We heard that right: everybody is talking about skipping Figma to do everything now, maybe also to do their laundry, and at this point I genuinely wouldn’t be surprised if someone tried.

I know they’re talking about design process. Specifically, when they go through their product design process, because that’s where the conversation keeps circling back to.

Usually how it’s done is that designers start with discovering the problem, then iterating on it, testing it with real people, iterating again based on what they learned, and somewhere along the way there’s a formal handover to engineering where you package everything up and hope for the best. You might also want to measure the impact at some point, somehow, with whatever tool makes sense for your context: NPS, a survey, another round of research, whatever gets you the signal you need.

Oh, is what you’re saying that there should always have been Figma in the middle of all that? That Figma is the core skill that every designer has to use, the thing that ties all of those stages together?

Sorry, I thought design has always been less about what we use and more about how we think through problems for people. But I understand the argument, I really do. It’s sort of an industry standard at this point, so that everywhere you go it should be used, because team workflow is the number one priority and you really can’t be the only person on the team not using it. That’s fair. Collaboration needs a shared space, and when everyone is in Figma, you should be in Figma too.

Did I hear someone at the back say it was Sketch before that? Yes, indeed, what a nostalgia. I remember the cult of Sketch plugins, the way people swore by it, the way it felt like the answer to everything Adobe had gotten wrong. We loved Sketch the way we love Figma now, which is to say completely and without questioning whether the love was really about the tool or about belonging to the group that used it.

Oh, did I also hear from the very back that some of you used Adobe Photoshop in the heydays? Designing interfaces in Photoshop, layer by layer, exporting assets at 2x because retina had just become a thing? I remember that too. I lived that. And at the time, that was the skill. That was the thing you put on your resume, the thing interviewers expected, the thing that separated the “real” designers from everyone else.

So now things are changing again, because Claude Code (yeah, among many other AI tools and platforms) apparently walked into the bar one evening and started trying to change people’s minds, advocating for itself to be the de facto industry standard, the unmissable tool that everybody now has to learn whether they asked for it or not. And suddenly there are designers writing .md files to describe systems and flows, and the .md files are producing working prototypes faster than most of us can set up a component with the right auto-layout constraints.

You mean to tell me that in the not-so-distant future, the same people who once smirked at designers without Figma skills will be smirking at designers without Claude Code skills? That the same sideways glance, the same polite concern, the same “oh, you don’t use...” energy will simply transfer to a new tool and carry on as if nothing changed?

And that now .md files are somehow baked into the double diamond, that they should appear in every designer’s case study as proof of competency, the same way Figma screenshots do today?

I don’t know. What about being agnostic with tooling and focusing on the problem at hand? I’ve heard this sentiment too, many times actually, and honestly it sounds more refreshing than I initially gave it credit for. The idea that the process is the process, and the tool is just whatever helps you move through it with the least friction and the most clarity.

Or maybe the more uncomfortable question is this: did we, as a design industry, anchor ourselves too much on Figma as a skill? Did we confuse mastery of a tool with mastery of a craft, and build an identity around something that was always going to be temporary?

I should confess something here. I am an old school designer who hates being told what to do, so naturally, when some Figma ninja in whatever company I happen to join starts judging and closely teaching me how to organise my auto-layout very strictly, with very specific opinions about naming conventions and nesting hierarchies, I just smile. I smile the way you smile when someone is being very passionate about something you find only mildly important. I respect the discipline, but I also know that the auto-layout will not be the thing that makes or breaks the experience for the person using what we build.

So what’s really happening here? Are we panicking, or in a state of euphoria for those who secretly hated the Figma-first orthodoxy, that Figma is no longer the undisputed baseline tool we start everything with? Is the anxiety really about the tool, or is it about losing the one skill we had come to associate so deeply with the act of designing that we forgot they were two separate things?

Or are we doing the more grounded thing, which is sticking to the fact that design process is a process, one that acknowledges the tools, respects the tools, but only reaches for those that are relevant or potentially more beneficial to the work at hand? Because if that’s the case, then Claude Code isn’t a threat to Figma any more than Figma was a threat to Sketch, or Sketch was a threat to Photoshop. It’s just another thing that walked into the room and asked to be useful.

The interesting part is not the tool. The interesting part is whether we’ve learned anything from the last three times this happened, or whether we’re going to build another identity around another tool and act surprised when the next one shows up and the smirk starts all over again.

I’d like to think we’ve learned. But then again, I’ve been smiling at auto-layout lectures for years now, so what do I know.

Here’s an uncomfortable truth that’s truly unimaginable now to be said by a product designer. Even this post alone could cost me a job or opportunity.

I am tired of listening to or reading people’s contents about AI.

I am also tired of how fast it’s “progressing” by AI companies shipping new features every single minute.

I am also tired about the guilt-tripping, blackmailing tendency of “tech peeps” trying to undermine others if they don’t catch up.

But hear me out: it’s not that I am anti-AI. I am just anti-hype. I don’t want a tool or a vehicle to overpower anything that’s more precious.

I grew up as a student in early 2000s hungry about web design. Back then, you either learned to “code” frontend languages (HTML, CSS, and JS), or you use one of the WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get) tools like Microsoft FrontPage, Macromedia Dreamweaver, or something similar. There was no web-based or desktop app of a canvas design tool like Figma, Sketch or something similar. My first toolset was Corel PhotoPaint or Adobe Photoshop, to generate some designs, export/slice assets and build on either code or WYSIWYG tools. Then uploaded them through FTP. Beautiful days.

No social media to debate about who does it better, or what tools one must learn in the next 24 hours to still be employable in the next five years, because by 2030, you’ll be starving and out of any job.

Here’s the problem: I never like people imposing tools and processes. Okay, they might be something you need to keep marketable and employable, and it’s likely that most product design teams will utilise Claude Code + Figma or something like that, with addition of different tools here and there that are still powered by AI. However, the rate in which people and teams push us to the limits induces anxiety for me.

In the past, I’ve always enjoyed the process of creating, designing. Some manual work were appreciated and truly savoured. It is in the slowness of time and intentionality that we find our footings in our design process. Maybe while listening to music, or reading people’s blogs about how-tos. I remember we had to hack our way to even use a proper desktop font using sIFR. We also had to learn how to name our CSS classes semantically. Bought books, perused them and endlessly trying stuff.

Today, people seem to claim that they could do an app within 1 hour or a weekend, an they feel empowered and energised. They would also spend hours trying and exploring all these new toys.

However, the breakneck speed of things and the lack of process in between has been disturbing.

Most designer-AI-slash-product posts have been either about:

• how to set things up! what tools to use!

• hey look I made this in one hour (I am also guilty of this)

• why you will lose this AI race, join us now, old way is broken

• my tooling is better than yours

• my process is better than yours

• you will lose your job

Compare these to the heydays of web design in the early 2000s up to 2010:

• people sharing in-depth articles on their blogs about technicalities like…

  • how to create a CSS-only navigation

  • hacking to use desktop fonts through sIFR

  • designing a skeuomorphic Wordpress themes

• people sharing their design process for

  • icon design

  • illustration

  • type design

• people sharing inspiration from

  • their trips

  • cars

  • everyday objects

  • annoying encounters at the supermarket

  • books

  • other people’s articles

It feels like the soul is missing. The soul of humans actually trying to solve problems creatively. All that I see are humans trying to solve problems technically, and quickly. Scale is important but it feels like it’s getting too fast to scale up, and we don’t ever pause to ponder.

To wonder.

To think and feel.

To be honest, it’s not the design field I genuinely enjoy anymore. Now that I am 40+, I crave more for trial and error, discovery and exploration. Not necessarily a hacky weekend trying to ship a small vibe-coded tool that people don’t use, but something more of a creative pursuit: documenting design process for my website, why I go that way, not necessarily what stack I built it with.

People obsess about stacks and technical framework more than the why and how they design it.

It’s a problem for me.

I am now 40, and I probably have 15 years left in my design career. Honestly, I do not know what I want, and even if I do, how I will go about it.

Before you judge me, also hear me out for the last time: It’s not that I am anti-AI. I still use AI in my work, mostly because the industry demands it, and we have shareholders to keep up with. But deep down inside, I think we are losing the soul of our… craft. Our work. Our profession. If you still think that’s valuable of a term.

I was navigating a job offer recently, and like a hidden needle in a haystack, I found a clause that says that the notice period is 2 months (normal), but if I do join a competitor (which at the discretion of the company to decide which is which), I have to serve up to additional 4 months of garden leave. On paper, this looks good because then you will be paid without working. But in reality, you’re held hostage for up to 6 months in total to join a competitor.

I asked my friend what he thinks about this and if he would take such a job.

He said, “Well, I would, in this economy and job market.”

Fair.

But to me, I have hesitations. I need the money and the job, of course. But deep down inside I don’t know if I am making a good decision for my future.

I am not talking about one year out. I am talking about three to five years out when I decide to leave, and while I don’t always leave for competitors, the company still decide one-sidedly whether it’s a competitor. Then I’d risk saying to the new company, “Well folks, I can only join you in 4 months.”

No company will wait you that long. Maybe a few. But you get the point.

In this company, I am not even in a management or leadership position. I believe this draconian clause should be for directors an above, if any.

Now you might think that I am overthinking. Maybe I am, but, after years of working and many wrong decisions later, I realise probably I can step up for myself once in a while.

I do not want to be imprisoned. I want to have leverage and decision-making power for once.

In the tech industry, we spend our time obsessing over base salaries, equity structures, and shiny job titles. Yet, we rarely scrutinise the single, deeply buried paragraph in our employment contracts that can abruptly halt our careers.

Non-compete clause is one of them.

I understand that these clauses are meant to protect the company. I know.

These clauses essentially dictate that upon your eventual departure, the company reserves the right to lock you out of working for similar businesses for months, and sometimes for over half a year.

However: For a product designer or engineer in an industry that moves at the speed of light, a six-month forced absence from the market isn’t just an inconvenience. It is a career death sentence. This begs a much larger question. In the modern era of work, why are tech companies still allowed to hold their employees’ career mobility hostage?

The asymmetry of corporate loyalty

Let’s be honest about the reality of the tech winter we’ve been navigating over the past couple of years. If we have learned one brutal lesson, it is that corporate loyalty is strictly a one-way street. Companies can lay off thousands of workers overnight, severing livelihoods without a second thought under the banners of restructuring or operational efficiency.

Yet, when an employee decides to seek a better opportunity, these same companies suddenly hide behind the shield of aggressive non-compete clauses or disproportionately long garden leaves. They demand months of exclusive loyalty and block you from practicing your craft elsewhere, all under the guise of protecting trade secrets.

Let’s be clear about this. For C-suite executives holding the literal blueprints of a company’s future, these clauses make absolute sense. But when companies apply these terms as a blanket policy down to individual contributors and middle managers, it is no longer about protecting intellectual property. It is about labor monopoly. It is a calculated move to strip away your leverage and bargaining power in the open market.

The Silicon Valley playbook

There is a very specific reason why Silicon Valley became the undisputed innovation capital of the world, and it is not just the California weather or the proximity to Stanford. It comes down to the law.

In California, non-compete agreements are fundamentally void and unenforceable, setting a precedent that dates back to the late nineteenth century. When a brilliant engineer or designer in Silicon Valley feels stagnant at a tech giant, they can leave today and join a competitor or build a startup tomorrow.

This legal freedom creates an environment of explosive innovation through cross-pollination. Ideas and talent flow freely across the ecosystem, elevating the entire industry. Furthermore, it creates balanced power dynamics. Because companies in California know they cannot legally trap their employees with restrictive paperwork, they are forced to retain them the right way. They have to actually treat them well by providing better managers, healthier cultures, and competitive compensation. Conversely, in regions where draconian non-competes are strictly enforced, innovation stagnates and companies become lazy about their internal culture because they know their talent is legally paralyzed.

