into into the conversation. Miguel, thank you so much for joining us. We have now run out of time, but it's flown by and I've really, really enjoyed hearing everything that you've had to say. So, yeah, thank, thank you so much for sharing all of your advice and insight with us.
Miguel Fernandez: 43:19
Thank you, Lily. Thank you so much, Randy.
Randy Silver: 43:21
This was a great chat.
Lily Smith: 43:33
The Product Experience hosts are me, Lily Smith, host by night and chief product officer by day.
Randy Silver: 43:39
And me Randy Silver also host by night, and I spend my days working with product and leadership teams, helping their teams to do amazing work.
Lily Smith: 43:48
Luran Pratt is our producer and Luke Smith is our editor.
Randy Silver: 43:52
And our theme music is from product community legend Arnie Kittler's band Pow. Thanks to them for letting us use their track.
