The purpose isn’t to shock and awe you. You may even guess what will happen next. Or at least, you won’t be surprised. This is okay! It doesn’t mean it was a waste of time. Recently, I was part of two foundational research studies, each for different products. In both, I heard different co-workers say…

Tinkering on websites has been a thing for me since the late ‘90s. The first site I made was an Angelfire powered, unsanctioned site for the local ski hill. (Corel draw, java applets, and embedded weather gifs, oh my!) Over the years I’ve continued to tinker, creating new sites for myself, and friends. Learning new…

I’ve run a few businesses in the past, and can tell you from first hand experience, it is no joke. I ran a physical products business using WordPress, and WooCommerce. I went from focusing on just design (pre business), to focusing on everything (while running business). Before starting the business, I was aware of the…

As designers we often do research or get research insights by a specialized team. This research work is always impactful and can lead to smaller and large changes. Over the years, I realized that one of the challenges of research — especially the kind that is wider, deeper, and richer — is to make it…

Not too long ago, my coworkers produced a report to help understand small business owners. It’s filled with solid insights that will challenge your ideas on who small business owners are and where their priorities lie. I found, for myself it pointed out details I had overlooked, but, in hindsight, were staring me in the face.…

Creating work for myself has always been a challenge. It’s easy to get sucked into the possibility of the project and all it could be. I’m reminded of this challenge when I ask a client or colleague to define their first-ever creative brief. I empathize with the ways in which that’s a difficult task to…

My father ran his own business for most of his professional life. I always admired that he was able to venture out on his own and not take the easier route of working for someone else. I grew up knowing that running a small business was not easy, to say the least. Not only did…