RJ Crowder-Schaefer

Sneak peek! Join us as Kal Walkden, VP of Product Engineering at Double Good, shares insights on building collaborative, user-centered product teams. Don’t miss this episode! 🎙️🎧 #ProductManagement #UserExperience #Podcast

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Product team Book Club - we read Transformed by Marty Cagan this summer and had an excellent discussion. I'm just now getting around to writing it up. Feel free to use this discussion guide with your own teams! Would also love any suggestions for future book clubs... https://lnkd.in/gZ3Xhr4f #transformation #productteams #productmanagement #martycagan

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The user experience for Government portals like The Department of Unemployment in Massachusetts is absolutely horrendous. Try to log in and the experience becomes a 1990s nightmare. A complete overhaul is needed, but for an MVP can we start with login pages? Here's my prototype of how it could be simplified and redesigned for a better user experience. Executive Office of Technology Services and Security #govtech #stateandlocal #UXgov #UnemployedUXUI #openforwork https://lnkd.in/etjNpHgV

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Are your UX teams constantly putting out fires instead of driving strategy? In our latest episode, we discuss how to transform UX teams from reactive firefighters to strategic leaders. Learn how to: Create shared resources that empower your entire organization Provide training to spread UX best practices Offer consultative services without getting bogged down in execution Build a UX community to foster user-centered thinking Discover how these strategies can help your UX team have a broader impact, even with limited resources. Listen now: https://lnkd.in/eKaCBTHw

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How do you drive design excellence and innovation in UX? This Wednesday on UX Banter, host Dushyant Kanungo gets in a conversation with Amina ElShazly, CTO and Co-founder of UXIT. Amina shares her insights on leading successful design teams, mentoring future UX leaders, and integrating AI and blockchain into design practices. Plus, learn about her inspiring journey empowering women in tech and design. Stay tuned! #uxdesign #userexperience #innovation #designthinking #leadership #blockchain #ai #womenintech #productdesign #techleadership

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🎨 📺 Sharon Roth is a Product & Design leader who’s built her career in the lab, across different modalities, to bring more creative product experiences to life 📺 🎨 It's W3 / Q3 / 2024 and this week in our MGMT Boston up & coming operator series we’ve got Sharon who serves as the Senior Director of Product Management at Quantified.ai, the AI-driven flight simulator for sellers. The app feels as real as your next video call, scales across teams, programs, and companies, and ramps reps 42% faster. Sharon is leading Quantified AI’s Product & Design team after previous roles in Product leadership at Tamr & Honor Education. She’s excited to be back working in an Enterprise focused company, leading Design alongside Product, focused on strategic & execution based discipline. ❓Questions Are Your Roadmap ❓ It’s popular to encourage new hires to ask a lot of questions. But it’s always a good time to ask questions! When a member of your team comes to you and says “we really need to build X feature”, they’re coming to you for good reason. Dig into the why to understand how often the issue comes up, when it happens in a customer conversation, and why they’re asking for it in the first place. Is there an even better way to build a solution? Also, people are always excited about getting to a solution. By delaying the solution discussion to first get everyone to agree on the problem, you can coordinate a better response. Sharon has been in rooms where stakeholders can’t agree on the problem they’re trying to solve, which can sometimes be even more painful! By asking better questions and articulating the underlying issues thoroughly, they can work together as an organization to chart a better path forward. 3 Career Insights / Learnings 🙋‍♀️ Seek New Challenges - “Trying new things is how you learn and grow. At a startup, there are so many opportunities to try new things. As startups evolve, you need to embrace all that’s going to happen and make it a positive thing. Otherwise don’t go to a startup!” 🤝 Act with Integrity - “Do your best, show your work. But also treat others with respect and kindness while doing it. How you treat people and how you show up every day will impact your work environment. You’re responsible for the energy you bring to the room, so be authentic and try to inject some positivity. It will help you build the type of network you want to have too” 🗣 Invest in Communication Skills - “It helps you ask questions well, advocate for yourself, have your ideas be heard. It also helps others understand your impact. It takes continuous practice to do well.” If you’d like to learn more about Sharon’s career, the full post is linked in the comments. Go ahead and sign up for the newsletter to see the operator learnings we bring you in the weeks ahead too, will ya? #bostontech #operators

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"Empathy for the customer is key, but we have to also align our research with business metrics to ensure we drive meaningful impact." Check out this insightful blog summarizing the Q&A between Julie Marie Norvaisas and my brilliant colleague, Elysa Stein on how to demonstrate the ROI of your research. #uxresearch #impact #businessimpact #researchimpact