The beggar’s dilemma

When I was weighing my own decision to push back against a suffocating contract, another friend offered a sobering piece of advice. They reminded me of the brutal current economic climate and warned that in this job market, beggars cannot be choosers.

Their perspective is entirely valid, and I recognise the immense privilege required to even consider walking away from a concrete job offer when the industry is rapidly contracting. For many, swallowing a toxic contract is a matter of pure survival, a necessary sacrifice to pay the rent and keep a roof over their family’s heads. There is absolutely no shame in doing whatever you must to survive a bitter winter.

However, we must also recognise the profound danger of adopting a beggar’s mindset as a permanent state of being. When experienced professionals quietly accept fundamentally exploitative terms out of fear, we inadvertently normalise these practices for the entire industry. We forget that an employment contract is supposed to be a mutual exchange of value, not a plea for charity. We are not begging for alms. We are trading our accumulated decades of expertise, our strategic vision, and the most productive hours of our lives to build their products.

A takeaway for tech professionals

After nearly two decades of building products globally, I have realised that your most valuable asset is not your sign-on bonus, but rather your mobility and your time. If a company asks you to forfeit your career flexibility for half a year in the future, you have to question whether they truly believe in the strength of their leadership, or if they are simply using legal fear to trap talent they cannot otherwise inspire to stay.

If you are currently evaluating a job offer, you need to read the termination, notice period, and garden leave sections as if your future career depends on it, because it does. You have to find the courage to negotiate these clauses down to standard industry norms if you are not holding the nuclear launch codes for the business.

Most importantly, you have to remember your own worth. The market may be tough, and we all need jobs to survive, but entering a negotiation with the mindset of a beggar guarantees you will be treated like one. Your future is simply too valuable to be imprisoned in a paragraph.

The debate over top-down versus bottom-up product culture is often framed as a simple efficiency contest. Which model ships features faster? Which one innovates more?

I’ve been in both ends, and sometimes a mix in one company depending on the project. I used to dislike the idea of top-down, as it is considered as limiting. However, after talking to friends about it, it feels like they all have trade-offs. Sometimes it could also be beneficial, if and only if we adhere to one thing: who’s accountable for the outcomes.

The true, fundamental difference lies not in speed or innovation!

Let’s borrow the RACI framework:

This distinction is more than semantics; it is the cornerstone of fair organizational design, and it’s perfectly illuminated by two letters from the classic RACI framework: R (Responsible) and A (Accountable).

If you operate in a strict top-down culture, your teams should be considered Responsible, but never truly Accountable. In contrast, a bottom-up culture demands both.

So technically, in top-down culture, it could be easier on you if you’re not in leadership, or you’re heavy on execution. If, and only if, they’re doing it properly.

The greatest mistake and worst implication to your performance as an executor is that if you’re also held accountable for the outcomes.

If it’s a bottom-up culture, then you’re in a more difficult situation, because you’re also responsible for the outcomes. Whatever you plan and propose, you have to shepherd it along. If you fail, then you lost, or at least people will hold you super accountable.

Top-down: “let us do it, but you’re accountable”

In a top-down product organization, strategy and vision cascade from the executive suite. The mandate is clear: “Build X feature because the market demands it,” or “We must integrate Y technology to meet our competitor.”

In this scenario, the product team—the managers, designers, and engineers—becomes the highly capable execution engine.

The team’s primary role is Responsible (R). They are responsible for the execution. They must write clean code, ensure minimal bugs, meet deadlines, and deliver the feature exactly as scoped. They are responsible for the how.

However, they must be exempt from the heavy weight of Accountability (A).

Accountability, in its purest form, means being answerable for the outcome. Did the feature drive adoption? Did it increase revenue? Did it solve the customer’s problem?

If a product team is simply executing a mandate handed down from the top, they are executing someone else’s strategy. Their authority is limited to the tactical choices (how to build it), not the strategic choices (what to build and why).

To hold a team accountable for the failure of a strategy they didn’t author is fundamentally unfair. It creates a toxic environment where consequences are divorced from the power to affect change. A great execution team can’t save a flawed strategic decision. In the top-down model, the senior leader must retain the A for the strategy, while the team owns the R for the build.

Bottom-up: “let us decide, but we’re accountable”

The bottom-up product culture is an entirely different ecosystem. In this model, the organization empowers product teams with a problem space and clear goals, but gives them the full authority to define the strategy, prioritize the work, and choose the solution.

This autonomy is liberating, but it comes with a necessary and appropriate weight.

Here, the Unspoken Contract is whole. The team is both Responsible (R) and Accountable (A).

1. Responsible (R): They still own the execution, the delivery, the quality control—the how.

2. Accountable (A): Because they had the authority to define the strategic problem, to run the experiments, and to ultimately launch the solution, they must be answerable for the results—the did it work.

When a bottom-up team fails, it is a valuable learning experience because the failure is a direct function of the team’s strategic choices. They own the entire end-to-end outcome, and thus, holding them accountable is both fair and highly motivating.

This is how it maps out, more or less:

How about the C and I portions? Consulted and Informed will still be involved in both cultures, but their roles are kind of different. Here’s how I see it:

In the top-down product environment, the flow of information is largely a one-way street, running from the highest echelons down to the execution layer.

The Consulted (C) becomes narrow and highly tactical. For example, engineering team might be part of this.

They are called upon to answer questions like: “Can we build this specific feature on time?” or “What are the technical constraints of implementing this mandate?” Their expertise is valued strictly for optimizing the means of execution, not for validating the strategic end goal. They are consulted on feasibility, not desirability or viability.

The Informed (I) teams are the recipients of the strategic mandate, the deadlines, and the executive vision. They are kept in the loop on what must be done.

For example, the Customer Service team. They will be informed on what strategies and products we’re launching, and they will have their own cascaded tasks or assignments. It is highly directive.

Whereas in the bottom-up product environment, the engineering team will become more of a strategic partner, and maybe even part of the responsible. The Customer Service team will be a collaborator, perhaps even defining in some parts of the strategy.

In conclusion

The insight derived from mapping organizational culture to RACI roles provides a critical test for any leadership team. Here’s my takeaway:

If you expect your teams to be Accountable (A) for outcomes, you must give them the authority of a bottom-up model. This means trusting them to define the problem and the solution, not just the technical specifications.

If you choose to retain that authority at the executive level (the top-down model), you must, for the health of your culture, relieve the teams of the Accountability (A) for results. Celebrate their Responsibility (R)—their effort and quality execution and accept the strategic accountability yourself.

The goal isn’t to pick a single “best” culture, but to ensure that wherever the power to make decisions resides, the consequences for those decisions follow precisely behind it. That is how trust is built, and how high-performing teams, in any culture, can thrive without succumbing to the burnout of unfair expectations.

—

Hat-tip to my friend Vikram Managoli for the discussion that inspired this article.

As an Indonesian, watching the recent protests back home has been painful. The images of tear gas, burning tires, and crowds filling the streets are not just headlines. They carry a weight for anyone who knows what it feels like to be unseen by those in power. Channel News Asia described the government’s early response as focused more on optics than on listening, more on control than on care.

Of course, what is happening in the streets is about lives, not management theory. This post isn’t meant to diminish the weight and reality of what happens in Indonesia. But it shows a truth that applies across all forms of leadership.

I feel that as president, Prabowo Subianto is highly focused on optics. In just his first nine months in office, he traveled to 26 countries in his first year, a whirlwind global tour that commentators described as a deliberate effort to project influence and stature abroad. Analysts have noted that many of these trips served as diplomatic spectacles, reinforcing his image as a strong, charismatic leader rather than focusing solely on policy substance. At home, his Gaza-related initiatives were also described as making for “good optics” both domestically and internationally, further suggesting that Prabowo thrives on praise, ceremonial recognition, and the performance of leadership.

Oh boy. I feel that this is utterly familiar with my own situations at work, too.

The bubble of optics can exist anywhere: in politics, in corporations, in small teams. And the pattern is always the same. Leaders who retreat into their bubble feel safe for a while. They polish the story, manage upward, and keep the surface looking calm. But the ground shifts. People know when they are invisible. And when voices are ignored, they eventually rise.

I have seen it inside companies. Leaders who are brilliant at managing up, who know exactly how to impress their bosses, who can spin reality into clean slides. But downward, toward the teams they are meant to serve, they go quiet. Advocacy vanishes. Trust erodes. The people carrying the real weight are left alone.

The idea that a controlled story can overpower reality is seductive. But history shows how fragile it is. President Nixon thought he could control the Watergate scandal by sealing off the truth, by clinging to optics. For a time, it worked. He convinced himself the bubble would hold. But once cracks appeared, the truth rushed in. The presidency collapsed under the weight of what he tried to hide.

The New Yorker (May 26, 1973) published an article titled “Facts According to President Nixon” which deftly captures how Nixon attempted to "seal off" the truth by manufacturing and controlling narratives, what he termed "Presidential facts", and using repeated messaging and selective suppression to override actual facts. This encapsulates the idea of clinging to optics while suppressing reality:

"The Presidential facts were crowding all other facts off the stage… The factual environment, by contrast, is conservative and reassures them… The many traditional wellsprings of information have been unclogged…”

The same happened in the corporate world. Enron was once celebrated as a miracle of innovation. Behind the curtain, it was a house of cards propped up by optics. Executives obsessed over quarterly appearances, not long-term substance. They silenced dissent, inflated numbers, and kept the story tight. When reality finally broke through, it destroyed not only a company but also the trust of thousands of employees and investors.

These are extreme cases, but the principle holds even in the everyday. John Wooden said it best:

“Be more concerned with your character than your reputation, because your character is what you really are, while your reputation is merely what others think you are.”

Reputation is optics. Character is what endures when nobody is looking.

The breakdown of trust rarely starts with riots. It starts with silence. People stop speaking up. They stop pushing back. They stop offering ideas. Andy Stanley warned:

“Leaders who don’t listen will eventually be surrounded by people who have nothing to say.”

Tim McClure sharpened the point:

“The biggest concern of an organization should be when their most passionate people become quiet.”

Silence is resignation. And silence always comes before the collapse.

From the outside, though, things can look fine. Reports look tidy. Meetings run on schedule. Leaders mistake order for health. But Benjamin Hooks put it bluntly:

“If you think you are leading and turn around to see no one following, then you are just taking a walk.”

There is another path. Peter Block called it stewardship:

“The willingness to be accountable for the well-being of the larger organization by operating in service, rather than in control, of those around us.”

Stewardship flips the script. Leaders are not only accountable upward, but also downward, to the people they hold power over.

Simon Sinek captured it in plain words:

“Leadership is not about being in charge. Leadership is about taking care of those in your charge.”

That applies equally to a prime minister, a CEO, or a manager of five. The role is not to polish an image but to carry the trust of others.

Ignore that responsibility, and reality always breaks through. Martin Luther King Jr. said:

“A riot is the language of the unheard.”

In the streets, the unheard eventually fill the squares and avenues. In companies, the unheard leave, disengage, or quietly resist. But the principle is the same: people will find their voice, one way or another.

Barry Posner wrote:

“Leadership at its worst creates fear; at best it inspires trust.”

Fear may keep people silent for a moment, but only trust sustains. And trust is not built inside the bubble. It is built on the ground, in the messy space where people struggle and hope someone with power will stand with them.

Throughout my career, I’ve seen both the best and the worst of managers. The best always advocated for me and my team.

I remember back in 2015, my manager at the time helped me handle some difficult stakeholders. He was utterly disappointed with their unrealistic timeline and even repeated the exact words they used. Then he came back to me and said, “Let me help you. It’s not right that they said this to you. I don’t care if I get fired.” I loved that energy and authenticity.

