Session Title
Should we take off our black turtlenecks and give up “ownership” of interaction design in order to take it mainstream?
Presenter
Preston Smalley, eBay, User Experience Design
Session Type: Discussion
As we evolve interaction design as a field, one approach we should consider is to open up the facilitation and ownership to people that don’t have the word “design” on their business card (e.g. product managers, development leads). We’ve recently tried a number of techniques that does just this at eBay and would like to discuss with you the following topics:
* Giving up “ownership” of design (how to do it, pros and cons)
* Impacts this shift has on the role within the company and our field
* How language and terminology can help or hinder you
* How to build on initial successes and institutionalize the methodology
In this discussion you’ll hear real world examples from companies such as Facebook, Intuit, Yahoo! and eBay. We hope to create some healthy debate so come with your strong point of views to share.
Biography
Preston Smalley directs the user experience design team at eBay and as a product leader contributes to shaping the overall customer experience strategy for eBay Marketplaces. Before taking on various management roles, he worked as an interaction designer at eBay and as a product manager for Microsoft. He recently graduated with his MBA from UC Berkeley’s Haas School of Business where he focused on design innovation and product management. He’s also got a unique background in HCI and software engineering with a BS from Cal Poly San Luis Obispo. From time to time he shares his thoughts on the intersections of design, business, and technology on his blog: www.prestonsmalley.com
Shailesh Shilwant is a senior design manager at eBay and the pioneer of “product discovery” as a practice within the company, which integrates design thinking into the product creation process. He’s trained hundreds of product managers, developers, and designers on the methodology of determining “what” products to build for the target customers and business goals. Shailesh has been practicing interaction design and visual design in ecommerce and elearning industry for more than a decade. He holds masters in Design from IIT Bombay, India. He speaks at various conferences and writes articles to share his thinking and insights.
5 Comments
Would love to hear more about this type of collaboration – too often, I feel that the design team is forced to operate in a “bubble” within linear constraints.
I would like to hear more about this topic, particularly about how to build a culture of design and how collaboration with folks that don’t have “designer” in their title can lead to better designed products.
Hiya, I’m curious to hear your conclusions. My sense is that whether we like it or not, lots of people in companies already feel some ownership over “design”. Product managers and the like always voice their opinions on whether X should be blue or green, or a few pixels here or there. Makes sense to institutionalize the fact that ownership is distributed.
Thanks for the comments…
Christian–Yes we will go into how relaxing constraints can really unleash innovation.
DeAnn–Your point is key as this approach does just that by leveraging non-designers in the process.
Rodrigo–Yes many companies do this and yet don’t setup product managers for success. That’s a key difference with our approach.
If we give up ownership, does the product and design start to become lackluster, mushy, or lack a strong point-of-view? Does it become more of a design by committee? And is this a good thing or bad? Or, do all the collaborative owners add insights that other owners have not considered? I’m looking forward to hearing the IxD field’s POV! To own or not to own?