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😋🥒🥕 Haley Wilcox is a competitor, listener, and solution driven revenue leader who has built partnerships through environments spicy and mild 🥕🥒😋 It's W8 / Q3 / 2024 and this week in our MGMT Boston up & coming operator series we’ve got Haley who is the the Director of Enterprise Sales & Partnerships at Boston food technology leader ezCater. Joining as one of their early sales reps, Haley became a part of helping ezCater establish their B2B go to market model. She was an integral part of the company’s transformation from a transactional marketplace company acquiring individual customers to an Enterprise focused growth stage startup selling to B2B decision makers who implemented corporate food programs. Currently, Haley is leading the Strategic Partnerships team, partnering with real estate and hospitality providers to help provide food programs that align with today's evolving workplace. In addition to the Partnerships team, Haley oversees the Enterprise Demand businesses consisting of Enterprise Business Development and Enterprise acquisition functionalities. These teams are experts and consult large companies on the best food and beverage program for today's environment. 🤝 💡 Successful Partnerships Rely on Relationships & Solutions 💡🤝 Haley has been most successful in her career building relationships through trust and listening. Whether it’s her customers, partners, or teammates, trust is the foundation of all of those relationships. Haley cares deeply and demonstrates it by listening and asking the right questions before she even thinks about opening her mouth to pitch a product. Where she has been very successful is through understanding in the food and beverage space, there will never be a "one size fits all" model. Her success has driven from understanding customer needs, and consulting based on industry knowledge and use cases. She loves working directly with workplace teams. Those are the people that care about optimization, making the office a great place to work, and understanding the impact of food on a company. 3 Career Insights / Learnings Listening - “Listen intently. Understanding your client’s needs to provide the best recommendations leads to strong relationships” Building Relationships - “I’ve been super successful by building long term relationships to establish trust. It’s hard, and it takes time, but I’ve found it to be crucial for long term success” Have Mentors - “Find a mentor that works for your style. Where people haven’t been successful is picking someone based on their role or title. I’ve been successful with mentors who have similar styles to how I work with customers and think about strategic decisions. I’ve learned so much from mentors that prioritize my values and style, focused on customer needs” Go ahead and sign up for the newsletter to see the operator learnings we bring you in the weeks ahead #bostontech #operators

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You can’t make UX decisions in a vacuum. That’s why Alignment Workshops are integral to everything we do at ZeroDegrees. Check out our latest Miro template for tips, tricks, and exercises to ensure that every stakeholder is onboard with your strategic vision and tactical priorities.  Alignment Workshops can help break up logjams and get people out of their often siloed ways of thinking. It’s a great tool to define priorities and outcomes, and identify important steps along the way—like establishing personas and evaluating best (and worst) practices—for your next UX undertaking. We found that gaining alignment and clarity of purpose in the beginning of a project helps to ensure you reach success in the end. Ready to Workshop? Get your free Alignment Workshop template now at https://lnkd.in/eB22pk3d. Once you take it for a spin, let us know what’s working, what could be better—and what you think overall. #miro #miroverse #workshops #alignmentworkshop #designthinking —- ZeroDegrees, Inc. is a user experience (UX) research, strategy, and design studio that helps organizations put human insights at the heart of their digital experiences. We’ve created a series of UX research workshop templates to identify strategic goals and priorities, gather insights, gain consensus, and generate breakthrough ideas to drive better user experiences. Because when the user wins, we all win.

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🏆 Andre Marquet knows his stuff! What a fun podcast. I had the pleasure of chatting with him about #productstrategy and how #productoperations enables : 1️⃣ A winning product strategy 2️⃣ How you measure the success of a product strategy transformation 3️⃣ Just how do you get Product Operations stood up? ⭐ Building on that theme, join me in Lisbon for my NEW workshop "From 0-1: Standing Up Product Operations (with no new hires)" at the Productized conference Oct 2-4. https://lnkd.in/esiH8hff #productmanagement

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"You can't iterate towards a revolution." (or something like that), the saying goes. We disagree. But how do you completely overhaul your product without disrupting existing customers' experiences? If you have users engaging with your product, but know this product needs to fundamentally evolve, you want to make progress quickly while making sure that you don't overly invest in something that will soon be obsolete. Read how we iterated our way towards a product transformation (and more) in our latest newsletter and case study. https://lnkd.in/eGF_wamA #productinnovation #newsletter #GenAI #productdevelopment #productdesign #agency #casestudy #digitaltransformation