In 2021, another manager knew I had just been diagnosed with a medical condition. He told me, “Don’t get too stressed out. Take necessary breaks—even in the middle of the day. We all know we have commitments to care for ourselves and others. I can help manage the timeline for you.”

And the worst? They simply didn’t care. I’ve had managers who used 1:1s just to do status updates or run through Figma files. I hated that. 1:1s are supposed to be about my well-being and my career. But all she cared about was how she was perceived by upper management. That was it.

That is the thread that connects Jakarta’s protests, Watergate’s tapes, Enron’s spreadsheets, and even the smallest team in the quietest office. Leaders who cling to optics eventually discover how fragile it is. Leaders who choose character, who choose stewardship, who listen downward as much as they manage upward, are the ones who endure.

The bubble always bursts. The only question is whether leaders step out before it does. These bubbles might not be utter physical riots, but they could be rejections, disrespect, silence and at worst… resignation.

The working world is performative at best. At worst, it's performative positivity. And people gladly call it professionalism.

Don't get me wrong: sometimes this performance comes from good intentions. We want healthy, supportive environments where people feel encouraged. But it can turn toxic too, when the act becomes more important than the truth.

When I started my career in 2007, I quickly learned the most important rule: always smile in meetings. Not real smiles—just quick, polite ones that appeared and disappeared like pop-up ads. When your manager spoke, you nodded. When a coworker shared an idea (even a bad one), you smiled. It wasn't about whether you agreed. It was about keeping things smooth.

Your actual feelings didn't matter. Maybe you were confused. Maybe you thought the idea was terrible. Maybe you were exhausted. None of that showed on your face. You put on the same supportive expression as everyone else, like we were all wearing matching masks. This was normal. This was professional. This was survival.

I started calling this "fake positivity." It was the invisible glue that held office culture together. We didn't just do our jobs—we performed a constant background track of "that's great!" and "love it!" and "awesome idea!"

To be honest though, some teams value more openness and directness, but I still find workplaces are performative at best.

Then, a few years ago, I started hearing about something new: the Gen Z stare.

Social media began buzzing with videos and discussions about this phenomenon. Young people in workplaces, sitting in meetings with completely neutral faces. Not angry stares or mean looks. Just... nothing. Eyes looking straight ahead, face blank, mouth neither smiling nor frowning.

From what I read and saw online, it was throwing off managers and older colleagues. They'd present ideas, expecting the familiar chorus of polite smiles, and instead would get some people nodding encouragingly… and others, usually younger, simply staring. No nod. No reaction. No verbal support. Just quiet attention.

At first, many assumed it was disengagement. Maybe these young workers were bored, multitasking, scrolling social media. But as the conversation developed, a different picture emerged: the stare wasn't empty. It was intentional. They were listening, but refusing to perform.

Psychologist Tara Well explained this shift in Psychology Today:

"The Gen Z stare isn't just a blank look — it's an important signal. It pushes back against older norms of digital self-presentation, reflects changing attitudes toward visibility and authenticity, and may also be a subtle form of emotional boundary-setting in an age of constant exposure."

When I read that, it hit me: maybe this wasn't rudeness at all, but a rejection of the fake smiles I had been trained to give.

I started thinking about how different generations treat the workplace like theater. Baby Boomers built the stage, set up the lights, made everyone wear suits. Millennials like me came along and tried to make things more relaxed, but we still followed the basic script: we still smiled through boring meetings, still laughed at our boss's bad jokes, still kept our LinkedIn profiles full of humble success stories. I guess, that is.

Gen Z? They walked onto the same stage and simply refused to applaud.

That's what the stare really is.

It's a quiet rebellion against fake positivity. Not shouting, not complaining, not quitting. Just refusing to give the automatic reactions everyone expects.

The blank expression says: I'm here. I'm listening. But I won't pretend to feel something I don't feel.

Clinical psychologist Ellen Hendriksen noticed this too:

"Gen Z might be less willing to do the people-pleasing part, but that means that some of the professionalism has also gotten lost."

She's right, it can feel shocking when the polite rituals you learned suddenly disappear. What looks like coldness might really be a refusal to fake enthusiasm.

What I began to understand is that the stare might not be emptiness at all. It could be processing time… or more importantly, it could be a form of protest. Which, I think, I am mostly inclined to agree with.

Psychology lecturer Dr. Shane Rogers explains this generational difference:

"The stare could also be used to pause and consider a response… [whereas] older generations were more likely to instantly respond."

The silence wasn't laziness or disrespect. It was thinking happening in real time.

Sometimes, though, the stare is about protecting yourself emotionally. Social researcher Mark McCrindle put it this way:

"They might say it's authenticity … but it does come across as being a bit cold or uncaring. It's not that they don't care, it's just that they want to be real and not put on the fake voice and the fake warmth."

This makes sense to me. For Millennials like me, politeness was like paying rent… the cost of being accepted. For Gen Z, being honest seems more important than being liked.

Therapist Jacalyn Wetzel agrees:

"Many Gen Z simply don't see the point in performing social niceties with strangers or people they don't plan to build community with. They're not uncomfortable with silence, awkward or otherwise."

Of course, sometimes the stare is just about being new to work.

Clinical psychologist Meg Jay, who has worked with young adults for decades, reminds us:

"Blank stares you receive from young workers may be more about not knowing what to do and not feeling confident on the job than about their trying to be (passively) aggressively Gen Z."

In other words, sometimes it's not rebellion. It's just learning how things work. And that's completely normal.

But other times, it definitely is rebellion.

Nineteen-year-old TikTok creator Efe Ahworegba, who helped make the term "Gen Z stare" popular, said it clearly:

"The Gen Z stare is basically us saying the customer is not always right."

That's a huge shift. Entire industries are built on the idea that employees must smile through anything, must happily accept poor treatment while grinning. Gen Z's neutral expression says: not anymore.

Looking back at my early career, I wish I had been brave enough to stare sometimes. To sit calmly instead of nodding along. To show that I was thinking, not just agreeing with everything.

But I was taught that positivity was like money. You bought acceptance with smiles. You kept things running smoothly by being pleasant all the time.

Maybe Gen Z is right to reject this deal. Maybe the blank look is the most honest thing happening in the room.

So now, when I see the stare, I don't get nervous. I don't rush to fill the quiet. I try to see it as an invitation. A chance to be real. To drop the act. To say what I actually mean.

Because sometimes, in a workplace full of fake positivity, the most powerful thing you can do is simply stare back. If you are brave enough, perhaps, you can say it loud.

If you work in a modern-day tech company, you're probably familiar with Slack. It's a chat platform, or collaboration platform depending on how you spin it, where most of your day-to-day work happens. Sure, there are meetings, but Slack is where the real pulse of the company lives. Conversations. Decisions. Announcements. Meltdowns. Memes. It all happens there.

Every time I join a new company, I find myself oddly drawn to deactivated Slack accounts.

Yes, I know they simply mean someone has left the company. Their account is gone, their name grayed out. But these quiet remnants always fascinate me.

What brought them here? What did they hope for? Did they leave with a smile or a bruise?

Slack doesn't tell you that. It just leaves behind the ghost of a name, frozen in time. Maybe a kind message in a long-abandoned channel. A thumbs-up emoji from a forgotten thread. A reaction on your first announcement. That's all. No farewell. No context. Just silence where there was once presence.

And I can't help but think: every deactivated account is a modern-day allegory. Someone who once believed. Who maybe worked late. Who tried. Who laughed at inside jokes in #random. Who once dreamed that this job would be the right next step. And maybe it was until it wasn't.

We don't talk about this much. Tech is obsessed with beginnings: onboarding, orientation, welcome lunches. But endings? They're quiet. Sanitized. Often wrapped in "wishing them the best in their next adventure," even when that next adventure wasn't a choice.

I've worked long enough to know that the stories behind deactivation are rarely simple. Layoffs. Burnout. Managerial friction. Misalignment. Or just life happening. Some were treated unfairly. Some simply outgrew the place. Some left before they broke. Some left after.

And yet, the traces remain in old threads, shared files, forgotten channels. Digital sediment layered over time.

Sometimes I scroll back through channels and stumble on a deactivated account's message. It's strangely moving. As if time paused mid-sentence.

It reminds me that work is, at its core, made of people. Not org charts. Not KPIs. Not dashboards. But people: messy, brilliant, hopeful, flawed. People who leave marks, even when they're no longer around.

So here's to the grayed-out names.

To those who came before us.

To the ones who paved, pushed, stumbled, or carried the weight so we didn't have to.

To the ones who left silently, whose stories are unknown, but whose impact lingers.

Because every deactivated Slack account was once just like ours: active, green, typing.

And one day, ours will be too, and that somebody new will look at our grayed-out names and wonder the same thing.

I’ve been thinking about how dramatically UX hiring has changed over the past decade, and honestly, it’s kind of wild when you really look at it. Ten years ago, if you were a UXer looking for a job, the whole process was so much more relaxed. Companies would basically look at your portfolio for like 20 minutes, ask you a few questions about your process, and if you seemed smart and curious, you were probably getting an offer. No one was asking you to do homework assignments or going through ten rounds of interviews. Cultural fit? That wasn’t even a thing most places bothered with.

Back then, companies were betting on potential. They’d hire someone who showed promise, maybe had some design chops and could think through problems, and they’d figure the rest would work itself out. The field was exploding, everyone was still figuring out what UX even meant in their organization, and frankly, there weren’t enough experienced people to go around anyway. So you hired for curiosity and problem-solving ability and hoped for the best.

Fast forward to today and it’s a completely different world. Companies now hire almost entirely on past performance and incredibly specific context. I’m talking about job descriptions that read like they’re looking for a clone of someone who already worked there. “Must have led a team of exactly 8 designers across 3 product verticals while shipping 12 features in a fintech company focused on lending products for enterprise customers with 5,000+ seats.” Okay, maybe I’m exaggerating a bit, but not by much.

The obsession with metrics is insane now. Companies want to know exactly how many people you managed, exactly what you shipped, exactly what impact you had on conversion rates. They want to see your OKRs and KPIs and all these acronyms that barely existed in UX conversations a decade ago. Did you increase sign-up rates by 23%? Great, but what about retention? Oh, you worked on retention? But was it B2B or B2C retention? Because we need B2B experience specifically.

And the domain expertise requirements are getting ridiculous. It’s not enough to be a good UXer who can learn new domains anymore. Companies want someone who’s already done the exact thing they need done. Healthcare UX? Better have HIPAA compliance knowledge. Fintech? Hope you understand payment flows and fraud prevention. E-commerce? They want to see your abandoned cart recovery strategies and checkout optimization wins.

The interview process itself has become this elaborate gauntlet. What used to be maybe two conversations has turned into this multi-week ordeal with portfolio presentations that need to be perfectly crafted with business impact metrics, take-home assignments that basically amount to free consulting work, whiteboarding sessions, cultural fit interviews, leadership philosophy discussions, and presentations to executives. I’ve seen candidates go through eight or nine interviews for a single role. It’s exhausting for everyone involved.

So what happened? Why did we swing so hard from “show us your thinking” to “prove you’ve already done this exact job”?

Part of it is just that the field matured. There are way more experienced UX people now than there were in 2014. When supply was limited, companies had to bet on potential because they didn’t have many other options. Now they can be picky. Why take a risk on someone who might be great when you can hire someone who’s already proven they are great?

The economy shifted too. The “growth at all costs” mentality of the early 2010s is over. Companies are more careful with their money, more risk-averse, and hiring managers are under more pressure to make sure every hire works out. It’s easier to justify hiring someone with a track record than someone with just potential.

Products got more complex and specialized as well. The days of the generalist UXer who could jump into any problem are kind of over, at least at senior levels. If you’re working on a healthcare product, there really is value in understanding healthcare workflows and regulations. If you’re designing for enterprise software, consumer app experience might not translate as well as it used to.

