Ian Bach

🚀 Exploring AI & User-Centered Design: Where UCD Falls Short 🤖🔍 AI is transforming our world, but is User-Centered Design (UCD) keeping up? In my latest blog, I dive into my experience and challenges of integrating UCD with AI, covering key points like: 🔹 The Dilemma of Unknown Unknowns: How AI introduces new, unpredictable issues. 🔹 Data Gaps: The impact of missing data on inclusivity and fairness. 🔹 Big Data Complexity: Why designers need new skills in data analysis. 🔹 End-User Complexity: Making AI understandable for users. 🔹 AI Behavior: The need for ongoing maintenance and refinement. Drop your thoughts and experiences in the comments—I’d love to hear your perspective! 👇📢 https://lnkd.in/g9yAHQ5p #AI #Design #UserCenteredDesign

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Profit is killing our planet. And your business can save it. For too long, we've chosen profits over the planet and growth over global responsibility. But what if we could have both? With ZenShifu and Unlimited Designz, I'm on a mission to prove that success and sustainability can coexist. I'm planting trees, investing in green initiatives, and making every client interaction benefit the Earth. It's a small step, but it's a catalyst for change. Imagine if every business joined in. We could create a network of enterprises that heal rather than harm, that grow responsibly and give back to our planet. The future of business - and our world - depends on the choices we make today. Let's build a sustainable future together. Your move could inspire a movement. How will you redefine success? I'd love to know.

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A podcast 🎙️ with a twist 🍭 needs your input ✍️ I know — there are plenty of podcasts out there. But when it comes to the product + design space, truly valuable content that helps you level up is still pretty hard to find. We're working on a new concept and would love your input to help shape it. If you have a spare 1 minute over your lunch break, fill in this super quick survey 🙏 #podcast #tech #product #design #ux #ui #productdesign #startups #dubai

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Listen to this today if you’re designing experiences with LLMs and AI agents. LiveKit’s CEO has some great insights around: 👉🏼 What voice is good for, what text is good for, and what neither is good for. 👉🏼 How these relate to the modalities of how we interact with each other as humans. 👉🏼 The current bifurcation of modes (text, voice, computer use/touch) and how we need to work towards blending those more fluidly for the ideal UX. Very fascinating stuff that’s deeply resonant with my mind this week and validates a path towards the future of human-computer interaction.

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Product designers take note. The world is changing so quickly. If you're not designing these kinds of experiences, you are creating something that is already obsolete: 👉🏼 AI agents that work for you proactively 24/7, and autonomously complete tasks and workflows on your behalf. 👉🏼 Multi-modal discussions that include voice, text, and visuals all at once. 👉🏼 Tools that combine all your data into a single knowledgebase that empowers AI with extreme understanding and real-time context across multiple channels and touchpoints. ❌ Wrappers around ChatGPT don't count. You'll be cannibalized. ❌ Co-pilots added on to legacy products don't count. That's still old-paradigm, human-first thinking. It needs to be an end-to-end experience (not a point solution!) that solves valuable niche use cases and replaces labour. (The labour budget is way bigger than the software budget!) That's the future of all software. If you're not building the future, find another job that will allow you to. Anyone disagree? I'd love to hear your thoughts.

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Way back in March I ran a workshop for designers to discuss the potential impact of AI on our roles, and on the people who run and use the services we design. I finally, FINALLY wrote it up here: https://lnkd.in/eHfr-gCD

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🔍 The Risks of Not Measuring Design In my latest article, I break down the madness of not measuring design—because the risks are bigger than you might think. Here’s a quick recap of what’s at stake: 1️⃣ Conflating delivery with design. 2️⃣ Treating design like a vendor, not a partner. 3️⃣ Flying blind into development. 4️⃣ Focusing on the wrong solutions or audience. 5️⃣ Missing critical learning opportunities. 6️⃣ Worsening organizational silos 7️⃣ Veering away from audience needs 8️⃣ Missing critical learning opportunities 9️⃣ Weakening design's role in strategy But it’s not all doom and gloom. I’ve also shared some practical ways to mitigate these risks and start building a measurement culture. 📖 https://lnkd.in/eJvF_jHe #MeasuringDesign #DesignLeadership #StrategicDesign

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Inclusion is essential, not optional. Alienating anyone during a design process breeds opposition. Years ago, I spearheaded a major design overhaul with a talented team. Yet, something was amiss. The product managers seemed to be on the outside looking in, sceptical and disengaged. That’s when we decided to change gears. We invited them to our brainstorming sessions, valued their insights, and openly shared our challenges. The transformation was remarkable. Scepticism turned into support. We didn't just create a product; we built a shared vision that surpassed expectations. The lesson? Inclusion is a catalyst for innovation. Open up your process. Embrace every voice. Together, you can build something extraordinary.