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I think Pete Wells' sign-off article in today's NYT is a must read for anyone interested in technology, it's impacts on society, or what a good restaurant experience should be like. I spent the first couple months of 1997 running around the country visiting innovative device makers who were doing things with Microsoft's small platform (it had a lot of names including Windows CE). I was looking for what I called a "magic box" that combined several features from different devices in a variety of very different industries. Mind you, this was a full decade before Steve Jobs did his introductory iPhone demonstration. What I was after was a small portable device on which we could install apps for use in super secure machine area networks, with white listed relationships with our switch/router infrastructure such that packets would only be sent by the infrastructure to devices that were specifically authorized to receive packets from the sending device using our own private GUID system (not MAC, EICN, etc.). I also wanted it to be able to be a VoIP phone with full telephony capability other than text, except via a "text over analog speech" channel that had been digitized. Again, this would make it safe to use around factory equipment such as AGVs, and other dangerous things. Well, you still can't buy that box. It is possible to have them made-up custom, but it's such an obvious industrial need, I did not and still do not believe that a company like Boeing should have to pay the price points that would be required for such a device. Cell phones have become a social disaster, while at the same time are pieces of unsafe crap for applications that are crying out for something very much like them, yet different.

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Listen to this podcast snippet on using a question-clustering approach to RAG applications design from a real-world practitioner/consultant. https://lnkd.in/gepyHEBr

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When was the last time you checked out the Business Insider ✳ app ✳?! Look how amazing this Review's post looks on the app (you won't regret it). Link in the comments. Huge shout out to the UXD, Service Journalism and Mobile App prod/tech teams! #product #uxd #design #productmanagement #tech #userexperience #mobile #media #servicejournalism #businessinsider

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The smartest companies are slimming workforces while outcompeting those fatter than a Thanksgiving turkey (RIP). How? By integrating AI across the business. In my world, a couple of years ago it was challenging to convince stakeholders content design and content strategy needed expert resources. Now it's impossible. Or should be. Because whether or not we recognise it, computers primed with data can do a consistently better job. Our role as product people has evolved from creating assets to stewardship. Researchers are more important than ever - because AI still (for now) needs humans to test its outputs with other humans. But the more we move into an agentic world, the more important AI becomes in bringing customers and companies closer together. Which means instead of moaning and creating opaque arguments about our worth, we need to be reskilling to embrace the inevitable future.

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I have a RL task that I have been struggling with for a while and decided to test 4 AI chat tools with it: create a detailed itinerary for my NYC Christmas trip. I didn't make it easy - 7 days, 15 must-visit places, a wish-list of restaurants, rooftop bars, jazz bars, and specific dishes to try. Plus, everything had to be optimized considering the hotel location, pre-booked tickets, and existing dinner reservations. I was surprised! 🤯 📊 My ranking order: 1. Claude 2. Chat GPT 3. Perplexity 4. Gemini Here's why: 🥇 Claude.ai dominated: - Super organized with perfectly placed activities - Optimal distance planning - Loaded with additional tips - Restaurant and rooftop recommendations with great ratings - Suggested a rooftop bar in the same building as the dinner spot for late night drinks - Gave me multiple itinerary options based on my interests when I asked to change something - Great additional tips on hidden restaurant gems, transportation, holiday markets, convenient subway lines, and evening activities - MINUS points: Made one mistake (a non-existent restaurant) 🥈 ChatGPT solid runner-up: - Provided the most additional tips based on my interests, locations, and time of year - Very well-structured daily planning - Smart hotel rest breaks before nearby activities - Strong attention to detail - Made some mistakes (suggested Brooklyn Bridge in afternoon when I specifically asked for sunrise) 🥉 Perplexity (far behind the leaders): - Well optimized but very basic itinerary - Zero additional recommendations - No reasoning behind suggestions - Just did the bare minimum (no mistakes tho) 😕 Gemini (the disappointment): - First try: "Cannot complete request" - Second attempt: Mixed up my arrival dates (said 04.12 when I specified 03.12 evening) - Least structured of all - Activities poorly organized and hard to follow - Worst optimization for locations and activity types - ZERO additional tips While Google is really struggling with their core: search quality, they are falling behind with the AI game. They are really getting it from both sides. What shocked me most was the massive gap between the top two (Claude/ChatGPT) and the others. The difference in quality, attention to detail, and extra value was mind-blowing. What's your experience with these AI tools? Have you noticed the same performance gaps?

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I have worked with Karyn in the past and have seen the impact she can make through her thoughtful facilitation. Are you interested in how you could leverage systems thinking to scale innovation in complex product development organizations? Worth the read!

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5 Powerful frameworks problem-solving tools can make or break your success. 1️⃣ Root Cause Analysis (RCA): Dive deep beyond symptoms to fix problems at their core. Perfect for quality management and preventing recurring issues. 2️⃣ Design Thinking: Transform user pain points into innovative solutions. Essential for product development and service design. 3️⃣ Six Thinking Hats: Make better decisions by considering all angles - facts, emotions, risks, optimism, creativity, and process. 4️⃣ SWOT Analysis: Strategic planning powerhouse. Map your Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats for clear direction. 5️⃣ Value Stream Mapping: Eliminate waste and optimize processes. Crucial for operational excellence. #data #tech

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