Plus, everything is measurable now. Companies want designers who can speak the language of business impact, and they want to see proof that you’ve moved needles before. It’s not enough to say you’re a good designer - you need to show that your designs led to measurable improvements in whatever metrics the business cares about.

Remote work probably made this worse too. When everyone was in the office, you could get a better sense of someone’s potential through casual interactions. Now companies are relying more heavily on structured interviews and documented experience because it’s harder to evaluate soft skills and cultural fit remotely.

But here’s the thing - I think we’ve overcorrected. This performance-first hiring approach is creating some real problems that companies aren’t fully recognizing.

For one, it’s making teams incredibly homogeneous. When you only hire people who’ve already solved the exact problems you’re facing, you end up with a bunch of people who think about those problems in very similar ways. Where’s the innovation going to come from? Where are the fresh perspectives?

It’s also creating this weird experience trap where companies expect people to have done specific things, but if everyone has those same requirements, where are people supposed to get that experience in the first place? We’re basically creating a system where junior designers can’t break into senior roles because senior roles require experience they can’t get without already having senior roles.

The whole thing is expensive and inefficient too. These elaborate interview processes take forever, cost a ton in terms of everyone’s time, and honestly, a lot of great candidates just drop out because they’re not willing to jump through eight hoops for a job. Meanwhile, hiring teams spend months trying to find the “perfect” candidate when someone with 80% of the requirements might have been perfectly fine with some onboarding and support.

I think the companies that are going to win long-term are the ones that figure out how to balance both approaches. They’re looking for ways to evaluate potential alongside performance, creating internal pathways for people to gain new domain expertise, and building assessment methods that test adaptability and learning ability, not just past accomplishments.

Some places are pairing less experienced designers with domain experts, which lets them leverage potential while reducing risk. Others are focusing more on transferable skills like systems thinking and collaborative problem-solving rather than requiring identical previous experience.

The truth is, the best designers I know are curious, adaptable people who can learn new domains and apply design thinking to novel problems. But our current hiring practices are optimized for finding people who’ve already learned specific domains and applied design thinking to familiar problems. Those are related but not identical skills.

I get why we evolved this way - it makes sense from a risk management perspective. But I think we’ve swung too far toward safety at the expense of growth and innovation. The companies that figure out how to bet on potential again, just with better frameworks for evaluating it, are going to have a real competitive advantage in building diverse, innovative teams.

Because at the end of the day, the most interesting design problems are the ones nobody’s solved before. And you can’t hire people who’ve already solved problems that don’t exist yet.

The most annoying part of being laid off isn’t just losing your income. It’s losing leverage. Sometimes you also lose momentum, which makes it feel even worse.

You could have spent years building relationships, context, trust, and a solid reputation in your previous company. But once you're out, that work often doesn’t carry over. Your next employer doesn’t care. Worse, they might even see you as desperate.

And when you’re seen as desperate, everything you’ve done before feels like it doesn’t matter. The achievements you were proud of? They suddenly feel like they were just internal noise. Things that don’t mean much to the outside world.

It makes you stop and think. Why work so hard? Why even try to prove yourself? What’s the point of pushing through challenges?

Over the past few months, I’ve been talking to fellow designers who were laid off or actively job hunting. Most of them, eventually, settle. Maybe for a lower title. Maybe for less pay. I’m in that group too.

Let’s say you were a senior designer aiming to move up to a lead, staff, or principal role. After a layoff, good luck with that. You’ll need to prove that your achievements are just as strong in a new context, and that’s hard in an employer’s market. Even if you were close to a promotion before, none of that really helps. It becomes na-da. And no, not even AI can help you explain your worth better.

The truth is, a "senior" title doesn’t mean the same thing from one company to another. Expectations shift wildly. Some places expect you to be hands-on, some expect you to be more strategic. And sometimes, both.

Trying to get the same role you had before? It’s like applying for a role in a different lifetime.

And here’s the kicker: even when you're willing to downgrade and take a step back, that’s not always easy either. Some companies might look at your background and think, “Why is this person applying for a role that’s clearly below them?” Others might not even think you’re qualified at all.

Mentally, I’ve already flipped the table.

I know some people will come in with advice like “build your personal brand” or “start your own thing.” And sure, those are valid paths for some. But not every post needs a solution. Sometimes we just need to say things out loud, let it sit, and be okay with the messiness.

If you’ve been through this or are going through it, I see you. It's hard. And you're not alone.

I’ve asked myself this question more times than I can count. What does it really mean to be a designer? Is it about satisfaction? About money? Prestige? Or is it just one of those things people fall into because it’s trendy or in demand? I don’t know the answer. Not in a way that feels final, anyway. But I do know how I ended up here, and maybe that says something.

I made a piece of video on it. Enjoy.

When I graduated in 2007, I had no clear idea what I wanted to do with my life. I studied graphic design, so the most obvious path was to join a branding agency or advertising firm, like most of my classmates. But something about that route didn’t click with me. I had always been more drawn to digital. Back in high school and university, I spent hours making websites with FrontPage, playing around with HTML, even designing interactive CD-ROMs using Macromedia Flash and Director. It wasn’t formal education, but it felt more natural than anything I ever learned about paper stock or printing techniques. Looking back, I guess I had already drifted toward what would later be called UX, even though no one called it that back then.

My first job was at Oracle, designing web-based e-learning tools. I was based in Indonesia, but the team was in the US. It was remote, but not in the current sense of the word—I still went into an office every day, just not with the people I worked with. The only design tool I used at the time was Adobe Illustrator. There was no Figma, no Sketch, no libraries or tokens or frameworks. Just a print-focused design tool that we forced into working for the web. It sounds funny now, but it got the job done.

The truth is, I didn’t have a deep motivation when I started. I just needed a job. I was more comfortable designing for screens than for paper, and that was enough of a reason to take the path I did. I didn’t have a grand plan, and I certainly didn’t see it as a lifelong calling. It was simply a way to make a living. And for a while, that was enough.

Even now, I wouldn’t say I’ve found some pure, burning passion in design. If I have any passion at all, it might be travel. I spend a lot of time writing about it, filming videos, planning trips. Maybe that’s the thing I actually care about. Maybe that’s why I’ve gravitated toward travel tech companies like Expedia and TripAdvisor. I’m still not sure. I just know that I think about travel more than I think about design.

When I’ve changed jobs over the years, it was never part of a grand career trajectory. It was usually about escaping a bad situation or chasing a better one. Better salary, better team, better manager, better environment. That’s how I moved from one place to another. I didn’t sit down with a five-year plan and try to climb the ladder step by step. I just went where things felt more tolerable. If I look back, most of my career moves were driven by opportunity, not ambition.

Even when I moved to Singapore in 2016, it wasn’t really about the work. It was about building a better life for my family. Sure, the jobs were better, the pay was better, but ultimately I moved because I wanted my kid to grow up in a place that felt more stable, more open, more livable. And if I’m being honest, the same reasoning applied every time I jumped to a new job. Sometimes I just needed to leave because I couldn’t take the burnout anymore. Sometimes I followed a manager I respected. Sometimes I just needed something different. In 2021, for example, I left Shopify and joined TripAdvisor partly because I missed working in travel, but mostly because I had burned out hard and met a new manager who made me feel hopeful again. That was enough of a reason.

So when people ask me, what does being a designer mean to you? My answer is: it doesn’t mean much, really. It’s a job. It’s something that made sense to do, given the time and circumstances. I’m not trying to change the world. I’m not building toward some master plan. I just want to make a living, stay sane, and maybe find time and space to do things I truly care about on the side. That’s about it.

If I were born in a different time, I might have done something else entirely. Maybe I would have been a painter. Maybe a machine operator in a factory. Who knows. In this era, design happened to be the thing that worked. So I went with it. There’s nothing heroic or poetic about it.

If you’re starting out and hoping to become a designer today, I’d say don’t get too philosophical about it. Don’t romanticize it. The industry will disappoint you sometimes. That’s guaranteed. But it can still give you what you need, even if it’s not what you thought you were looking for.

Thanks for reading. And if you’re curious, the video version of this reflection is here.

Five hours into my day, I no longer had a job.

This wasn’t my first layoff. I went through one during COVID, and I thought the second time would be easier. It wasn’t. In fact, it hit differently. Not harder or softer, just strange. The first time, there was chaos in the world, and it felt like we were all struggling together. This time, it felt more isolating. Like I was suddenly excluded from a world I had been part of for years.

After sorting out the logistics, saying goodbye to teammates, signing documents, I sat in the quiet for a while. My family was there, and that helped. The next day, I posted about the layoff on LinkedIn. I thanked the company. In hindsight, I’m not sure why. Maybe because I didn’t know what else to say. Maybe because I thought it was the polite thing to do. Maybe because I hadn’t fully processed how I really felt.

What followed was 30 days of writing. Not because I wanted attention. Not because I was trying to optimize for reach or land a job. I just needed to write. To process. To not disappear. And in return, people responded. Friends, former colleagues, even strangers. Some shared their own stories. Some just said “me too.” That alone made me feel a little less alone.

But what I didn’t share at the time were the breakdowns. The 2 a.m. panic spirals. The doomscrolling. The obsessive LinkedIn browsing. Reading post after post about how AI was replacing everything, how UX was supposedly dead, how job seekers were being ghosted or offered 40 percent less than their last role. I knew I shouldn’t internalize it all, but I couldn’t stop. It was like watching a slow-motion collapse of the career I had built for over 15 years.

At the same time, I saw leaders and former teammates posting about product launches, company plans, new hires. It felt surreal. Like watching a parallel universe move forward while mine was frozen. I questioned everything. Do we stay in Singapore? Do we go back to Indonesia? Is it even worth being a Singapore PR if I can’t land a job here?

Still, I did what most of us do. I applied. A lot. Some applications went nowhere. Some led to interviews. I reconnected with people I hadn’t talked to in years. Some remembered me and wanted to help. Others surfaced opportunities I had passed up when I was still comfortable at Tripadvisor. I aimed high. I looked for design leadership roles, principal roles, manager roles. But the higher you go, the fuzzier the rules become. Fit starts to matter more than skill. Some companies thought I wasn’t managerial enough. Others thought I was too IC. Some offered roles that were a step down, and not even subtly.

Every interview was a different game with a different set of rules. Some focused on design craft. Others cared more about business thinking. Some grilled me on systems. Others wanted B2B experience even though they knew I had mostly done B2C. And I often didn’t know what they were really looking for until it was too late. I’d spend days crafting a presentation only to be told afterward, “You seem more like a strong individual contributor than a team leader.” If that was the case, I wish they had said it from the start.

Surprisingly, what turned out to be the most helpful were the design challenges. The take-home assignments. I used to hate them. They felt exploitative. Why should anyone do work for free? But this time, I embraced them. Because unlike portfolio reviews that dissect your past, design challenges show your potential. One of those challenges led to an actual offer. For that, I’m grateful.

If you’re job hunting right now and you have the capacity, I’d say don’t dismiss these challenges outright. Just be mindful. Know your limits. If a company doesn’t respect your time or effort, that’s a red flag. Ideally, they should compensate you. But even if they don’t, the exercise can sometimes be the clearest way to show what you’re capable of.

It’s an employer’s market right now. There are more designers than open roles. Salaries are being slashed. Some of the offers I got were significantly lower than what I made before. But markets shift. They always do. And the companies that underpay or treat candidates poorly will feel the impact when the tide turns. Good people will leave the moment they have better options.

If you’re in a position to hire right now, please treat candidates fairly. Pay them fairly. Be transparent. It’s not just the decent thing to do. It’s the smart, long-term strategy.

