Musings of a design team of one #1
It’s been two years since I last wrote an article and published it. Post-pandemic my life has been chiefly about honing my craft and earning a decent living, But during this time I have grown in my career, made mistakes, and learnt from them. Now, I’m in the process of reminiscing and reaccessing my journey so far.
In the process of thinking back, I’ve realised that 90% of my professional work experience as a product designer has been at early-stage startups and boutique companies while the remaining 10% I did freelance work. Digging deeper, I realised that I had been the only product designer in the entire company in most of the companies I've worked at.
Well, since this is my comeback article and my shot at consistent journalling I’m going to share some of the experiences I’ve had being the only product designer at an early startup.
Sidenote: So, I’m just going with the flow writing this article and might not have all the words to describe all my experiences so far, so bear with me.
The Beginning:
The saying, “a new day, another opportunity to be world-class” was pretty much my mantra every morning before starting work, and I’ll be excited to go fire up Figma, google docs and the linear app/Jira/ClickUp to plan my tasks for the day and later on prepare for morning standup with the rest of the team.
I must say the beginnings were full of enthusiasm, for the product, its users and the rest of the team. Deliverables and tasks breakdown would either be on the Linear app, Jira or ClickUp, user research reports on google docs and I’d go over them, again and again, in order to think through the user flows while keeping the business deliverables in mind, I’ll also sketch designs and start with the high fidelity designs as well and sometimes I’ll have to present those designs almost immediately to the product manager and other developers for feedback and sometimes the designs get implemented the same day.
I remember in those times, I could sit poorly at my desk for 8+ hours at a stretch tweaking designs or brainstorming with the team on the next steps, I’ll entertain a few bathroom breaks and all the while I’ll be munching snacks and biscuits. By the time I look out, It was already dark outside and my family has had dinner without me but that doesn’t mean my meetings are over or that work was done.
It was an endless cycle, but the hard work paid off with a successful product launch amassing thousands of users at a go, with users leaving good and encouraging feedback. Of course, there were some minimal kinks around, but it was good enough, and I remember feeling so proud that I contributed a significant part and that my work had an impact, but at what cost? And how much did I have to pay for it?
1.
Cost: Some serious back pains from bad sitting posture.
Fix: I decided to invest in an ergonomic chair and softer mattress, My back hasn’t ceased to stop thanking me.
2.
Cost: Spent endless time in meetings and feedback calls for the greater part of some days.
Fix: Got better at async feedback by using tools like loom for recording flows and prototypes.
3.
Cost: Creative block. (need I say more… It sucks)
Fixing tools: Took a solo trip to Ouidah, a coastal province in Benin republic, slept by the lagoon and enjoyed nature.
- Took time out to visit friends and plan fun activities
- Went on self dates
- Slow living on weekends
(PS: I am still doing some of these activities, they help me see more of life outside work).
Asides from costs and fixes, I also realised along the way, that the fact that I’m a design team of one doesn’t mean I get to work alone. Collaboration is very important. Collaboration with product managers, product owners, Engineers, the marketing team and even the customer success team would go a long way to make my day-to-day work easier.
In my current team, there’s a lot of cross-communication across teams and async updates. I guess when you work with a company of fewer than 30 employees, cross-communication and collaboration are easier.
I’ll pen down here, for now, I hope to continue writing down my thoughts more often.
To be continued …