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🤹‍♂️ “I had no idea you could do that” As we attempt to scale and white-label our design systems, we've run into providing some options that leave our team a bit stumped and scratching our heads. After doing some research, I’m appreciating all the efficiency gains you can pull off with just a few Figma tricks and tutorials. → Small components are easy, but as components get more complex or resemble layouts, tracking all the possible nested variations is impossible. → Sometimes components have optional elements that show and hide depending on the needs of a specific client or context. → “You get a logo, you get a logo, everyone gets a logo“ Everyone has their own branding, which means toggling between multiple logos and lockups. With some digging, we found resources to help with all of these use cases: 🖼 Building flexible components with "slots" by Luis Ouriach is a super useful walkthrough for experimenting with the concept of slots in Figma. “Slots” allow you to create a placeholder component inside a more complex “container” component allowing you to build more flexible and context-specific layouts. https://lnkd.in/gp2JEFFU 🙈 An Introduction to Boolean Variables in Figma by UI Collective offers a simple overview of how to apply use the hidden gem of variables options. Boolean variables allow you to show and hide elements not just in prototypes but in component variants. This was useful when we wanted to toggle elements within components for various themes. https://lnkd.in/gWt8QRit 🎭 Modes: Changing a Branded Header by Nate Greenwall was exactly the solution I was looking for when I needed to offer multiple logo options from a centralized library. The playground file maps out how you can pull this off with string variables and modes. https://lnkd.in/gJhcemcm 💎 I hope some of the resources that we've leveraged at Exygy can be helpful for you and your teams working in Figma. → Leverage slots for nesting smaller components within larger container layouts. → Utilize boolean variables to show and hide elements across variants. → Experiment with using string variables to switch elements like logos for different brands. #figma #ui #design #DesignSystems #variables

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𝗛𝗼𝘄 𝗜 𝗘𝗺𝗯𝗿𝗮𝗰𝗲 𝗚𝗲𝘁𝘁𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗟𝗼𝘀𝘁 Sometimes mid way through developing a new product I’ll find myself feeling like I’m lost in the woods. In order to avoid walking in circles, I need is a landmark to head towards. In product design, my landmark is the solution I aim to create for my customers. At the beginning, I don't know exactly how to reach that solution. If I stay focused on the solution I know I’ll find my way, if I don’t I may be circling in the woods forever! But if I keep taking steps towards the landmark, I'm bound to encounter a stream or a river that will lead me out.

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Useful warning here from Phill Julian about Figma's default setting on AI content training. If you want to protect your IP/design work processes, take a moment to decide whether you want them training Figma's AI models...

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As AI, VR, AR, & MR continue to dominate conversations in and about our industry, I’ve been prompted to think about what kind of change I hope these advancements will spur in the product design practice. Here are some of my thoughts and how more technology could save us from the robots.

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We secured $770k in design salaries in our first month operating in the US 🎉 We placed exceptional: • Product Design Director in California • Two Senior Product Designers in Oregon and North Carolina • Senior Product Designer in London Some of these searches started before July, but last month was when all the offers were finally signed. I could not be more excited with the results! Shoutout to the most design-savvy and caring recruitment team at Hirey | Design Recruiters 🖤 Looking back all I can say is that: Last year was D-E-V-A-S-T-A-T-I-N-G. I believe many of you experienced the same. I was full of self-doubt and nagging thoughts: "Will what I do ever be needed again?" “Maybe it’s time to shut down and go back in-house?” “Am I just a good IC, but not a business owner?” Now, everyone says the market is picking up, and autumn should be fruitful in hiring. Fingers crossed! But we’re ready to face any challenges that come our way. To all small business owners who’ve made it through hard times without losing the team: I believe now we can do anything! #hiring #recruitment #entrepreneurship #motivation #community #design

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I love this article on what we've learned over the past 10 years of Material Design at Google: Form should follow feeling. We need variety as well as consistency where it matters. Just start designing with others and see where lots of iterations take you. And put human connection first to make it interesting. Material has come a long way from "digital paper" and what the world needed 10 years ago, a focus on consistency above all to make the exploding world of apps understandable. I'm super excited by where we're at right now and everything the next 10 years of Material will bring to create unique, but still highly usable, digital products that embrace the feeling of using them. https://lnkd.in/gQC93JdW

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Vision. Whether you're a hardware startup founder, or corporate design leader, forming an inspired vision is essential to guiding your teams to success and provides a North Star to follow. But it is typically not enough to have formed a vision. It often begins as an idea, intuition, or notion in the mind which needs further exploration and clarity when aligning a product or service to it. The key to unlocking your visions potential lies in finding creative partners who take the time to understand your vision, expand upon it, and then know how to bring it to reality. Bringing a vision into reality is one most beautiful aspects of design we specialize in at Rise Design Studio. We'd love realize yours as well! Rise Design Studio | Los Angeles, California ♻ Repost this if you found it helpful! #Vision #DreamsToReality #IndustrialDesign

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Hey industrial designers check out this informative AI event Thursday for IDSA, RSVP in the link below!

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I’ve been thinking a lot about how we might charge for “service as a software” products in the future. I predict packaging and pricing for these products to actually start looking a lot more like how we charge for human labor — T&M, consulting fees, maybe eventually even some version of a regular salary based on complexity of computation or job to be done. Curious to know your thoughts. #ai #design #productmanagement #business #strategy

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// The Work of the Next Generation of Designers and Anthropologists // Arvind Satyanarayan frames the challenges for the next generation of designers /and/ anthropologists. "Determining whether the /agency/ GenAI displays will enhance or diminish the human capacity for culture will be the work of the next generation of designers and anthropologists. We have attempted to delineate the kind of collaborative effort this work will entail, and detail a program of design research related to issues of accountability ..." "How should models be trained to value cultural diversity or avoid recurring patterns of oppression? How do human–computer interactions within the context window of a particular chat or project relate to broader sociocultural contexts in which people act?" "Addressing such enormous questions will advance fundamental science, technical art, and moral imagination; applying the framework of /distributed agency/ to human interaction with GenAI models will make them tractable." https://lnkd.in/gtxqYJuy https://lnkd.in/gydMj-q8

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This great article is about how to take action to have a real mindset on having a human-centered service. 👏

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