So what have I learned from all this? That rejection still stings, no matter how senior you are. That writing openly can be grounding. That AI panic is a distraction, not a direction. That leadership hiring is more political than people admit. That portfolio reviews are broken. That design challenges, when done right, can actually open doors. And most importantly, that even if the market doesn’t value you today, that doesn’t mean you’re not valuable. It just means your moment hasn’t come yet.

If you’re still in the thick of it, sending out CVs, refreshing your inbox, second-guessing your abilities, I see you. I’ve been there. I might still be there, depending on when you read this. But keep going. Rest when you need to, then keep going.

Thanks for reading. If you're curious, I talked about this in a video too, which you can watch here.

The UX case study interview needs a redesign. For years, UX case study interviews have followed a familiar pattern. Designers are expected to present an end-to-end project, detailing how they identified a problem, conducted research, ideated solutions, and executed a final design, preferably with measurable impact. The idea is simple: a structured narrative that showcases both process and results.

This approach works well in certain contexts. In smaller companies or agencies, a designer may have ownership over a project from start to finish. They define the problem, gather insights, design the solution, and sometimes even influence development. Their work follows a clean arc, making it easy to showcase as a complete case study.

But in larger product organizations, this is rarely how design happens. Instead, work is often distributed across multiple teams, each contributing to a broader vision. A designer might spend months refining a single feature, working within an established system, or iterating on an existing product rather than building something from scratch. Many designers don’t experience a clear “beginning” or “end” in their work; they step into projects at different phases, contribute their expertise, and pass the work along to the next stage.

Yet, despite this reality, the UX interview process continues to rely on a format that assumes designers are working in isolated silos, controlling a product’s entire evolution. The expectation that every designer should be able to present a self-contained, start-to-finish story doesn’t reflect how complex organizations function. Worse, it undervalues the skills that truly matter at scale: collaboration, problem-framing, influencing stakeholders, and navigating ambiguity.

This is where UX interviews need to evolve. Instead of treating case studies as a one-size-fits-all assessment, we should rethink what they measure and how they align with real-world design work.

The obsession with end-to-end case studies

There’s a certain elegance to an end-to-end case study. It follows a clear arc: a problem is identified, a solution is crafted, and results are achieved. It’s easy to digest and leaves little room for ambiguity. But design rarely unfolds in such a linear fashion, especially in large organizations where projects stretch across multiple teams, priorities shift, and decision-making is often layered with constraints.

Consider a designer working in a global product company. They might join a project midway, inheriting past research and design explorations. Their role isn’t to start from scratch but to refine and push the work forward within an existing system. Or take a designer on an internal platform team, rather than designing a user-facing feature, they might be focused on improving infrastructure, ensuring consistency across teams, or refining internal tools. In cases like these, an end-to-end case study simply doesn’t exist.

And yet, in an interview, they’re expected to present one. They must craft a story that makes their work seem like a neatly packaged journey rather than what it actually was… a continuous effort, shaped by collaboration, dependencies, and ongoing iteration. Instead of being able to focus on how they worked and the thinking behind their decisions, they are pressured to fit their experience into a format that doesn’t reflect reality.

What we should be evaluating instead

Rather than treating UX case studies as storytelling exercises, we should focus on how designers think, how they navigate challenges, and how they contribute to a team’s success.

One of the most overlooked aspects of UX work is how designers operate within real-world constraints. In large organizations, design is rarely about executing a vision in isolation. It’s about working within a system, influencing decision-making, and aligning with business and engineering priorities. It’s about knowing when to push for change and when to adapt.

Instead of obsessing over end-to-end execution, interviews should probe deeper into how designers make decisions. What trade-offs did they have to navigate? How did they collaborate with engineers and product managers? How did they balance user needs with business constraints? These are the questions that reveal a designer’s ability to operate in the complex environments they will actually be working in.

Moreover, the impact of design work isn’t always measured in numbers. The common expectation that every case study should end with a measurable business outcome—whether an increase in conversion rates, engagement, or revenue—ignores the broader ways in which design creates value. Not every project results in a perfect metric. Sometimes, impact is about influencing culture, refining processes, or elevating design’s role within an organization. A designer who improves the way teams collaborate, refines internal tools, or champions accessibility might not have a direct number to showcase, but their impact is just as meaningful.

The UX manager’s case study

For designers moving into UX leadership roles, the flaws in case study interviews become even more pronounced. The transition from individual contributor to design manager is not just about craft. It’s about how one leads teams, influences strategy, and creates an environment where good design can thrive.

Yet, many interviews for UX leadership roles still begin with a case study presentation that focuses on execution rather than leadership. Candidates are often asked to showcase their best design work, as if that alone proves their ability to manage teams or set design direction.

A better approach would be to clarify upfront what kind of case study is expected. If the focus is on management, then the case study should highlight how the candidate led a team, how they made strategic decisions, and how they navigated challenges in hiring, stakeholder management, or team structure. If craft is being assessed separately, that should be made explicit. Too often, companies conflate design skill with leadership potential, when in reality, they require very different competencies.

Evolving UX interview for the future

It’s time for UX hiring to move beyond rigid case study expectations and embrace more flexible, realistic assessments. Instead of forcing every candidate into the same format, companies should consider alternative approaches:

• If end-to-end ownership isn’t typical for the role, allow candidates to present their contributions within a broader team effort rather than making them craft an artificial “complete” story.

• If assessing problem-solving and design thinking is the goal, use interactive problem-solving exercises that simulate real-world challenges.

• If leadership is the focus, ask about how the candidate has shaped culture, influenced strategy, or scaled design within an organization.

Case studies will always be a part of UX hiring, but they shouldn’t be the only measure of a designer’s ability. The best UX designers are those who can navigate complexity, collaborate effectively, and think critically, skills that go far beyond presenting a polished portfolio piece.

If companies want to hire the right designers, they need to start by asking the right questions, and setting up the right expectations from the beginning.

Thanks for reading! If you like this content, you will like my book too.

Ever feel like an impostor in your design career?

After years in product design, I still catch myself questioning whether I belong. It’s a constant dance between self-doubt and pushing forward—a feeling many of us know too well.

That’s why I wrote Forever an Impostor, a deeply personal memoir that pulls back the curtain on what it’s really like to work in design. It’s not a guide to becoming the perfect designer; it’s a story of resilience, navigating impostor syndrome, and finding your way in an often messy industry.

I’m sharing this not because I have all the answers, but because I hope it makes you feel less alone on your journey. If you’ve ever wondered if you’re the only one struggling, this book is for you.

Would love for you to check it out, and if it resonates, let’s connect and chat more.

Here’s a bit of what the book is about…

Forever an Impostor isn’t just another book on design—it’s a candid collection of thoughts (and feelings) by Sigit Adinugroho, a product designer navigating the highs and lows of the design world while grappling with self-doubt, impostor syndrome, and the realities of balancing career and family. Blending personal anecdotes, professional insights, and practical advice, this book offers a heartfelt reflection on the unglamorous side of the design profession—where resilience, adaptability, and self-acceptance become key to thriving. Whether you’re an aspiring designer or a seasoned professional, Sigit’s journey provides an authentic look into the often messy yet rewarding path of a creative career.

Buy the book on Gumroad

Layoffs are often framed as an unfortunate but inevitable part of business. A tough but necessary decision. A numbers game. A reality of market downturns, shifting strategies, and cost-cutting measures.

But here’s the truth: Layoffs don’t just happen. They are a leadership decision.

Yes, sometimes businesses must adjust. Priorities shift. Market conditions change. But how companies navigate these changes isn’t set in stone—it’s a choice. And more often than not, companies default to eliminating roles without exploring the one thing that could make layoffs less harmful: giving employees agency over their own future.

Agency means having the ability to participate in decisions that affect your own career. It means being given options, rather than just being handed an outcome.

In the context of layoffs, it means:

✅ Clear, honest communication about potential risks before a decision is finalized

✅ Opportunities to transition into new roles or teams when restructuring occurs

✅ Discussions about alternative options—scope changes, role adjustments, even temporary salary reductions if it means staying employed

✅ A real chance to prepare—not just being blindsided by an abrupt decision

Instead, what often happens is the exact opposite. People are told their work is still needed—right up until the moment it’s not. They’re reassured that their role is secure—until the email lands in their inbox. They are kept in the dark, and by the time they learn the truth, it’s too late for them to do anything about it.

This isn’t just a failure in business planning—it’s a failure of leadership.

When a company decides to lay people off, people managers are the ones closest to the ground. They understand their team’s skills, their adaptability, and their value to the business. And yet, too often, they act as passive messengers—simply delivering bad news rather than fighting for alternative solutions.

A good people manager doesn’t just execute layoffs. They advocate for their team before it ever reaches that point.

That means:

• Pushing leadership to consider reassignment opportunities before terminations

• Giving employees a clear understanding of where they stand, even when the news is uncomfortable

• Having hard conversations early, rather than misleading people with false assurances

• Exploring creative solutions, instead of defaulting to headcount reductions

Too often, managers avoid difficult conversations until it’s too late. They remain vague, noncommittal, and reassuring—perhaps because they don’t have all the answers, or because they don’t want to be the bearer of bad news. But this does far more harm than good.

By the time employees realize their roles are at risk, they have no agency left. No room to negotiate. No time to prepare. No chance to transition internally. The decision has already been made.

And in that moment, the message is clear: Your career is not in your hands. It never was.

The irony is that when companies handle layoffs this way, they don’t just lose people—they lose trust. They create a culture of fear, uncertainty, and disengagement. Employees stop believing in long-term growth because they realize decisions about their careers can be made without them.

The most talented people? They don’t wait for the next round of layoffs. They leave on their own terms, taking their knowledge, expertise, and loyalty elsewhere.

Layoffs aren’t always avoidable. But the way they’re handled? That’s a choice.

A company that values its people doesn’t wait until the last minute to have hard conversations. It doesn’t treat layoffs as the default answer to financial challenges. And it doesn’t strip employees of their agency, their dignity, and their ability to shape their own future.

Because when employees aren’t given a say in their own careers, it’s not just the employee who loses. The entire organization does.

What do you think? Is this also what you observe?

But after seeing multiple companies go through similar cycles, I’ve noticed a pattern that repeats itself time and again:

1️⃣ A strong start. A company enters APAC, often with ambitious plans to expand, localize, and capture market share. Dedicated product, marketing, and operations teams are set up in the region. There’s excitement, resources, and a sense of purpose.

2️⃣ The shift. After a year or two, priorities start evolving. Global leadership—usually based in HQ—reassesses business objectives, and the focus on regional adaptation starts to fade. Some teams find themselves working more on global initiatives rather than region-specific efforts.

3️⃣ The restructuring. Gradually, APAC teams are merged into larger global functions, often working on company-wide programs instead of their original local-market focus. At this stage, people are spread across different teams, and the original mission gets diluted.

4️⃣ The closure or downsizing. As the regional focus diminishes, some roles become redundant. Eventually, satellite teams are either restructured, deprioritized, or dissolved entirely.

This isn’t unique to one company—it’s a challenge many global businesses face when balancing regional investment with global efficiency. For those of us who have worked in satellite offices, it can feel like a cycle that keeps repeating.

The reality is that business priorities change. Expanding into new markets is exciting, but sustaining that investment over time is difficult. If a company doesn’t see immediate success, or if global teams believe a more centralized approach is “good enough,” regional teams can find themselves in a precarious position.

For those of us working in APAC, this raises important questions:

• How do we ensure that regional teams continue to add value in a way that’s recognized by leadership?

• How do we avoid being seen as just an “expansion effort” and instead position ourselves as an integral part of the company’s long-term strategy?

• What can we learn from past experiences to improve the odds of longevity for future regional teams?

After going through this cycle multiple times, I’ve started thinking about how we, as professionals in regional roles, can navigate these challenges better. Here are a few takeaways:

Seek teams with a clear, strategic local mandate. If a company sees APAC as a core market (rather than just an expansion experiment), the team is more likely to have long-term viability. This isn’t a guarantee, but it increases the chances of sustainability.

