Growing pains

While I come from a rojak or mixed career background centered in Graphic Design and have anticipated that UI/UX isn’t exactly the same thing, I did not prepare for the knots and curves in the process. If for a moment you think “Then be prepared next time,” well, let’s just say you never know what it is until it hits you. There’s only so much you can prepare for a certain amount of control. Old ways don’t work with new ways, and what happens then? You try something different. A new approach at tackling your thoughts or a new set of tools to design an outcome. To unlearn is like shedding years of skin and it comes with challenges that mimic pain but in a good way. This signifies growth and to be able to still experience growth, that should be celebrated.

Shifting & moving

Remember the bit about old ways not working with new ways? Well that depends on old ways that simply don’t work anymore vs old ways that are still applicable. The moment I realised that I had exactly zero experience in this new industry, I could have just sunk in the deep end but I chose to approach it from a different perspective. I began to wonder, what existing processes that I know of can still be applied here? What new skills have I not yet possessed and should be working on? Once I had the answers, I moved onwards. So let’s not sink until we acknowledge that our muscles remember how to swim.

One example of this being applied, I would say happened in my first few months. My experience isn’t exactly conventional. I had most of my hours dedicated to planning and learning things on my own. Some call it freedom, I call it responsibility for my own growth and that could have either dragged me down or kept me afloat. I did not have much involvement in projects early on and then came the Designer Maker Programme (DMP). Equipped with my previous ideation process, I mind-mapped and sketched. Armed with newfound UI and UX design knowledge, I turned sketches into wireframes, applied UI design principles, set a goal for the outcome and considered the user’s experience.

So what does it mean to be a work in progress?

If you’re highly critical of yourself and battle with inner thoughts of doubt, I feel you. Everyone faces challenges and tackles them differently while for me, it’s acknowledging that I’m still learning and it’s OKAY. Accepting that I’m a work in progress has helped me regulate throughout the apprenticeship. It’s a byproduct of the mentorship and guidance, an outcome of embracing failure and having the courage to experience it. Although I’m not immune to the critical moments of failure, now I have a way to regulate the state as it appears and that’s something I can always carry with me, no matter the stage of growth I am in.

Learnings & aspirations

There’s more than hard skills. You’re continually developing a new interest within the field, an exciting new tool or method, sharing and collaborating. It’s overall the foundation for one’s growth in design. Have your Dunning-Kreuger moments and fall into the valley of despair but work on getting out of it to reach the next peak. There are a lot of resources but if there’s something I can offer, it’s a book called “Just Enough Research” by Erika Hall, introduced to me by one of my mentors. It’s a great starter for me as someone who’s completely new to User Research and I often fall back into it from time to time. While it isn’t really a manual, I do flip the pages when I need clarity about research methods especially when it comes to either lesson exercises or projects like the case study.

The apprenticeship journey is not one size fits all and not every apprentice goes through the same outline. That’s where you come in and shape it. Have side quests to achieve like learning a new facet of design or thinking method, have boss fights like the DMP and case study where you blunder and tackle end to end. It is a malleable experience so go on and truly make it your own.

All in all, I’m excited about what the future holds for me. I’d like to focus on strengthening my core while exploring other avenues and will remember this apprenticeship as one of the pivotal moments in my career. Thank you Stampede for the experience and I hope to continue being a design explorer and learner wherever my path may be. If you’d like to know more about my journey or have any questions, do reach out to me on LinkedIn. I’m happy to have a chat.

Here’s to the unknown! 👏

Disclaimer: All the beautiful illustrations featured in this content are sourced from streamlinehq.com.

The post I’m a Work in Progress (& That’s Okay): An Apprentice’s Reflection appeared first on Stampede: the strategic design & technology company.

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Tony the Developer

Before joining Stampede, I found that communicating with my ex-coworkers wasn’t so intense although we were all in the same office. If you weren’t the extroverted type, this sort of environment was pretty normal and I’m sure others could relate to this. When I joined Stampede however, a large shift occurred.

As you might already know, Stampede is a remote agency with team members working from different places across the globe, so one would think that communications would be much less than your standard office.

Boy, was I wrong.

What I learned was that Stampede had a very active style of communication and coordination with the team was very tight. Our daily stand-up ‘Blitz’ meetings is just like warlords preparing for a strategy to stampede the enemy’s line (Wait, maybe this is why this company called Stampede).

BlitzThis is how our Blitz meetings feel like

To be honest, I had some trouble keeping up with the pace at the beginning but soon learned how the herd ran. While minor chatting happens throughout the day, our daily ‘Blitz’ meetings and weekly sharing session, ‘Happy Things’ make up the majority of our tight communication. It took me around two months to get comfortable with this sort of tension. I survived.

Tony the Project Lead

Back in 2016, we lost our project manager. Despite transition and hiring efforts, we just couldn’t find a new project manager with the right fit, let alone remote. Turning a near-disaster into an opportunity, we decided to experiment.

We asked “Instead of having one project manager, can we distribute this role to many people? And instead of managers, can we become leaders?”. Being a project lead means that you have to manage the team associated with the project, and deliver the project to the client on time and make sure everything signs off. You would have to be the bridge which connects the client and the team.

The first project which I got to lead was a brand called Big Film. The client had worked with Stampede before and good relations were already established. This knowledge pressured me. I thought to myself, what if I messed this project up? I would end up disappointing the client and my team. Luckily however, the project scoped wasn’t that large and only had two people on board; me as the developer and Shaza our founder, as the lead designer. It was a weird feeling giving directions to my own boss.

It was a weird feeling giving directions to my own boss.

But everything new is a learning process. What I learned from this setup was to:

Talk to team. As I mentioned before, to lead a project well, you need to deliver the project on time. To do so, I needed to get in contact with the team about each task’s status every day. At first I felt like I was being annoying, but I gradually got used to it and understood that it was my job to do so.

Talk to client. As a project lead you are the bridge that connects the client to the team. This task was a bit daunting to me at the beginning as I had to compose messages to the client to request and update the project’s status. I was worried that tone used in the message was wrong. Luckily, Zana helped me out with this.

What I learned from this

During my transition from a full-time developer to a developer with project leading responsibilities, I realised that the challenges and problems that came with the project could be solved by communicating it with the team. In the past, I would only see it from a developer’s perspective but now that I front the client and also work with more team members, I have a bigger picture of how the project runs.

So now I have modified my workflow. When I sign into work, I will spare 30 minutes of my time to check the status of the projects under me. From there, I will create a to-do list based on my observation from before. I find that my workflow is a lot more organised this way. At least I know what needs to be done.

Check, check and check.

To my fellow developers out there. If you find yourself in charge of a project, know that communication is very important. If you work it out with the team, every problem can be resolved efficiently with no need for double-work. Trust me you will not regret it.

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