Article

User Research

Zach Schendel of Doordash debunks some of the common user research myths he has come across. It's an interesting 35+ min conversation full of examples from his experience at Netflix, Unilever and Doordash. For the time-crunched, listening through the first myth on ‘you can’t ask users what they want [4.22 - 9.30] would be great.

Books

Psychology in Design

Hooked is a playbook for creating products customers obsess over. Eyal presents a four step “Hook Model,” that breeds habitual use. The author also explores phenomena he calls “hook cycles,” or the efforts companies make to lure clients. The book uses psychological principles to drive product design, and coaches readers on how to make products that are irresistible and become an everyday part of users’ routines. Eyal presents case studies and examples that demonstrate this practice, and each chapter ends with bulleted points that summarize the main takeaways. 

Framework

Psychology in Design

Keep your friends close and your cognitive biases closer

Framework

User Research

The “job to be done” describes what a product helps the customer to achieve. Looking for the JTBD is a method to move away from the current solution and create a new frame of reference for a different future solution. The JTBD framework includes a social, a functional, and an emotional dimension.

Podcast

Designing for Emerging Tech

The Presentable podcast focuses on how people design and build the products that are shaping the digital future. Jeff tracks the tools, trends, and methods being used by teams from major companies and the latest startups.

Books

Psychology in Design

In this book, Krug does an excellent job highlighting the various roles within product design and forcing you to think about your own projects, problems and communication efforts. As you read this guide you will be met with inspiration and examples that lead you to epiphanies and new opportunities to improve the projects you’re working on.

Books

Storytelling for Designers

Design Is Storytelling explores the psychology of visual perception from a narrative point of view. Presenting dozens of tools and concepts in a lively, visual manner, this book will help any designer amplify the narrative power of their work. Use this book to stir emotions, build empathy, articulate values and convey action; to construct narrative arcs and create paths through space; integrate form and language; evaluate a project’s storytelling power; and to write and deliver strong narratives.

Video

User Research

Kate Towsey, Research Ops Manager at Atlassian and started the research ops slack community. She talks about the kind of signals and information that one needs to look for when getting into research through the analogy of candy floss and carrots.

Video

User Research

My name is Steve Jobs and this is the first of one of many chalk talks we’re going to have this year together the subject of this one is really important which is who is our target customer why are they selecting our products over our competition and what distribution channels are we going to use to reach these customers.