Make localization measurable and visible. Businesses make decisions based on data. The more we can demonstrate the impact of local market initiatives—whether through user growth, engagement, or revenue—the stronger our case for long-term investment.

Build strong relationships with global leadership. The further a satellite office is from HQ, the easier it is to be deprioritized. Ensuring regular engagement, alignment, and advocacy with decision-makers is key.

If leading a satellite team, plan for a 1–2 year runway. The unfortunate reality is that many satellite offices have a short lifespan. Leaders in these teams can fight for impact, push for visibility, and secure buy-in—but also be realistic and proactive in preparing for change.

The dilemma of satellite offices isn’t new, and it’s not just an APAC issue. It’s part of the broader challenge of how global companies scale and adapt to different markets. Some teams make it work, but many struggle to justify their existence when global strategy shifts.

I still believe there’s enormous value in local expertise, but I also recognize the realities of how businesses operate. The key is finding ways to embed that value deeply enough that it’s not seen as an add-on, but as something critical to success.

For those of you who have worked in regional roles at global companies—what has your experience been like? How have you seen companies navigate this challenge?

Have you ever been told in a job interview that “jumping into UI design” is a big red flag? That you should always be able to explain how you gather context before even touching Figma? Have you ever been unsure about how to start a design project? As a designer, once you’re deemed “senior” enough, you’re expected to thrive in ambiguity—at least that’s what people assume. Yet, navigating that ambiguity can still be challenging, depending on the project’s complexity, the team, and the culture.

Most designers know that every project should start by seeking clarity—the why, how, when, what, and so on. What do we know, and what don’t we know? Some call this discovery; others call it “context building.” This approach is not only valid but should be the norm. Without clarity, how can you know what to design or how to approach it? The design process offers a rich array of methods. You might use a design sprint, desk research, generative research, user interviews, stakeholder interviews, or even a comprehensive process combining many of these.

As you gain experience, you’re expected to come equipped with these contexts and data points, even before opening Figma to use that library of components. Jumping straight into Figma without this preparation is often seen as a glaring red flag. It risks unnecessary back-and-forths that frustrate everyone, waste resources, and are simply… unprofessional. Interviewers especially look for evidence of this preparation, often asking how you build context before diving into design.

While I agree that context-building is crucial, I also find this expectation occasionally paralyzing. Designers can feel obligated to follow a specific process simply for the sake of it. If you don’t present some form of prerequisite research or context-building activity, you risk not being taken seriously. Even if others don’t mind, you might carry a heavy guilt: I have to do all this context-building, or they’ll find out I’m not a good designer.

However, here’s the thing: context-building doesn’t always have to precede design activities (such as working in Figma), nor does it need to be completed before UI design begins. Context-building is an ongoing, iterative process—malleable and integrated into every stage of the design journey. Even after thorough upfront research, starting to design in Figma often reveals new limitations, edge cases, or possibilities that make you revisit earlier assumptions. How often does a UI design project proceed smoothly, even after extensive research or a well-rounded product brief?

Design is rarely a linear process. The journey of discovery and clarity doesn’t always start with stakeholder meetings or research. Sometimes, the best way to understand a problem is to dive straight into it. What if I told you that context-building can include sketching directly in Figma or starting with UI design to uncover problems in real-time? At the same time, you can still conduct user research, gather data, and hold stakeholder interviews. It’s also perfectly fine to present stakeholders with work-in-progress explorations on Figma, complete with assumptions and hypotheses, to gather their input and build further context.

This approach, often called “designing by doing,” flips the conventional playbook. Instead of waiting for all the answers, you start creating. The act of designing becomes a process of discovery. For instance, as you lay out screens or map user flows, questions naturally arise: does this screen solve the user’s problem? Is this interaction too complex? How does this fit into the larger system? These questions often lead back to stakeholders or research, but now with a sharper focus. Instead of vague queries like “What are the user needs?”, you might ask, “How do users navigate between these two steps?”

This isn’t about skipping steps or rushing to a solution. It’s about acknowledging that design itself can uncover the clarity you need. When you start sketching or prototyping, you often reveal gaps in understanding that weren’t visible during research. Suddenly, the theoretical becomes tangible, and the issues come to light.

The stigma around jumping straight into UI design is, in my view, misplaced. Sometimes, starting in Figma is the fastest way to surface the right questions. It reduces overthinking, breaks the cycle of analysis paralysis, and provides a starting point for iteration. Even if your initial designs miss the mark, they offer something tangible to react to—both for you and for stakeholders.

In fact, designing by doing often encourages collaboration. A rough prototype or wireframe can spark more meaningful conversations than abstract ideas ever could. Stakeholders can react to something concrete, which accelerates alignment and leads to more actionable feedback. It’s an organic way of building context that integrates discovery with creation.

Let’s not overthink this. Let’s stop shaming designers who prefer to start with UI design, and let’s stop labeling it as a red flag. Design is about problem-solving, and there’s no single “correct” way to get there. The path to clarity is rarely a straight line, and sometimes the fastest way to make progress is to pick up your tools and start exploring. You might find that the clarity you’re looking for was always waiting for you on the canvas.

Thanks for reading! If you like this content, you will like my book too.

Ever feel like an impostor in your design career?

After years in product design, I still catch myself questioning whether I belong. It’s a constant dance between self-doubt and pushing forward—a feeling many of us know too well.

That’s why I wrote Forever an Impostor, a deeply personal memoir that pulls back the curtain on what it’s really like to work in design. It’s not a guide to becoming the perfect designer; it’s a story of resilience, navigating impostor syndrome, and finding your way in an often messy industry.

It’s been a work from at least 8 months ago, and finally I finished it.

I’m sharing this not because I have all the answers, but because I hope it makes you feel less alone on your journey. If you’ve ever wondered if you’re the only one struggling, this book is for you.

Would love for you to check it out, and if it resonates, let’s connect and chat more.

Here’s a bit of what the book is about…

Forever an Impostor isn’t just another book on design—it’s a candid collection of thoughts (and feelings) by Sigit Adinugroho, a product designer navigating the highs and lows of the design world while grappling with self-doubt, impostor syndrome, and the realities of balancing career and family. Blending personal anecdotes, professional insights, and practical advice, this book offers a heartfelt reflection on the unglamorous side of the design profession—where resilience, adaptability, and self-acceptance become key to thriving. Whether you’re an aspiring designer or a seasoned professional, Sigit’s journey provides an authentic look into the often messy yet rewarding path of a creative career.

Buy the book

In Hans Christian Andersen’s famous tale “The Emperor’s New Clothes,” a vain emperor is deceived into wearing an invisible suit, praised by fearful advisors unwilling to admit the truth. It takes the honesty of a child to reveal the obvious: the emperor is, in fact, wearing nothing at all.

Similarly, many cities today make bold claims about becoming “the next Singapore,” showcasing grand infrastructure and eye-catching designs as symbols of their success. Yet, like the emperor’s invisible clothes, these claims often lack substance. Beneath the surface, these cities frequently miss the deeper elements that define true success: long-term vision, sustainability, human-centered service design, and seamless public systems integration.

The illusion of success, much like the emperor’s invisible attire, fades when the underlying principles are absent. True success, akin to good UX design, isn’t just about what’s visible—it’s about how all elements work together harmoniously to create a sustainable, efficient experience for people.

In digital design, good UX (user experience) ensures systems are intuitive and function well. The same principles apply to city planning and governance, and Singapore exemplifies this on a broader scale. Its success is not just in grand designs, but in the UX of living—an interconnected, systemic approach that considers the long-term impact on people, the environment, and the economy. Having lived in Singapore for the past nine years, I’ve seen firsthand how these elements come together to make the city what it is.

While many urban projects worldwide aim to rival Singapore, focusing on surface-level features like large airports and skyscrapers, they often overlook the deep-rooted UX principles that have made Singapore a model of efficiency and modernity. Let’s explore why these cities fall short and how Singapore’s approach to urban design and governance is built on UX principles that truly make a city work.

Jakarta’s Soekarno-Hatta Terminal 3 Ultimate: Impressive design, but lacking seamless experience

Jakarta’s Terminal 3 Ultimate was pitched as a rival to Singapore’s Changi Airport, claiming it would “beat” Singapore. While the terminal offers impressive design and scale, it lacks the comprehensive service integration, sustainability, and regulatory efficiency that define Changi’s user experience. It is very hard to get into town with frequency and connectivity as easy as in Singapore. Lighting, temperature and flow of the airport is not as efficient.

UX in Singapore isn’t just about making things look good—it’s about how all systems work together seamlessly. Terminal 3 may be visually impressive, but without smooth transport connectivity, efficient operations, and thoughtful service design, it cannot offer the same holistic experience that makes Changi a global leader. H

Phnom Penh’s Techo International Airport: Flashy much?

Phnom Penh’s new Techo International Airport aims to position itself as a regional competitor to Singapore, focusing on its size and ambitious design. But this seems to focus on aesthetics overlooks the deeper UX principles that make a place functional and people-centric. Techo Airport lacks the forward-thinking governance and service design that underpin Singapore’s success. For example, while the terminal may be large, without an intuitive layout, efficient immigration services, and convenient access to public transport, the user experience falls short. In UX terms, the airport offers a flashy interface but lacks the usability that keeps users coming back. We don’t know yet for sure, but that’s my gut feeling. They contracted Changi Airports International to manage their F&B businesses, which is a testament in itself that service design and management matter more than fancy buildings or size.

Dubai, UAE: Grand designs but lack of public transport connectivity?

Dubai is often compared to Singapore for its rapid development and iconic infrastructure, like the Burj Khalifa and Dubai International Airport. However, Dubai’s UX suffers from a lack of integrated public transport and urban planning. A core UX principle is reducing user friction, and Singapore has mastered this with its efficient Mass Rapid Transit (MRT) system, walkable streets, and thoughtful city design. Dubai, by contrast, remains highly car-dependent, leading to congestion and a fragmented user experience. It highlights a crucial lesson: grand designs alone do not create a seamless experience—it’s the thoughtful, behind-the-scenes systems that make it work.

The point is that while weather plays a role, the lack of integrated public transport and walkability in Dubai is not solely due to the climate. Thoughtful planning, as seen in cities like Singapore and Doha, can ensure that even in harsh weather, cities provide seamless and comfortable user experiences. Singapore has mastered UX principles by anticipating challenges like heat and humidity, and Dubai could implement similar strategies by investing in air-conditioned, connected, and climate-controlled public spaces.

Even in extreme climates, cities can design systems that reduce user friction and improve overall urban experience through careful planning and climate-specific solutions. Grand designs need to be complemented with behind-the-scenes systems that make everyday life more livable and accessible, regardless of the weather.

Iskandar, Johor, Malaysia: Affordable but lacking integration

Marketed as the “next Singapore,” Iskandar Malaysia is an economic zone offering lower costs but faces challenges with inconsistent regulations, underdeveloped public transport, and fragmented urban planning. UX in urban design is about creating cohesive systems that work for all users—residents, workers, and visitors. Singapore excels at this by integrating infrastructure, services, and governance into a unified experience. Iskandar’s failure to offer a seamless user journey across these elements shows how crucial this principle is to replicating Singapore’s success.

Colombo Port City, Sri Lanka: Ambitious but unsustainable?

Colombo’s Port City was envisioned as a regional hub to compete with Singapore. However, it faces environmental sustainability issues, political instability, and weak regulations. Good UX in city planning goes beyond immediate user needs to consider long-term sustainability. Singapore’s forward-looking Green Plan 2030 and urban policies ensure that today’s infrastructure won’t create problems tomorrow. Colombo’s Port City, while ambitious, lacks this future-focused approach, leading to a user experience that may be enjoyable today but unsustainable in the long run.

Shenzhen, China: Tech giant with human-centric gaps

Shenzhen has rapidly become a global tech powerhouse, sometimes compared to Singapore for its innovation. However, it struggles with issues like pollution, congestion, and lack of walkability. Good UX means creating environments that work for people on a human scale, and Singapore does this exceptionally well through green spaces, pedestrian-friendly areas, and efficient public transport. Shenzhen’s rapid growth has prioritized economic output over livability, highlighting that success in one domain doesn’t always translate into a better user experience for residents. It is also important that to be the next Singapore, one region has to stay open to migration and be friends with most if not all in the world, which I see lacking in China. It is simply too high of a barrier to get into. Whether it is an excellent choice as an alternative to Singapore, remains a debate.

Naypyidaw, Myanmar: Poor user-centric design

Naypyidaw, Myanmar’s purpose-built capital, was designed to be a modern city like Singapore. Despite its vast highways and government buildings, it’s often described as a “ghost town.” This is a prime example of failing to design with the user in mind. In UX, understanding user needs is crucial, and Singapore does this by ensuring public spaces are accessible, services are efficient, and infrastructure supports the daily lives of residents. Naypyidaw’s failure to create a livable, engaging environment shows the importance of designing cities for real people—not just for political or aesthetic goals.

Putrajaya, Malaysia: Administrative hub, but lacking good flow

Putrajaya was built to serve as Malaysia’s new administrative capital, modeled in part on Singapore’s success. While it features impressive government buildings and parks, it lacks the livability, economic diversity, and public transport efficiency that make Singapore so successful. Putrajaya’s UX issue is its disconnection between the needs of the people who work and live there and the design of the city itself. In UX terms, it’s as if the interface looks clean and functional, but the underlying systems do not work well together to create a fluid experience.

Masdar City, UAE: Sustainability stuck in a prototype stage

Masdar City in Abu Dhabi was designed to be the world’s first carbon-neutral city, aiming to rival Singapore’s reputation for sustainability. However, delays and scaling issues have left the city stuck in a prototype stage. Singapore’s approach to sustainability is practical, integrated, and long-term. Masdar City’s failure to execute on its sustainability goals reflects a breakdown in long-term planning and user-centricity. In UX, it’s akin to launching a flashy beta product without ensuring that all the features work cohesively. People say it’s a failed project.

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Singapore’s success is not just about infrastructure—it’s about applying the core principles of good UX to every aspect of city planning and governance. Here’s how these principles manifest in Singapore’s broader success:

User-centric design – Singapore designs its systems with people in mind, whether it’s the intuitive flow of Changi Airport, the efficient public transport network, or the integration of green spaces in a dense urban environment. These aren’t just isolated wins—they are the result of thoughtful, human-centric design across the board.

Seamless experience – Like any great digital product, Singapore offers a seamless experience for its “users”—its residents and visitors. From housing to healthcare, public services to education, everything is designed to work together, minimizing friction and enhancing quality of life.

Sustainability – A good UX product isn’t just about the present but also about future-proofing. Singapore’s Green Plan 2030 and water management systems like Newater show a deep commitment to long-term sustainability, ensuring the city works for generations to come.

Efficiency – Just like efficient code in a digital product, Singapore’s governance, regulatory frameworks, and infrastructure systems are optimized for smooth operation. This isn’t achieved by accident—it’s the result of a culture that values order, planning, and precision.

Good service design – Singapore is a master of service design, ensuring that every interaction with public services, from housing applications to transport, is streamlined and user-friendly. Cities like Jakarta and Phnom Penh focus on the infrastructure “interface,” but without service design, they struggle to deliver the same level of satisfaction.

If Singapore is an example of good UX, then its success lies in its ability to apply these principles across every aspect of city life. Cities that aspire to “be the next Singapore” often focus on surface-level achievements—grand buildings, airports, and shiny infrastructure—but without understanding the deeper UX principles, they miss what truly makes Singapore work.

Becoming “the next Singapore” isn’t just about building bigger and better; it’s about adopting user-centricity, seamless integration, sustainability, and efficiency as core values. Only when cities design for the people who live in them, just like a good UX designer would for their users, can they hope to replicate Singapore’s holistic success.

So, every time you hear a big claim somewhere in the world about being the “next Singapore,” it’s likely to fail. A good city or project doesn’t boast grand claims about itself but instead focuses on working out its strategies.

Design systems are often heralded as the glue that holds a company’s design efforts together, providing consistency and scalability across products. But in large-scale companies, the very thing that is meant to streamline can, at times, become a crux—a framework so rigid it begins to stifle creativity, slow progress, or even mask deeper, more fundamental problems within the organization. Yet, this isn’t to say design systems are inherently flawed. On the contrary, they are a necessary tool, especially in environments where designers and developers work across complex, multifaceted products. The issue arises when the design system becomes the focus rather than the enabler, shifting attention from improving the user experience to maintaining rigid adherence to the system.

In large companies, design systems promise the allure of efficiency. They create a shared language between designers and developers, smoothing out collaboration and ensuring consistency. However, this promise can falter when design system teams are not fully in sync with product teams. It’s not uncommon to see friction arise because the design system evolves at a slower pace than the speed of product or business development. Product managers, in their pursuit of “quick wins” and “rapid tests,” can sometimes resist using the design system, arguing that it slows them down or complicates fast experiments. And when these quick experiments fail, the blame often circles back to the design system being non-compliant or too rigid, leading teams to roll back changes that don’t align with the system’s guidelines.

The speed at which business moves can feel like a sprint compared to the slower, deliberate evolution of a design system. While the design system team may be focused on ensuring every new component or rule is polished and thought through, product teams might be scrambling to meet deadlines or capitalize on a market opportunity. This difference in pace creates tension. Product teams may feel constrained by the system, and instead of the design system being a helpful tool, it can feel like an added layer of effort they must work around. This isn’t about neglecting the importance of consistency; it’s about recognizing that flexibility is equally vital in a fast-paced environment.

What complicates the matter further is the way design systems are often placed on a pedestal—viewed as an untouchable entity, something so precious that deviating from it becomes an organizational taboo. Teams can find themselves in an awkward situation, balancing the need for rapid product iterations with the expectation to adhere to the system. When the design system becomes too revered, it can paralyze decision-making, where every deviation is scrutinized, and every experiment must first pass through the lens of compliance. This approach, though well-intentioned, can slow down progress and, at its worst, turn the design system into a bottleneck rather than a facilitator of innovation.

The reality is that in large organizations, a design system cannot anticipate every possible use case or future need. There will be times when product teams need to break away from the system to experiment and adapt quickly. But this doesn’t mean that the system itself is failing. It simply means that the system must evolve, growing alongside the products and users it aims to serve. If teams are rolling back changes because they’re not “DS-compliant,” it may indicate that the system has reached a point where it is too rigid to accommodate the speed of business.

None of this is to say that design systems are not valuable. They remain critical for ensuring a cohesive user experience and reducing redundancy across teams. But when a system is put too high on a pedestal, it risks becoming disconnected from the realities of product development. A good design system should enable teams, not control them. It should offer guidelines but leave room for flexibility, for experimentation, and for those moments when the system needs to be questioned or adapted.

In the end, the role of a design system in a large-scale company is to support innovation while maintaining a sense of cohesion. It should be the tool that empowers product teams to move quickly without sacrificing quality, but it should also be flexible enough to evolve with the changing needs of the business. It’s about balance—creating a system that holds everything together without becoming a burden, a system that is both respected and adaptable. When this balance is struck, a design system can truly fulfill its potential, serving as the foundation for growth, not the crux that slows it down.

Ever feel like an impostor in your design career?

After years in product design, I still catch myself questioning whether I belong. It’s a constant dance between self-doubt and pushing forward—a feeling many of us know too well.

That’s why I wrote Forever an Impostor, a deeply personal memoir that pulls back the curtain on what it’s really like to work in design. It’s not a guide to becoming the perfect designer; it’s a story of resilience, navigating impostor syndrome, and finding your way in an often messy industry.

It’s been a work from at least 8 months ago, and finally I finished it.

I’m sharing this not because I have all the answers, but because I hope it makes you feel less alone on your journey. If you’ve ever wondered if you’re the only one struggling, this book is for you.

Would love for you to check it out, and if it resonates, let’s connect and chat more.

Here’s a bit of what the book is about…

Forever an Impostor isn’t just another book on design—it’s a candid collection of thoughts (and feelings) by Sigit Adinugroho, a product designer navigating the highs and lows of the design world while grappling with self-doubt, impostor syndrome, and the realities of balancing career and family. Blending personal anecdotes, professional insights, and practical advice, this book offers a heartfelt reflection on the unglamorous side of the design profession—where resilience, adaptability, and self-acceptance become key to thriving. Whether you’re an aspiring designer or a seasoned professional, Sigit’s journey provides an authentic look into the often messy yet rewarding path of a creative career.

Buy now

One price gets you three formats:

• PDF (fixed layout, with images and colors)

• ePUB (fixed layout, with images and colors)

• ePUB (text only, B/W)

What to expect

• Real stories, no sugarcoating: Dive into the reality behind the polished LinkedIn feeds and glamorous job titles. This book strips away the façade, revealing the often messy, unfiltered truth of a design career.

• Navigating impostor syndrome: Learn to manage that persistent feeling of inadequacy, regardless of your achievements. I share my ongoing struggle with impostor syndrome and how I've learned to coexist—and even thrive—with it.

• Practical insights: Whether you're starting your first job, managing a team, or simply trying to survive another day in this ever-evolving industry, you'll find advice and reflections that resonate with your experience.

• Balancing work and life: As both a father and a professional, I understand the challenges of juggling work, family, and personal well-being. This book explores the nuances of managing these priorities without losing your sense of self in the process.

Who this book is for

If you’re an aspiring product designer just getting started, a seasoned pro feeling stuck, or a design leader seeking a relatable voice, Forever an Impostor is for you. It’s a book for anyone who’s ever felt out of place in their career but keeps showing up anyway.

Previews

Here are some previews to convince you (hopefully!):

Convinced yet? If so, let me know what you think after you get it!

For Indonesians out there — watch this space, I plan to release a Bahasa Indonesia version soon enough.

Buy now

Fast forward a couple of years, and guess what? The same problems pop up again. Different people, same issues. The team decides, “Let’s do another UX audit,” as if the last one never happened. So we go through the motions again, identifying the same pain points, dusting off the same ideas that were floated years ago, maybe tweaking a few things but mostly covering old ground. It’s like living in a time loop—constantly repeating ourselves, wasting time and resources, and not actually solving anything.

You’d think we’d learn, right? But it happens again and again. Why? Part of the issue is just poor knowledge management. Things get lost. People leave, leaders change, and the collective memory fades. Those insights that once felt crucial are buried in some forgotten deck or document nobody looks at. And when new people come in, they’re not aware of what’s already been tried and tested. It’s easier to start fresh, to hit reset, than to dig through old files and find that gold we already mined.

There’s also the pressure of immediate business needs—revenue goals, strategic pivots, that new shiny thing the CEO is suddenly obsessed with. Long-term improvement projects get sidelined because they don’t fit the current narrative. So we keep the cycle going, spinning our wheels in a loop of ideation without action.

And let’s not even get started on documentation. Most of the time, findings from UX audits or research efforts get stored away in silos, disconnected from the everyday. There’s no single source of truth, no central place where past efforts are recorded and visible for everyone to build on. So, by the time someone thinks, “Hey, let’s do another round of user research,” they’re unaware that much of what they need is already there—if only anyone remembered.

So, how do we break the cycle? It starts with creating a living, breathing repository of insights—a centralized space where all past research, ideation sessions, and audits are housed. Not just a dumping ground for documents, but something dynamic, easily accessible, and regularly updated. This isn’t about nostalgia or hoarding data; it’s about continuity. It’s about being able to say, “Here’s what we learned back then; how can we build on that now?”

It’s also about integrating these past insights into the everyday workflow. This means making them part of the planning discussions, revisiting them during quarterly reviews, and actually referencing them when making decisions. Don’t just let them gather digital dust. Bring them up, question them, see if they still hold water, and figure out how they can inform the next steps. Cross-functional showcases can help here—getting teams together to share what they’ve learned and what they’re working on, so the left hand knows what the right hand is doing.

And speaking of actionable roadmaps, we need more of those and fewer lofty reports that get filed away. Every major insight should lead to a clear next step, with timelines, owners, and alignment to business goals. It’s about bridging the gap between what we discover and what we actually do. Action needs to be part of the DNA of our processes, not an afterthought.

Decision-making frameworks can help too. Tools like RICE (Reach, Impact, Confidence, Effort) or MoSCoW (Must have, Should have, Could have, Won’t have) are great for cutting through the noise and focusing on what really matters. They help bring objectivity to the process so we’re not just chasing the loudest voices or the shiniest ideas but making decisions that align with our broader goals.

But the biggest change needs to come from the culture. There’s a tendency in product teams to glorify newness—to be constantly in search of the next big thing. We need to shift that mindset to value follow-through as much as innovation. Leaders need to champion this. They need to push teams to see things through, not just to ideate but to act. And this isn’t just about accountability—it’s about creating a culture where follow-through is celebrated as much as the initial spark.

Of course, leadership changes throw a wrench in things. But even here, there’s room for improvement. When new leaders come in, there needs to be a proper handover—not just of projects, but of the knowledge that’s been gathered. It’s about keeping the momentum going rather than starting from scratch every time there’s a shake-up at the top.

At the end of the day, the goal is simple: stop the endless cycle of re-discovery and start actually doing something with all those great ideas. We’ve got to find a way to break the habit of “fire and forget” and turn those insights into impact. It’s not about doing more audits; it’s about doing something with what we already know. Let’s make sure our hard work doesn’t just sit there, gathering dust, but instead becomes the foundation we keep building on. It’s time to get out of the loop.

I always have both affinity and apprehension towards Figma, and any community events like this. For one, it feels like it’s a very sales-y event (of course, Dylan and his team would love to get more customer base in Asia Pacific), but in other side of the coin, it’s probably one of the rarest moments that designers can get together (if they are not debating on LinkedIn or design Twitter). But to be honest, it does feel good to reconvene as a community after all the layoffs that happened, and see that there are still energies going strong. I feel sorry for those who can’t attend though, for whatever reason, especially when Config only accepts registration through company emails.

As an introvert, it was strange that I felt particularly energized meeting old design friends. Not that they get older by a lot, although they actually do. In a graceful way.

Out of four people who registered in my team at Tripadvisor Singapore, only two got accepted.

The morning opened with a chit-chat at what they called “Makerspace”. This space is a reminiscence of Figjam in real life. We surely had fun going around and just putting our “marks” on the whiteboards.

Soon enough, we listened to Figma’s latest updates, as most designers are already aware of. I don’t actually have to write them here, as you can find them online easily, and on social media, where designers rave about these things (maybe a bit too much?)…

Their update brings a redesigned interface, making it more intuitive for new users and efficient for experienced ones. Enhanced AI tools are integrated throughout, with a centralized "Actions" button providing quick access to features like image generation, background removal, and text translation. Collaboration is also improved with an enhanced Dev Mode, new statuses for tracking progress, and focused views with annotations. Additional updates include performance enhancements, bug fixes, and new shortcuts, making Figma an even more powerful and versatile tool for design teams.

I am particularly more interested in Figma Slides. Figma Slides is a new feature introduced in Figma's latest update, allowing users to create interactive presentations directly within the Figma platform. It offers a seamless way to integrate designs with presentations, making the transition from design to presentation smoother and more efficient. Figma Slides offers features like templates, transitions, and live interactions, providing a powerful tool for designers to communicate their ideas effectively.

However, all these tooling and tech updates didn’t excite me too much. I felt like they’re the natural path in which Figma, as a profit-making company as it should be, should be going on.

The sessions after lunch actually brought some highlights for me.

Designing at scale

Alejandro Urrutia Daglio (Executive Manager Experience Design, Commonwealth Bank), shared on how to scale quality at an entreprise level. Working for a large bank in Australia, he surely faces different challenges than those of smaller or even medium-sized companies. He argued that the rate of the quality of a product is not parallel to the size of the company. In fact, it is the opposite. The bigger the company, the quality of the product normally suffers (or dwindles down).

To strategize for this, he argues that in larger companies, we also need to scale up the conditions that allow quality to happen.

Quality is a result of an input, then output, and an outcome.

Without going into too much details, essentially, to achieve a scalable output (and eventually outcome), we need a scalable input. This includes setting up a scaled-up criteria for success (what he calls “Expectations”), scaled-up standards or universally-accepted heuristics (“Standards”), the required specializations and skills (“Specializations”) and last but not least, the required “Culture”.

My take on this? I feel like I agree, particularly on the whys (“Expectations”) and the “Culture” part. However, I’ve seen this discussed over and over again and while the way that Alejandro outlined it sounded fresh and amazing, in reality, corporations still struggle day by day.

It does feel like a first refresh for me in the day though, after morning full of sales-y product updates.

The anti-thesis of “vanilla” design

The next one was one of the best, if not the only one, that day. Shantanu Kumar from his own skh.design, a design agency based in India, argued that the design world has come to what he coined as “vanilla-ization” of design. Design has been such a commodity, every design starts to look the “same”. The same vibe, module, layout, experience. This happens not only in identity design (his specialization), or UX, but also other sub-fields like interior design. He then showed a photo of how cafes have same aesthetics everywhere. Or how houses in the suburbs look exactly the same.

He then proceeded in outlining his process designing for a cafe brand in Sikkim, a small state in northeastern India known for its diverse culture, stunning landscapes, and rich Buddhist heritage, with the world's third-highest peak, Kangchenjunga, located on its border with Nepal. It is home to various ethnic groups including Lepchas, Bhutias, and Nepalis, and features a wide range of climates from subtropical to tundra due to its mountainous terrain.

This setting inspired him to do something different for the brand, and explored its heritage and cultural history, intertwining it with the fauna (red panda, cute!) and resulted in a brand that represents the local values best.

My take on this? While we’ve seen many culturally-inspired brands, I think this is such a refresh and a balancing act to all the tech and AI-related updates in the morning. When all directions seem to go to automation and scalability, Shantanu does it in the way that is not at all scalable, nor automated. Whatever the output and outcome, I still find strong values in his process. We should do more of this. Even in UX.

Soulful design vs regurgitation machine

I loved this one to bits. It’s a talk by Feng Zhu, a prominent concept artist and designer well-known for his work in the entertainment industry, including video games, films, and television. He has contributed to various high-profile projects and has worked with major companies like Electronic Arts, Blur Studio, and Lucasfilm.

In addition to his professional work, Feng Zhu founded the Feng Zhu Design (FZD) School of Design in Singapore in 2009. The school offers an intensive one-year diploma program focused on entertainment design, aimed at preparing students for careers in the industry. Feng Zhu is also known for sharing his knowledge and expertise through tutorials and lectures, many of which are available on his YouTube channel.

His premise is of similar nature to Shantanu’s, where design and arts have often become “soulless” because designers try to imitate based only on what they consume on screens. He also argued that many young visual artists he met do not know why they became artists. This resonates with me deeply, as I continue to ask myself questions today about why I became a designer in the first place. “Most young artists can’t answer that.”

He then suggested that every artist needs to pay more attention to the process. We can break rules and shouldn’t rush to the end. He pointed out many short-form and “listicle” videos on YouTube about steps to “become a better artist/designer,” stating that these types of content are detrimental. Real artists should learn from “the world.” He highlighted how travel made him a better designer, mentioning trips to places like Egypt to learn about Egyptian mythology. He invested a significant amount of time in “learning the world,” which he found immensely beneficial.

I also love his stance on “not changing.” He loved airplanes as a boy, and that passion continues to inspire his work. Now, he even has a pilot's license and flies his own airplanes.

The best part of his talk? His take on AI. He explained that AI “regurgitates” information without processing (thinking, feeling) it. Similarly, humans are fed information, and if we don’t think and feel about it, we become just like AI, merely regurgitating what we consume. To beat AI in the future, we must be more than “regurgitation machines.”

Some other highlights

I think the main theme of the day was AI versus (or rather, coexisting with) design and humanity.

Here is a collection of quotes and insights:

• Isha Hening, a visual artist, on how AI helped her work, “I use it to scale up rendering on 50K screens, something that would’ve been costlier on render farms. I use AI just to do the boring work, so we can have the fun work.”

• Jordan Singer, the designer at Figma, argued that AI should be “Augmented Imagination”, and that this age will not be the downfall of artists and designers, instead a “renaissance”. Think of AI as a way to elevate our process and think more strategically.

• Dylan Field, CEO of Figma: “Our tech actually lets you do and explore more designs. The world is evolving, so is our tooling. I don’t see a world where AI replaces us, but I see a world where AI helps us elevate it.”

• Katja Forbes (Head of Client Experience, Standard Chartered Bank): “The way we see AI willl influence banking and finance is that we’ll implement it very intentionally.” She means that essentially AI will not be there just because it can be there. It has to help the customers and/or the business.

• Ryan Singer, designer and author of “Shape Up”, as quoted by Alejandro: “Best is in relation to your constraints.”

• Alejandro Urrutia (Executive Manager Experience Design, Commonwealth Bank): “Having a good design system does not guarantee good product, it only expedites the potential for it.” (But yes, it’s still potential.)

• Meng To (designer author) who recently moved to Singapore, highlighted how designer and developer roles are blurring with how design tools are now enabling designers to foray into testing their ideas or even implementing them. What I like about him is that how he still thinks design as a craft that’s very close to designer’s heart, highlighting the evolution of design tools and how “creating” has not changed meaning over time.

• Gumpita Rahayu, typographer, highlighted how typography still matters in UX because 70% of the screen experience is text. He then pointed out how some types have problems rendering on Figma in which the ascender and descender are not aligned thus making some type nudged down vertically. This is not Figma problem. This is more of the type problem, hence he proposed that designers also care about selecting typefaces that are designed especially for screens. The future for typography for digital is flexible typography.

Conclusion

I have a strange relationships with Figma and design conferences. At one side, I love catching up with industry’s latest, and tech’s latest. I also love rekindling relationships with fellow designer friends, particularly those I had the fortunate change to work together with. I think face-to-face design conferences that gather us all regardless of niche is rare these days, especially in Asia Pacific. Singapore is such a sweet spot where everyone in Asia can come without hesitation — it’s event-friendly and visa-friendly for most. I cherish the moment.

At one other side, I think this just yet another sales-y, hype-driven event. Half of the day is kinda something I can learn online by reading Figma’s website or following people’s hypes on social media (and there’s a whole bunch of them).

Also, I get tired and bored about people hyping for AI.

That is why I am more inclined towards the afternoon sessions when they are kind of “anti-AI” and “anti-tooling”, more like exploring ourselves as a human again. Isha Hening, visual artist, when asked about how she explored ideas, “Well, I just look at my surrounding, for example how the light hits some materials, or the food I eat.” That is just wonderful. No taking inspiration from Youtube and screens? That’s rare.

Learning about autolayouts and preparing efficient Figma files is one thing but it doesn’t say anything more about how to think and feel. This, I feel, something that we have to nurture more. I hope AI does help do the autolayouts stuff, so that we can detach components… once in a while… and focus on the fun stuff.

Thanks for reading.

Bonus: the misaligned shape on Figma’s motion graphic: