"The ability to publish anything, anytime, anywhere, to anyone, is a world-historic shift.” – Clay Shirky

Good things permalink

Andrew Keen was right permalink

I recently received a call from an old friend, Juliano Spyer (Juca), who is an excellent conversationalist, writer, and anthropologist. I’ve had the chance to hang out with him several times in São Paulo and London. He’s such a fantastic person to talk to, always full of exciting stories. One of the key lessons I’ve learned from Juca is how to effectively share your thoughts on the web.

Most people might be surprised to learn that I used to be shy and nervous when speaking in front of audiences. That changed after working with Juca and other talented people at Talk2. While we worked together, Juca led a project called Talk Show, a podcast where we interviewed “digital” personalities. It was recorded live on Twitter, using clever hacks to capture Skype calls, broadcast them, and handle questions—something easily done with apps today.

Many of those episodes are lost now—it’s been over 15 years! But I managed to recover a quote from an episode where Juca interviewed Andrew Keen.

At the time, Andrew was promoting his book The Cult of the Amateur, which critiques the impact of user-generated content on society. You can still listen to the entire episode (skip the first five minutes if you don’t understand Portuguese), but I want to share a specific quote about the web and business models:

“Clay Shirky and I are friends, and it’s interesting because many people think we disagree on most things. We agree on most things. He’s right. And he’s coming closer to my position. Because the assumption three or four or five years ago was that old media would die and be painlessly replaced by new media—this massive seismic shift from newspapers to bloggers, from the movie or television business to YouTubers. And that hasn’t happened. In my book, I argued that the old was dying, but nothing new was replacing it. And that’s even truer today. Old media is in crisis. Still, no viable business models exist to build new media companies.”

Clay Shirky’s point, which Andrew referenced, relates to the idea of value generated by communities. Shirky argues that:

“the absence of a business model actually allowed the creation of a value that the presence of a business model prevented.”

It’s fascinating to reflect on how this conversation has aged. We now face different risks and benefits, many of which we couldn’t have imagined back in 2009. I was always optimistic about the web, so I was leaning on Shirky's side. But now, in reflection, I can see that Keen was spot on. Erosion of quality, misinformation and the cultural devaluation -- all the things he was concerned in 2007 became incontestable aspects of using the web in 2024.

On top of that, the reckless use of our personal data for profit, and the complete inability of opting out of the algorithmic recommendations... It's hard to keep the optimism. But we keep swimming.

I still see writing and sharing great content as a way to be generous with the web community you serve. Over time, it creates value that isn’t necessarily tied to financial metrics. And I believe it's also a personal statement: we share, because we (still) can. And everyone should be nurturing their own web properties. It's a small part of this idea of Rewilding the Internet and core to the philosophy of the Indieweb.

I do it because I believe in fostering serendipity and human connection. Because I still inspired by the cluetrain manifesto. Conversations are still essentially a human thing and that we can and should nurture.

Sometimes, it feels like sending a message in a bottle—unsure of where it will land or who it will reach. But when it does find its way, the connections that form are invaluable.

Learned things permalink

Maslow and the Blackfoot permalink

I've been researching the topic of "user needs". I'm using ironic quotes here as I find the term extremely reductive. In my research, I was reading the famous "A Theory of Human Motivation" paper by Abraham Maslow. Maslow is well known for his Hierarchy of Needs. But according to this amazing article, Maslow himself never thought about his hierarchy of needs as a pyramid. And that his theories were probably influenced by the Siksika Blackfoot way of life.

"According to Blood and Heavy Head’s lectures (2007), 30-year-old Maslow arrived at Siksika along with Lucien Hanks and Jane Richardson Hanks. He intended to test the universality of his theory that social hierarchies are maintained by dominance of some people over others. However, he did not see the quest for dominance in Blackfoot society. Instead, he discovered astounding levels of cooperation, minimal inequality, restorative justice, full bellies, and high levels of life satisfaction."

I am always impressed with the wisdom of the First Nations. The key lesson in the article is the communal aspect of fulfilling needs. More on user needs and this research in the end of this post.

Things that bring me joy permalink

Swimming permalink

I never thought I would appreciate swimming that much, but here we are. With 40 degrees in Valencia, it's becoming a good habit with positive effects on my health. Sometimes I am feeeling adventurous and I go to Malvarrosa. Be in the water, my friend.

Web Designing permalink

Working with Leili on her food styling business has been a joy. This week we redesigned her website. After using markdown and eleventy for years, it was quite hard to get used to Wordpress blocks and all those bells and whistles. But it's live, we moved out of Squarespace. And now we're ready for the next stage: evolving the content, localization. And the marketing strategy. Onward.

Top 3 links permalink

The neuroscience of trust In “The Neuroscience of Trust,” Paul J. Zak breaks down how trust is the secret sauce for boosting employee engagement, productivity, and retention. He says companies that build trust see big wins—like 50% more productivity and 76% more engagement. Zak’s research highlights eight trust-building moves for managers.

Abductive reasoning in research In product, we always discuss the topic of evidence-based decision making. But teams learn in different ways, and all thinking tools are welcome. This definition of abductive reasoning and how it compares to inductive and deductive reasoning is refreshing:

"Abductive reasoning is a logical process where one starts with an observation and then seeks the simplest and most likely candidate explanations. Unlike other forms of reasoning that start with a theory or observation that cannot be explained by any existing theory, abductive reasoning begins with an unexpected fact or occurrence and works backward-and-forward to find the most plausible theory."

Perceiving Needs Professor Rolf Faste explored the same question I have: the difference between needs and wants. The paper is from 1987! This quote about how the discovery of needs impact the health of the teams is epic:

"A clearly defined need also attracts talent and provides motivation for employees. Thus needs are not just a sales issue, but significantly affect the entire health of the organization. Just as they do for students, good problems generate energy: they attract the best people and the best efforts of the entire organization"

"Wherever you go, go with all your heart” – Confucius

Good things permalink

Hola Valencia! permalink

It's my second month living in Valencia next Monday. Moving out of London after eight years was not an easy decision. I miss my friends there, the design community and the art. But Valencia it's growing in my heart in a way I was not expecting. Besides the Kafkaesque experience of obtaining my working visa. I feel confident about this decision, particularly after the recent riots in the UK.
Living near the beach was always something I dreamed of. I am not dipping in the Mediterranean Sea with the frequency I need. But just the possibility of riding my bike to Malvarrosa whenever I want makes me smile. Another quality-of-life improvement is having friends who care for you living within walking distance. We are so lucky to have Lady Cabanyal and Don Bumface (not using their real names to protect their privacy) to hang out frequently. Their help navigating the Spanish bureaucracy and learning about the local culture made all the difference. Learning Spanish, a language that I never had any curiosity before, has been good. It has many similarities with old Brazilian Portuguese. It is poetic, rich and sometimes fun. I am impressed with the locals, they are usually warm and receptive. Even when I torture them with my portuñol.

Working in healthcare permalink

This week I am completing six months working for Docplanner. It has been a joy to work in a scale-up again.

I was assigned to lead a strategic initiative as soon as I joined. I worked so hard — like I hadn’t for long. Since it was a greenfield opportunity, there was little internal knowledge about the people we were designing for. I was responsible for the research strategy, conducted all interviews and user testing with dynamic prototypes. Using Indi Young’s Listening Sessions method was so helpful. I listened to a group of inspiring women in Brazil and learned so much about what/how/why healthcare is still so hard for so many.

We sprinted. We tested. We argued. I feel people are excited about the learnings and the challenges. I am quite optimistic.

More recently, I have been focusing my time on my small but mighty design team. They are spread over 3 countries: Poland, Spain and Germany. All of them are lovely, talented and unique.

I already have people I can call friends at work. A good start.

Learned things permalink

Doing great work matters permalink

This year, I am trying to balance resting, healing and creating good stuff. Doing great stuff in my free time feels awesome. Creative work warms my heart. Writing, teaching, consulting, mentoring, hacking.

The first time I thought about this I started to teach professionally. I joined the Experience Haus team to teach Service Design. I recently finished my fourth cohort teaching online, which was rewarding. I am teaching the same course in November, and there are a few spots available and the full information in the Experience Haus website. I am also have been invited to create a voice interface training this summer. I have done something similar before in portuguese, with the mentorship of my friend Ben Sauer.

But the creative endeavour I am more excited about now is Secret Flavours. I am an assistant photographer, marketer, salesperson, UX intern, and commis. This week we had two sessions where people tested our menu. The three course menu, inspired by Bahia, was crowned by a Moqueca Baiana. Moqueca is a fish stew with a brazilian twist. Some say it's similar to a light curry. Reviews are positive, but there is some work to do. Marketing and selling experiences is not an easy task.

Leili is the owner and head chef. Her creativity and culinary talent and creativity are a gift to the world that needs to be shared. She is also the love of my life, my muse, and everything for me.

Things that bring me joy permalink

Souza's are winning around the world permalink

Bia Souza smashed Brazil’s first gold medal this week. It was her first time competing in the Olympic games. While that might seem insignificant to many, it struck a chord with me, and I cried joyfully. When I was a kid, I trained judo for 6 months, and I loved.

Bia’s father, Poseidonio, is a former judo athlete. Inspired by him, Bia has practised judo since she was seven years old. When she was a kid, she was uncomfortable with her body, and Judo helped her to build confidence.

She won many medals before but not in the Olympic Games. In Tokyo, Maria Suelen Altheman, now her coach, beat her, and she was not selected for the games. And now she got there and rocked our world.

Bia is the perfect example of Brazilian grit and resilience.

Like 80% of the Brazilian athletes in Paris, Bia is supported by a government grant created by President Lula in 2004.

I can’t stop thinking about how these fantastic black women are. The role models the new generations need.

Healthcheck permalink

Diabetes is under control. Mental Health is ok.

Weight: 93 kg

Food: The quality of the food in Spain is astounding. The tomatoes, fruits, cheeses. I am eating healthy as I can.

Drinks: Had a few non-alcoholic beers and some wine this month.

Top 3 links permalink

Occupational health and safety management — Psychological health and safety at work — Guidelines for managing psychosocial risks There is an ISO Standard for psychological safety and I find that fascinating. It talks about wellbeing at work, psychosocial risks and how to identify hazards and minimize the risks associated with them. It's a shame it's under a paywall, but that is why we have Anna's Archive.

How to go on an information Diet

"Information is a drug. From an evolutionary perspective, it makes sense: the more information our ancestors had, the more likely they were to survive. But this is the first time in history that humans have been exposed to such a constant flow of information. And in the same way the superabundance of high-calorie foods has led to obesity, this new information overload encourages overconsumption".

Anne-Laure is so smart!

Content Operations: The Invisible Scaffold You Can’t Live Without This article it's an interesting introduction to the topic. It's focused on Marketing, so it doesn't cover the complexities of global product teams. On this topic, the book Content Operations at Scale is more helpful. If you are into podcasts, listen this episode Defining Content Operations with my dear Content Empress, Rahel Bailie, who wrote the first chapter.

Top 3 links permalink

How to disagree with someone more powerful than you I'm not a fan of HBR content, but Amy Gallo deserves your attention.

He killed something beautiful Jason wrote a beautiful eulogy about the Twitter design team and their contributions. Space Karen killed something important.

Addressing Arguments Against Facial Expressions of Emotion Computer vision and machine learning have improved, and many people have discussed applications to detect emotions based on facial expressions. Dr. David Matsumoto attempts to address some of the arguments against that.

Good things permalink

Do what you love. permalink

The last time I updated my LinkedIn profile, people sent the usual congrats and comments. But one person asked me privately why I have changed jobs so frequently. That question haunted me for months. I have been in this industry for over two decades and have never experienced this speed of change.

Reflecting on my colleague's inquiry, I've been thinking about whether we, as a society, need to adjust our expectations about what a stable career is. An office-based, 9-5, with a 5-year tenure in the same company, is different from the norm these days. We live in a VUCA, post-COVID, AI-supported world.

I am resilient, but sometimes changing is for the best. With time, I have learned to be confident in my decisions and my ability to spot when the conditions are favourable. Or when I can influence change.

I have my mind clear, and my purpose hasn't changed. Every day, when I wake up, I think about that one great thing I will design with my people. Most of the time, I will support and inspire the conditions and conversations for teams to thrive. I am often hands-on, leading by example or trying to be more precise and helpful, showing the thing instead of talking about the thing. Some people call this being a "player-coach". My superpower is to connect designers/writers/researchers/engineers so they can deliver excellent work - I know how to do many things relatively well, but the player-coach definition might be misleading.

I am empowered at this career stage to choose better. The adventure of finding a new job (or doing something different) just started. Am I afraid? Definitely yes. The market is challenging these days. But I am also excited, at the top of my game. Onward.

• I am using WeWork's motto ironically, of course.

Facilitation and Butter permalink

Anamaria Dorgo is the Head of Community at Butter and the most curious person I know. She is always inviting me for cool stuff. We share this infinite love for understanding collaboration. Last year, she asked me to join Butter's first Bootcamp, a week of talks about facilitation - one of the core tools you can use to rethink group collaboration. But my talk was more straightforward and more focused on the basics.

The title was Don’t Leave Anything to Chance: Plan Your Sessions in Butter. There was a bit of theory about the stages of planning workshops and a basic framework to schedule any session. The participants tried the framework live, and I heard people liked it very much. If you want to learn a tried and tested framework to plan workshops, you are in for a treat. It's like a Crash Course on planning and leading a workshop. I hope you enjoy it.

Conference circuit permalink

Since my last post, I have attended Figma Config, where I had the pleasure of seeing Jack Roles and Brice Fontaine showing our work at Farfetch integrating design systems, operations, and user research. Another IRL highlight event I attended was the first in-person IXDA meet-up after three years. Meeting Sophie Gendron, Boon Chew, Jason Mesut and Niclas Ljungjberg. Territory Studio's excellent work in sci-fi interfaces, car interaction design and motion was inspiring. It was fantastic to see some friends and see great work.
This week, I attended the AI and Society Forum, part of the AI Fringe programme. Rachel Coldicutt and her team at Careful Industries / Promising Trouble rocked my world with a beautiful community event. In the first keynote, legendary Abeba Birhane explained the issues with AI and racism. Abeba is a cognitive scientist, and I have followed her work for years. And like a genuine fanboy, I asked her to autograph my credentials and take a picture.

Speaking and giving back permalink

I have also had the chance to speak at IRL conferences this year. Last March, Patrizia Bertini invited me to join a panel with Peter Boesma, Anna Wojcieszczak and others at the Design Operations London conference to discuss the impact of DesignOps. The panel title was How to Introduce and Position DesignOps in Your Organisation to Maximise the Impact. Lovely Zoe Seaman also presented on the same day. Next Tuesday, I will speak at the Innovation Conference. It's the most significant innovation conference in Latin America, with more than 6000 people attending online and about 2000 in Brasilia. I was one of the conference curators, covering service design and inclusive design. I convinced Daniel Burka, Stéphanie Krus, and Anamaria to share their brilliance remotely. I will be moderating a panel about inclusive design. And co-facilitating a workshop about designing voice services with Janaína Pereira. I am excited to return to my home country with such a meaningful contribution. After the conference, I will be travelling to Belo Horizonte to relax, visit my family and eat lots of great food.

Learned things permalink

Learning, teaching, liberating permalink

I am teaching my second cohort at Experience Haus. It's a small team of 6 designers learning Service Design. Before accepting the invite, I wondered whether that made sense. And in that search for meaning, I learned so much about learning. Paulo Freire's Critical Pedagogy transformed my thinking on teaching, and I am still inspired by it. I am learning things about service design that I have never thought about before. I am capturing some learnings in my new digital garden: sd notes

Things that bring me joy permalink

Leili, AKA little bird. permalink

It was a sweltering day in Brasilia, Brazil. My life was very different at that time. I was young, louder, stronger. And I was dating a girl from my home state. She lived with her adorable auntie, but we were spending a lot of time together. I honestly already knew she was the one from the get go. A few months later, impulsively, I asked her to marry me. Over twitter. About 13 years ago, on the first of April. We celebrate this milestone by travelling to Cabo Verde in March.

Every day, I think how lucky I am to have Leili in my life.

Healthcheck permalink

Overall, I am ok. My diabetes is under control. I am still using continuous glucose monitoring, but things are better. I have lost some weight, and I am slowly coming back to exercising.

Weight: 91 kg Blood pressure: 12/8 Food: I'm trying to eat fewer and fewer carbs, but Gail's Bakery is in my life. Drinks: Not drinking for months, except for extraordinary occasions.

Quote permalink

"Empowerment is a necessary step because we’ve been accustomed to disempowerment. Empowerment is needed to undo all those top-down, do-what-you’re-told, be-a-team-player messages that result from our leader-follower model... What we need is release or emancipation. Emancipation is fundamentally different from Empowerment. With emancipation, we are recognising the inherent genius, energy, and creativity in all people and allowing those talents to emerge. We realise that we don’t have the power to give these talents to others or “empower” them to use them, only the power to prevent them from coming out. Emancipation results when teams have been given decision-making control and have the additional characteristics of competence and clarity. You know you have an emancipated team when you no longer need to empower them. Indeed, you no longer have the ability to empower them because they are not relying on you as their source of power."

L. David Marquet and Stephen R. Covey, Turn the Ship Around!

I am facilitating a workshop: Unblocking Asynchronous Creativity. I will be sharing my journey learning about facilitation and the shift to remote and asynchronous ways of working.

Preet, the conference organiser, freaked me out. He said that there will be probably more than 200 people attending. I know how to navigate the Dunning-Kruger rollercoaster, but I confess I am bit nervous.

Not because of the crowd. I have delivered keynotes to hundreds of people before, but in Portuguese. And this will not be my first gig speaking in English to a big audience. Last year I talked about Design Operations at the first DesignOps Assembly event in London. And the year before, when we used to gather in real life, I was invited for two Design Leadership panels by the kind folks from Clearleft. It was packed, and I think it went fine.

But this is the first time I am sharing something I am not so confident in my skills: Asynchronous ways of working. I work remotely for years now, but async is a new game. And while I was researching for the talk I could not find a lot of information about this. But with or without the anxiety, I am doing this. Impostor syndrome and stage fright: bugger off, you are not welcome. Something that makes smile is that my brilliant partner, Leiliane, is gonna be one of my co-facilitators. She has this ability of calming me.

Yesterday we run the beta version of the workshop. I had the privilege of having some cool cats from my team at Farfetch, a few friends and the part of DEX01 team attending. It was great because now I know exactly what to change. I failed miserably with tooling and the timing was not right, so I have to edit myself.

I haven’t finished the workshop design and the talk yet. But I decided to write today and share this post as a Goodie Bag with a thank you note for the nice people that helped me yesterday.

The five people bellow inspired me for this talk. They not only deserve the credit, but my gratitide. I had the opportunity to learn with them because they all work in the opne, creating valuable content.

Alison Coward permalink

Alison’s work is focused on finding the balance between creativity, productivity and collaboration. Her Messy Middle framework clarifies the complexity of creating good workshops. A Pocket Guide To Effective Workshops was the first book I bought about the topic. And she was the one that inspired me to learn about facilitation.

Goodie: She created a free assessment tool so you can understand your team collaboration practices.

Priya Parker permalink

Author of the classic book The Art of Gathering: How We Meet and Why it Matters, Pryia also hosts the podcast Together Apart. She is a pioneer in the field, and her work explores what makes remarkable gatherings.

Goodie: She recently created a free guide that updates her book to the hybrid era

Daniel Stillman permalink

Conversation Designer, speaker and facilitator, Daniel recently wrote Good Talk - How to Design Conversations that matter. His Conversation OS Canvas helped me to think about the components of a good conversation. His human approach to facilitation is unique. Daniel changed my life last year when I attended one of his facilitation labs. I have a stick note in my office with something he said that resonates with me every day.

Goodie: His newsletter is just great. You get access to a treasure trove of tools and information. The facilitator hats series is fun and insightful.

Anamaria Borgo permalink

She is the Head of Community at Butter. Butter is my fave facilitation tool and the right thing to do if you are not stuck in Zoom, Bluejeans or Google Meet for compliance reasons. I was a beta-tester and this is how I met Anamaria. She works on the intersection of learning, community management and facilitation. I recently joined two incredible communities of practice where she shows her magic every day: L&D Shakers and Butter Community.

Goodie: Butter Community is definitely the place to be if you want to improve your facilitation skills for free.

Dr Myriam Hadnes permalink

Founder of the dutch consultancy workshops.work, Dr Myriam hosts an incredible podcast. Episode #1, about Human Connection, inspired the part of my talk that I like most.

Goodie: This beautiful map of all podcast episodes and related facilitation techniques and questions.

You should definitely follow all of them. Later on, I will extend this list.

And if you want to know more about tools, I highly recommend this article by the folks at Session Lab.

There is still a lot to do, but it was an exciting side project, and I had help from a brilliant bunch of people. The new layout is live since August, with the same content and new features.

I can wait to get some feedback and iterate. Onward.

Top 3 links

Teach Slower to Teach Better

Jon Kolko is a designer and founder of the Austin Center for Design. As I am more and more interested in education and learning, I found this article about how designers learn and the issue of quality versus speed. Jon is a prolific writer and you definitely should visit his site.

Cancel your meetings

Phil Libin is the founder of mmhmm - a tool that aims to transform video meetings and presentations. In this talk, he explores the value of asynchronous updates. There is also an interesting point about the speed we process information these days.

How to Foster Participation

Inayaili De León shares a lot of wisdom in her 2018 talk at the Design Systems London conference. Build a style guide, and the essential component library is way easier than making a living design system. This work is more complicated, unpredictable. There is no such thing as the right way of doing things, but some good practices always help.

Good things permalink

First 90 days permalink

When I joined my current job I bought this book "The First 90 days". It was heplful to plan my activities during the probation, and a lesson in finding the balance of learning new things and reusing existing knowledge. I feel more connected with the world of luxury and fashion, and I understand how self-expression and style is important for people. I know a lot more about our design org context and achievements.

The support I am getting from the team and the design leadership is excellent, and having this great chap called Justin to call boss is a privilege. So yes, I am happy and excited for the next quarter.

Workshops, love and productive conflict permalink

When I joined, there was a process in place for strategic design work. It’s an innovative approach that intertwines research and sprint activities smoothly. My first mission at the company was to improve part of this process. It was not my first time working with custom sprints and complex programs related to innovation.

But I was changing the process while planning the next initiative, which is not an ideal approach. In the end, it worked really well.

During the planning activities, I was lucky to work with Deborah Nogueira, a long time friend and talented designer. She led an interesting piece on inspiration and competitive analysis. With the right cross-polination with research insights, everything was ready for the hard work to start.

I had to join the incredible team of 5 designers in the sprint itself. It was our first pilot with a lot of changes, and a relatively new group.

I was in charge of the facilitation and planning, working with a Head of Design, a Principal and a Lead Researcher. Together we learned a lot about storytelling, async work, cadence and improvisation of ideation activities.

In some moments I did a bit of hands-on work as well, which was something extraordinary for me. Design Operations work can be tedious sometimes. I frequently miss the simplicity and the joy of delivering design work.

Two weeks ago we had a retrospective about this work. The feedback about facilitation, structure, and energy was very positive. Product leaders and the team were also pretty happy with the outcomes. Feedback from users was positive.

Another good outcome of this work was to have time working more closely with Paddy, one of our Principals. I shared with him some facilitation tricks and we tested new tools and methods to improve collaboration and equal participation in workshops.

Psychological safety, love, and a bit of productive conflict are core ingredients for quality design work. I am happy to say we delivered the work and changed the process significantly with great success. Now it's time to document, iterate and prepare for the next one.

A lens a day #42 - slow change permalink

Wonderful Dan Brown invited me to a chat about Information Architecture. Dan is one of the luminaries in the IA Community and founder of Eightshapes, an American design consultancy. His book Communicating Design helped me a lot a decade ago and.

He created IA Lenses, a deck with 51 cards to help practitioners with perspective when designing information architecture. Recently, he decided to invite Information Architects around the world to discuss the lenses in a video series that is also available as a podcast.

The topic we talked about was slow change, which I was honestly not prepared to talk about. But with great interviewing skills and low expectations, Dan put me at ease at the beginning of the call. We touched on topics like agile, service design and the opportunity to apply IA in a holistic context to enable sustainable change. The interview was recorded during my holidays. The video quality is not great but the audio is quite good.

Learned Things permalink

Meaning is pain permalink

Like many of you, I have lost important people in my life. My best friend and three grandparents and are the ones I am still mourning. And all happened before the pandemic. Mainly because I didn't have the opportunity to say goodbye properly. In July, Fabio Palamedi, a mentor and friend died of Covid. Right now, the last of my grandparents alive, Atilia, is in the hospital. Accepting death and the end of things is something I struggle with.

All of this makes me think a lot about finding happiness. At work, at life, in my relationships. Besides being a self-proclaimed pissed-off optimist, I confess that I have been overwhelmed recently.

Stupidity, prejudice and politics are now hurting or killing the ones I love more frequently. The situation in Brazil is out of control. Staying happy in my privilege bubble while the world falls apart isn’t easy. The ebbs and flows of doom and optimism are insanely hard for my mental health.

Helena, my therapist, is helping me to cope with these dilemmas. It might sound like a truism, but here it is: everything that carries meaning will definitely bring painful moments. If change is the only thing that remains constant, pain is the sidekick.

If you are interested in digging into this, perhaps you will find some joy and reflection reading this post from Scientific American.

The great resignation and communication breakdown permalink

Everyone is talking about the great resignation. Corporations are struggling to provide a sense of safety and fair participation to employees in regard to the decisions on remote work.

It baffles me that in 2021 we are still having discussions about this. It’s not that hard, really. Policy change is a service design challenge — it feels we have learned nothing about how governments handled the COVID catastrophe. (Kudos to Jacinta and New Zealand, the only country that really nailed it)

Even Apple is having trouble. This article published today at Vox is enlightening: it explains so much about the arrogance that comes with power and what is really behind these decisions.

Perhaps the only FAANG that is not having so much problems on this arena is Facebook. Since June, they acted fast and opened the work at home policy to all employees after trying to enforce some rules in May. Perhaps it is because they have way bigger issues to deal with it in terms of reputation.

The back story of the war on global talent and retention is that sad, really. Millions making bad decisions and a communication breakdown. Changes in how we work are happening fast, and leadership and management teams aren’t able to cope with that speed.

I am navigating this theme carefully and doing what I can. Having honest conversations with my team and learning more and more about asynchronous work. We have plenty of possibilities and ways of solving this charade. But the solutions will require flexibility and a new approach. And better communication and transparency, of course.

Things that bring me joy permalink

Late summer in Crete permalink

I had burn-out and got really sick the last march, so these things took a toll in my health. A few weeks ago, I was stressed and really tired. Leili, my lovely partner, noticed the changes in my mood and behaviour and intervened.

She gifted us with a holiday week in Greece. In a place that up to now is my favourite in Europe, Chania. We had terrific days enjoying good food and a real summer. I spent a many hours reading Nick Scalding books and listening to music. Soaking in the beach, breathing fresh air and sipping orange juice. I can’t wait for the next one.

Another visit to the office permalink

Thursday, I visited the office again, and I’ve met people from Product for the first time. It was nice to see them in 3D, taking some selfies, having some tea, high fives and hugs. It was a joy to find out we have a design library and having lunch with Justin and Rufus was great.

Leili’s book permalink

My wife just finished her first book, Cheiro Verde. It's a recipe book with a pinch of romance: a celebration of her family talent and the traditions from Minas Gerais. I’ve had the pleasure to eat 90% of all recipes, and I have to say: it’s all delicious. Now the plan is to help her with the printing production and marketing. She is aiming to launch this year in Brasil. One of the recipes of the book it’s available in English: you can learn how to bake Cheese bread, one of the classics of her cuisine.

Healthcheck permalink

Many things have happened in this area since my last post in June. I had another diabetes review, with some improvement in how I am managing the condition. On the other hand, long COVID is still a thing for me. I went through heart exams, blood samples, audiologists and many consultations. The same old weird shit is still affecting me eventually: parosmia, fatigue and tinnitus. But the heart palpitations are gone and I am really relieved.

- Weight: 98 kg

- Blood pressure: 13/9

- Food: We had great and healthy food this week

- Drinks: No alcohol since August.

Quote of the week permalink

None of us, including me, ever do great things. But we can all do small things, with great love, and together we can do something wonderful.” – Mother Teresa.

This week pop 3 links

An NDA Was Designed to Keep Me Quiet George Aye's piece about his time at IDEO was quite shocking. I am sure thousands have had similar experiences but are silent. This piece by Ifeoma Ozoma on non-disclosure agreements is powerful. She shines a light on the gap in our legal systems to protect victims of abuse in the workplace.

Sci-Fi & Me Stay Curious Café Jeremy Keith's love letter to science fiction is beautiful. I am a sci-fi enthusiast, but it was the first time I could understand the different categories. My book backlog is now complete for the next decade.

The Nexialist approach Cleu Oliver, a friend from Brazil, introduced me to the concept of Nexialism. If you struggled before with the binary discussions about specialist versus generalists you gonna love this article.

Nexialism is the science of joining in an orderly fashion the knowledge of one field of learning with that of other fields.

Good things permalink

Starting a new job permalink

I started in my new role about three weeks ago. I will be leading the Design & Research Operations practice at Farfetch. I received offers from tech companies and design studios. But the decision to join Farfetch was based on two things: the culture and my manager, Justin Stach.

Because it is a Portuguese-British company, there is a fascinating mix of people and cultures. What I noticed during my first few days is that people seem to take the values seriously. The one I like most is Todos Juntos.

Act for the greater good of all teams, even when it's beyond your area of expertise. Foster positive actions in those around you, and celebrate our shared achievements.

I first met Justin for the first time in 2018. We had coffee at Ozone, a hipster place in the Old Street area. We kept chatting on Twitter, and since that first catch-up, we had sporadic calls on Google Meet. Justin curiosity is infinite, which is a characteristic I appreciate in managers. I love this post he wrote a few years ago about accessibility at Tesco. With a great manager, you will normally find an amazing team. My first weeks have been smooth. The onboarding experience was reasonable, considering it was fully remote. I've met 60% of the team in 1-1's already. I am confident, energized and already trying to make things better. One small minimal viable improvement at time.

The ones that you don't forget permalink

A positive lens of leaving a job is that you always keep some of the people you met as friends for life. I feel so privileged to have worked with so many talented people in my previous employments. Naming a few would be unfair.

Yet, two of them made extra efforts for my growth in my last tenure. They also supported me when things weren't easy: Jane Austin and Fred Warburton.

Jane was one of the best managers I ever had. Working with Jane is like attending an MBA in resilience, positivity and team culture. One of the things I learned with Jane that changed me is the concept of trusting people upfront.

The other unforgettable one: Fred Warburton. We joined together, and we became friends in the first week. He is a beacon of work ethics and competence. We worked together one year and a half, and I learned loads with him. He made me fall in love with accessibility and inclusive design.

Learned things permalink

The lost art of good feedback permalink

Mindaugas Petrutis is Program Director at OnDeck Design, a revolutionary co-hort based education program for design leaders. He asked me to share my learnings about feedback with a community of design leaders. Inappropriate and biased feedback derailed my career twice. The invitation was an opportunity to deep dive into the subject. Teaching always forces me to learn with more focus and depth.

Part of my research was reading Radical Candor by Kim Scott for the second time. Another source of inspiration was Lauren Currie's work on Stride. The result was a 90-minute workshop: Feedback Dojo.

A group of brave designers joined me in a Miro board to discuss and practice feedback. During one of the activities, we discussed times where they experienced destructive feedback. I was in shock as I didn't know it was so common, particularly for women. My plan now is to run a new version of this activity with other design teams. For now, here is my curation of simple tips for effective feedback.

Golden Rules of Feedback

• Ask for permission and respect the personal context.
• Vet your feedback - fair, humble, unbiased
• Be factual (Situation, Behaviour, Implication)
• Be timely – provide feedback as close as possible to the time of the exhibited behaviour.
• Use descriptive language over evaluative. Avoid generalizations
• Isolate feedback from advice
• Focus on the future

Things I've learned permalink

Not a Sprint, but a marathon permalink

Absorbing tons of information to make sense of things is part of my praxis. Perhaps it is because of years of experience as an Information Architect. I was often surprised in the final stage of the project with a pack of new content or a new department.

However, collecting complex information can have a considerable mental cost. Listening to different perspectives for long periods can be draining. I felt overwhelmed at the end of my first week, a sign that I needed to be more mindful about my pace and slow down.

The first 90 days permalink

Before joining, Justin Stach recommended the book The First 90 Days: Proven Strategies for Getting Up to Speed Faster and Smarter. It's a classic that helps people to accelerate their learning in their first months at work.

The book contains many obvious things, but I was surprised by how many times I forgot about the basics. An important reminder in the book is to be mindful of your learning strategies. The risk assessment tool is beneficial.

Perception and Psychological safety permalink

Alla Weinberg interview with Jorge Arango at The Informed Life was quite revealing for me. She talked about work culture and explained many new concepts. Neuroception, for instance, is the subconscious system for detecting threats. I knew how our brain triggers fight and flight reactions. But I never thought of the cognitive costs of feeling unsafe. A bit of Alla's talk in the podcast:

"I found in research that our operating IQ — so our ability to think, to analyze, to be creative, to form, you know, rational thoughts — drops by half. So, if my normal operating IQ is, let's say, at a hundred points, when I don't feel safe in an environment, it drops to 50. And this is, again, a very human biological thing because our body and our brain will take resources away from our frontal cortex, which is where we think, and it will redistribute it to other parts to keep us alive, to keep us safe."

Things that bring me joy permalink

New office, pub visits and beating social anxiety permalink

If we worked together, you know I advocate for asynchronous and distributed teams. But that doesn't mean I sometimes reject access to suitable office space. When railroad maintenance and a construction site are near your flat, it's good to know that you have a space to go. I spent the day in the office, and it was not bad. The office is beautiful, the commute is only 25 minutes, and meeting some of my new colleagues was good.

Later that week, I had the opportunity to meet 3/4 of my team for a beer—such a great time. We talked about many things: food, language, annoying football fans. It felt like creating a good memory.

I am now more open to getting out and meeting people in real life. Some friends are still not ready, which I understand completely. But I've recently met Rahel Bailie, Gabi Stripoli, Emily Sappington, Mariana Menezes and Daniel Burka. Social distancing and some awkward moments could not diminish the pleasure of catching up with friends.

Holidays at Pepys Street permalink

Before starting to work again, I had some incredible days with Leili at home. We decided not to travel; in hindsight, it was a great decision. We are trying new things together (like swimming), and it was good to have time to rethink our routine. She is working on her book, and I am trying to help her. A few weeks ago, she prepared some Palestinian food for a new client, and the photo was so beautiful.

Leili is my safe harbour and my lighthouse. You get to know someone with depth when life isn't easy. This shitty year has been transformative for our relationship. A lesson learned recently is creating space and time for solitude. Sharing the same physical space for long periods is challenging.

Healthcheck permalink

I am investing a lot more time and effort in my health. I can say I am now 90% recovered from the COVID-19 nightmares. Since March, I have been managing my diabetes better. The NHS system helps but isn't enough. Next month, I am testing a new service that promises diabetes reversal in 60% of the cases. This is a big challenge for me as it is all about dietary changes and behaviour change. I have been using continuous monitoring for three months now, and it's been revealing.

Weight: 98kg Blood pressure: 14/8 Food: A good balance of delivery and homemade food. Drinks: A few pints due to meeting friends - recently rediscovered low-alcohol beers. Smoking: I am trying to stop, but I am not ready yet.

"We only understand something relative to something we already understand." Richard Saul Wurman

Top 3 links permalink

Ruins, Rub-outs and Trash

World Information Architecture Day happened yesterday. Forty-two cities around the world joined this year. In his keynote for the Egypt event, Dan Klyn shared a pearl of wisdom. He talks about Richard Saul Wurman and Lou Khan. He presents a case against the flight and fight dichotomy and the importance of being careful and thoughtful about process and documentation. This quote resonated with me a lot:

the processes and tools we use are aimed at helping us satisfy the demand for moving fast and breaking things, not to be good, or to better ensure the doing of good work.

Here is the text version of his talk. And while you there, explore the TUG website as they have amazing content.

A Common Point Between UX Design and Politics: Irresolvable Problems.

An interesting parallel between UX and politics. The search for perfection, making compromises, designing for everyone. This article reminds me of previous conversations with friends about design and diplomacy.

Content Strategy Insights Podcast with Rahel Bailie

In this podcast episode, Rahel shares the origin of her nickname, Content Empress. And some valuable ideas around Content Strategy and Operations. She also gives an overview of her popular article: An uneven story of Content Strategy. Must listen.

Good things permalink

Back home permalink

I returned to the UK last Sunday, after working from Brazil for two months. I am not yet in my home, as I am currently enjoying day six of a ten-day forced quarantine. I am counting minutes to get back home. My home office is splendid, with a big screen, microphone, chair. But being in the same timezone as part of the team is already helping me to work less.

WTF is.. permalink

Last year I joined a hackathon project, and the thing we built is becoming very helpful and popular. WTF (What the fu**) its a slack bot. It crowdsources explanations about internal terminology and acronyms. The engineering team is continuously making improvements, and the adoption is growing steadily. Clarifying things and giving context is essential when you have a lot of new joiners.

Learning Canvas and Deji permalink

My conversations with Deji, my mentee in Product, are always interesting. We have been working together with his Learning Canvas since december. He has now a clear perspective on his needs. It helped him to have a focused conversation with his manager about his growth. The Learning Canvas is a tool I've invented while I was working at Publicis/SapientRazorfish. It helps you to manage information flows and accountability. I can't wait to talk with Deji next week for the next iteration.

Experience Principles permalink

The work on Experience Principles is ramping up again. Last week, I spent a few minutes reviewing the previous deliverables—outstanding documentation from Daniel Harvey, Chris Brunner, Michael Delange, Mingxi and Kevin Telfer. As I always say: it's easier when you are Building on the Shoulder of Giants. Onward.

Learned things permalink

Radiating intent permalink

In a fast-paced environment, ambiguity is the norm. And making the information available for everyone all the time it's impossible. Things can fall apart, and people will struggle to think about what exactly happened. An important lesson I've learned this week is that your best option is to radiate intent. Over-communicate. Repeat. "Ask for forgiveness, not permission" is not a one size fits all approach. Elizabeth Ayers wrote an inspiring post about this matter.

Get into the habit of signalling every time you change direction. Signal even when you do not see anyone else around. It is easy to miss someone who needs to know what you are doing.

Moderation tricks permalink

I am learning some silly and simple trick about moderation while using Clubhouse. Since it is an audio-only tool with limited visual cues, it forces people to be very creative. Creating things like switching the microphone on/off to send a message.

Things that bring me joy permalink

A strong support network permalink

I had some stressful moments this week. Long-covid relapse, work-related debates, the terrible UK Quarantine scheme, inconclusive PCR test and so on... When things are not ideal, I reach out to people I trust. I am grateful for having people like Jane Austin and Rahel Bailie in my support network. Work colleagues that became friends. People you can reach out for a pep talk, a perspective or just for listening. Their humanity, integrity and attention is something rare these days.

Confined with Leili permalink

I've shared many different spaces with Leili in the last year. My ballpark estimation is that we have been in confinement - just the two of us - for about 300 days since the last march. She is always making sure my days are better.

Oculus Quest 2 permalink

I've sold my Oculus Quest in Brazil. I bought the latest version as soon as we arrived in the UK. I am getting back to my exercise routine in VR. The Quest 2 is lighter, the resolution is better, and the multi-user feature is helpful.

Ossobuco, Heloisa and Clubhouse friends permalink

I am spending more time in Clubhouse recently. This week I was curating and facilitating a room about Storytelling. It was a pleasure to work with Heloisa Rocha. She leads a social venture I co-founded in Brazil. One of the speakers was Bruno Scartozzoni, a friend and former workmate I adore. I've also had a funny unplanned conversation with Artur Ortega and a friend. More stories about my adventures on the platform coming soon.

Healthcheck permalink

A lot of things happened since December. I am alright but annoyed. The mental burden to deal with long covid stuff, getting tested many times, not controlling your diet, managing diabetes... It's like having another job.

Weight: 98kg Blood pressure: N/A Food: hotel food is healthy but awful. We ordered Deliveroo twice this week. Drinks: No Alcohol for weeks now. Smoking: After a relapse in Brazil, I have stopped smoking again

"The illiterate of the 21st century will not be those who cannot read and write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn and relearn." - Alvin Tofler.

Top 3 links of the week permalink

Circle of Concerns and designing at the NHS

Emma Parnell is a Lead Designer working for the NHS. In this post, she talks about her experience designing the COVID-19 Vaccinations Programme service. She also talks about ambiguity, service scopes and a tool to help you in times of uncertainty.

Baboons, bullies and stress permalink

No Time for Bullies: Baboons Retool Their Culture tells the story of a group of baboons that completely shifted their behaviour after belligerent members vanished from the troop. Robert M. Sapolsky, the Stanford professor of the famous Human Behavioral Biology lectures, was interviewed for the article.

Ted Lasso and workplace culture permalink

Work of Fiction is a podcast about org design and culture by the Nobl folks. In this episode, they talk about Ted Lasso. Building trust with a new boss and getting executive support for change are some of the topics. Julie Zhuo also gathered some of the best Lasso's leadership lessons on Twitter.

Good things permalink

Warburton & Roles, congrats! permalink

Fred Warbz and Jack Roles, pioneers of the DNA Design System team, have both been promoted recently. It's great to see their hard work being recognised.

Visual Stand-up and the art of gathering permalink

Visual Stand-up is our weekly chapter meet-up. Planning and facilitating this ceremony is a joy. I always see as a unique opportunity to gather our people and have fruitful conversations.

The first edition of the year happened last week. We spend 20 minutes in a Miro activity, a workshop I adapted from the Manual of Me concept. Lots of fun.

Before the holidays, we had End of the Year Special edition. Amy Keeling (Head of Design) kicked-off with a retrospective.

Following up, all XD's presented their best work of the year. One slide per minute. It was really cool to see how much we progressed and the quality of the work we delivered - considering all circumstances.

I had to select one work to present. I choose to talk about the challenge of extending the Visual Stand-up.

XD Bridge: extending the Visual Stand-up permalink

Sometimes recurring ceremonies become boring. Last July I received this feedback about the Visual Stand-up. Some people were not satisfied with the format. Others wanted to know more about some of the projects or initiatives. Some questioned if we really needed to meet every week.

A messy, chaotic problem. I was also having mixed signals about the problem, there was little agreement about anything. Design Thinking to the rescue: We started with a workshop with the XD Leads. With some of the assumptions and questions in place, I conducted research with XDs (new joiners, design managers, people across disciplines). We followed up with rounds of conversations with the people who provided the initial feedback.

The first change we made was to create a 10-minute slot called Show the Thing. It is straightforward: Designers book a slot and share their work or learnings with more time. Mr Jason Bootle helped to set-up this. Michela is now coordinating. Since we started we had about 8 talks, covering all disciplines.

However, I was still getting some comments about the value of the sessions. I had a hard time trying to figure out what was the real issue. But one day, I had a moment of clarity. What was missing was novelty and inspiration. Breaking the routine.

With that in mind, we trialled a new format: every other week we would replace one Visual Stand-up with the XD Bridge.

XD bridge is basically a mini-conference with an external team. And it's not only about the content but also the relationships: creating a bridge with an external team or a particular group designed to last after the event. It is also an opportunity for designers to invest time improving their presentation skills and test content they want to present externally.

The format is simple: 5 minutes of warm-up, two 15 minute talks, followed by 20 minutes in the break-out rooms with the speakers. Up to now, we had four editions:

1. Babylon & Futurice (Co-host: Luiz Soyer)
   Mia Muurimaki - Service Design and Futures Thinking
   Yours truly - Untangling Design Leadership
2. Babylon & ASOS (Co-host: Emma Boulton)
   Louise Lynn - Imagineering at ASOS — a really inspiring
   Daniel Harvey - Manifesto on Society-Centered Design
3. Babylon & Redgate Software (Host: Daniel Harvey)
   Neil Turner - The year without trousers
   Emma Boulton - Helping Researchers do their Best Work
4. Babylon & A11y team (Host: Fred Warburton)
   Taylar Bouwmeester - Why has a Sign Language interpreter joined the team?
   Bruce Lawson - Accessibility for Designers

Feedback has been really, really positive. Speakers loved. Teams from both sides shared a few good words about it. We are planning to have more XD Bridges this year. If your team is looking for some fun and inspiration, email or tweet me.

Things I've learned permalink

Doomscrolling makes you mad (and sad) permalink

The Capitol racist incidents this week and the advance of the new virus variant in the UK impacted me a lot. The lesson for the week is that I am responsible to control my anxiety and news intake. I will take this more serious - goal for the year is more offline time.

Politeness, facework and voice permalink

I was browsing LinkedIn and found this video by Brielle Nickoloff about Politeness. Brielle is a linguist. I've met her in Interaction Conference in Seattle where she presented a talk about voice assistants. In this new presentation, part of a series about conversational design and linguistics, she explains Politeness and the facework theory. A must-see if you are a conversational design nerd.

The importance of wandering permalink

In my 1-1 with Amy Keeling this week we talked about curiosity. I shared that I am always trying new digital services without any specific reason. My codename at Isobar was Beta Junkie: I am usually the first to sign-up for the indie start-up. Downloading all the apps. Trying all new start-ups. Testing all new cool websites.

The latest thing I am exploring is Clubhouse. Clubhouse is an audio-only social network. I got an invitation from Brielle this Friday, and I am addicted to it already.

Fascinating concept, interaction design and community. It's like having an intimate conversation with a crowd, with some good structure. Clubhouse solves many of the moderation problems that we have on zoom.

This is probably not relevant for any work that I am doing now. But interacting and observing how people use new products and services is so rich. You learn about microcopy, information architecture, visual design. I guess it's not about inspiration. Maybe it is about creating a memory of interaction patterns and well-designed design details.

Things that make happy permalink

My in-laws, Brasília and Tupaciguara permalink

I've managed to fly to Brazil for Christmas, before the Brazilian government-imposed restrictions to UK passengers. After 2 weeks of quarantine in Brasilia, we travelled to my in-law's place in the countryside. It's a small city called Tupaciguara, located in Minas Gerais, my home state.

Their home is so joyful. It's a big house, so there is plenty of space for Leili and me. They have a garden, a hammock and a huge kitchen, where we spend most of the time. We have BBQs frequently. Leili is always playing with Valentina, her 4-year-old niece.

And nature here is impressive. I enjoy listening to the birds in the morning. Sometimes I walk in the city with my father in law in the afternoon. Good times.

I can smell again permalink

After a long flight, we arrived at my friend's place in Brasilia. I went straight to get a shower. It was sweltering, so I turned off the water heating. My friend left a traditional Brazilian soap in the Bathroom: Phebo.

While I was showering in the cold water, I could smell the soap fragrance. After 5 weeks with anosmia, smelling something for the first time again was epic. I now have 70% of my sense of smell, and I am so happy I am recovering fast.

Brazilian ways of surviving COVID permalink

The racist, stupid Brazilian president isn't helping et al. l. His anti-mask, anti-vaccine bullshit creates ripples of disinformation. Brazil is maybe the only country in the world the authorities recommend HCQ. The numbers are terrible: two hundred thousand people died already.

Regardless, I am optimistic about my country recovery from COVID. This is a resilient, smart nation that handles crisis like no other.

I had to learn all about the Brazilian way of dealing with COVID. Their capacity to adapt is remarkable. Everything moved to delivery pretty fast, and the majority of the commercial establishments are following common-sense practices: masks, thermometers, social distancing, lots of hand sanitisers. Brazilians are coping well with the lockdown.

Healthcheck permalink

Great food and a bit of exercise, as I can go outdoors here. I am sporadically walking with my father-in-law, swimming once a week and watching less TV. Also trying some phytotherapy, and my diabetes is under control.

Blood pressure: 12/8 Blood sugar: 7,3 Weight: (I don't have a scale here, but I am sure I've gained 4kg.) Alcohol: Too many beers.

It's harder to be kind than to be clever.

Jeff Bezos grandfather - from this commencement speech at Princeton

This week was like a flash! I write short notes in the weekdays for things I want to share on my Saturday weeknotes. This week I was so busy that I haven’t captured one single note! But it was an exciting one, and I have great things to share about work and life.

My selected article for this week is Entering groups, by Esther Derby. She wrote a book about effective change. In the article, she talks about first impressions and how to offer help in the right way.

Good things permalink

Inclusive design in the stage permalink

The theme for our chapter meeting this week was inclusive design. Taylar delivered a great talk about sign language and inclusive design. Marvellous Bruce Lawson talked about accessibility and the web.

To finish the week on a high, Fred Warburton delivered a great speech in our tech All Hands. He finally shared his personal story about his lived experience of disability. Four hundred people went crazy. I had the privilege of watching the presentation twice: he asked for my feedback before the event. In our session, I was emotional. Fred is becoming a great speaker. I am sure his talk is a good candidate for any good conference next year.

The joy of design reviews permalink

We worked redesigning our design review process. I have learned so much. It was a joy to see Michael Owen, Jack Roles, Paul Tran and Danny Harrop working together. Open minds and willingness to make things better. We also onboarded two of our talented designers in the spike: Sarah Benson and Adrian Lopez. I am so excited about this work. It was also an excellent opportunity for the team to work with Amy Keeling.

The invisible work permalink

I’ve met Kevin Telfer this week to discuss ways of supporting people to write about their work. I am a big fan of the working out loud concept. I was so privileged to have Amy Hupe as my writing coach for ten weeks this year. I am excited that Kevin is leading this initiative to support XD’s in sharing their work and life experiences in the open. Recently, James Price wrote an incredible article about product design interviews and dyslexia. This is inspiring our team to improve our hiring practices. Writing operates magic. It feels like sending good intentions to the future.

Updating my Learning Canvas permalink

Taylar, the new member of our a11y team, is so smart. We had a conversation about metacognition and learning. I presented my learning canvas; we talked about self-learning and productivity.

Learned things permalink

Minimal Valuable Process Improvement (MVPi) and Design Operations permalink

Many in the design industry hate the term MVP. Because it’s symbolic, it represents the frustration of designers working in dysfunctional agile teams. I will make this post an opportunity to create a new unrelated acronym: MVPi. I wouldn’t say I like acronyms, but I can’t miss this joke.

Real agile teams (I am talking here about the mindset, not methodologies) love to fail and learn. This definition of the agile mindset can help:

An agile mindset is an individual’s willingness to deal with failure by learning from it and changing how things are done so as not to repeat the failure.

The term we use in the industry is Ways of Working. There is so much opportunity when we share learnings across contexts (squads, disciplines) in an agile organisation. But there is also change fatigue. I am learning (and failed a lot) on this as I am working with several squads in 3-5 super tribes for more than one year. To transfer learnings across teams, you have to understand and respect context. Or deal with the pushback!

Double down on clarity. Before making changes, make it clear why you are proposing that change and write it down! The way you suggest a change is essential as the change itself. As my friend Amy Hupe (again) repeated like a pirate parrot in my head over and over for months:

Do the hard work to make things simple

There is no rule book, but I have a secret: Go meta! Apply service design thinking and content design in your process change. It takes more time, but you can create something that can scale.

1. Start with basics. Do your research. You can’t be lazy on investigating root causes.
2. Map the as-is journey, pain points, emotions, opportunities. Don’t ignore the details. If you are mapping together, you are already winning. Async works for this - we use Miro in our teams.
3. Write about the change you want to make. You don’t need to use a Standard Operating Procedure format. But you do need a template. Be specific. (Async, again)
4. Give people some time to talk and ask questions before starting the experiment. Be mindful they are already doing the work and reflection takes time. Async works as well, but create time for people to express how they feel—using those 5 minutes after the stand-up is a solution.
5. Create the feedback loop and the time for people to reflect on the change before you start. You can use a retro for this, but it will railroad your retro.
6. Run the experiment. Communicate. Listen. Share back.
7. Now go back and edit the thing you created in step 3. Make it more clear.
8. Write about it. Celebrate the learnings, not the wins.

Some steps fit an asynchronous model. It’s a great way to avoid meetings and empower people to own the change. But you have to work hard and write it down. And be mindful people have different preferences to assimilate information. Over-communicate.

Agilists hate to be prescribed any process or solution. The crux of the question is that there is no Ways of Ways. What you are changing is the team, not the software, service or process. Transferring learning from one group to another is tricky.

This might be the reason *real* agile doesn’t scale well in enterprise settings: communication, coordination costs and the distance from customers increases. Companies don’t invest enough time and money in collaboration. It’s a tricky subject: internal tools, knowledge sharing, ways of working, culture. Making things connect and have all teams performing is a chaotic activity.

When there is a gap in this, you immediately observe a drop in the design quality. From a design perspective, even if you have an excellent design system, the consistency falls apart. Because user experience it’s a sum of all parts. Improving the user experience in an agile enterprise setting takes time. You have to learn effective ways of creating and managing change. Design Operations is a useful framework. But there is no silver bullet.

One day I will write a book or article about the tension between Design Operations and agile. There will be a chapter named Minimal Valuable Process Improvement. And that is my SAFe joke.

Anosmia and Phantosmia permalink

This week we have been struggling with long covid symptoms. Leili is suffering from Phantosmia. She is having constant olfactory hallucinations, and it’s going crazy. I can’t smell anything: I have Anosmia. So we have this situation when she says is smelling something like the house is burning and I can’t smell anything.

I’ve spent hours this week learning about this. I even created a slack group at work. In my search, I’ve found Abscent, a charity that helps people with smell disorders. They have the initiative to help patients and improve scientific research about this matter. If you have similar symptoms, become a member, it’s free.

Things that bring me joy permalink

Good old habits permalink

Now that we are almost recovered, Leili invited me to get back to our morning routine. Ours is very basic: waking up earlier, green juice, one hour of writing and a relaxed breakfast. The attempt this week was good. Seeing her focused and excited about small positive changes made me happy.

Writing together permalink

I’ve joined this week a new group: London Writers Salon. They meet every morning to write for one hour. A powerful and simple idea. It helped me a lot to start the day with a bang. Seeing about a hundred people writing in silence in a zoom room was shocking.

Healthcheck permalink

Other than the Anosmia, health is ok. I am working too much, and there is a bit of anxiety, but next week I have one day off.

Weight: 97 kg Blood pressure: normal Food: Some healthy food, three times we ordering deliveroo. Drinks: None Smoking: 5 weeks without smoking. This week I almost relapsed.

The way you ask for criticism and react when you get it goes a long way toward building trust—or destroying it. Kim Scott

It’s a lot of change. Yet, I feel in control. I’ve learned this year so much about resilience and dealing with ambiguity. Writing is helping me a lot, and it’s great to read my old notes and compare things. Onward.

My selected concept of the week is Org Physics. The authors have an interesting perspective about formal structures, hierarchy and power. It's a rabbit hole, honestly. This podcast with many links is a good starting point.

Good things permalink

A clear path and a kickass plan permalink

Of course, there is some chaos and confusion in Q4, as in any business. Strategy and planning activities are pumping—lots of conversations and questions, which is good.

Regardless of the strategy, improving the design system makes everything easier. We adjusted our roadmap and agreed to a temporary change in our contribution process. We will run a documentation spike in December. The support from our chapter and from the technology teams is excellent. The team is (almost) complete again, and we are back in the norming phase.

Another critical part of this is that we are rebooting our process of design reviews. The team will have the opportunity to work with Amy Keeling, our VP of Design and Tito, our head of Front End Engineering. This is gonna be fun.

A11y folks rocking my world permalink

I have spent a lot of time with Fred Warburton this week. We had great conversations about culture. And the challenges of delivering a critical mission while supporting our people growth. I am so proud of Fred’s work and leadership.

Design Systems and navigating sudden change permalink

A few weeks ago Bronwen Rees invited me for an online event. The theme was how Design Systems can enable teams do deliver with in times of crisis. The panel was me and Michael Zaporozhets, a friendly Australian chap. We talked about some essential Design System topics: ROI, collaboration, patterns.

Michael’s ideas about how to measure ROI were spot on. I shared some things I’ve learned with Amy Hupe, Lily Dart and the design systems community. It is easy to accept lagging metrics for this work. But measuring the impact in a community of creators and the cultural change is not.

It was an excellent opportunity to share a bit of the history of the design system team at Babylon. Bronwen facilitation was superb. The guiding questions she sent before the event made me reflect a lot.

Mentoring Deji permalink

I’ve joined our internal mentoring program for our product organisation. I meet Deji, a Product Manager, every week. He is so excited about learning about user research and experience design. Thursday, we had a fantastic conversation about interacting with the NHS services. We both had COVID in the same week. It inspired us to have ideas for an internal hackathon.

Learned things permalink

Being a design police sucks. permalink

I have been reflecting for long about how part of our industry - and specifically design practitioners - are so keen to debate ethics but don’t walk the talk many times.

This week I am disappointed with a design organisation that I am part of. They released a website for their yearly conference with loads of accessibility issues.

I’ve warned the organisation. I complained about this on social media. Enraged, I wrote an email with a report, suggesting some actions. They have answered me this morning. But still sucks.

A big part of our design community favours aesthetics over usability and accessibility. I get mad about this every time. I get emotional for many reasons. It increases the distance between the accessibility community and the design community. It’s also terrible for our relationship with developers and content people.

I was mad with myself, as well. Am I doing this in the right way? Am I being harsh? I asked for advice on Twitter and my friend Artur Ortega answered. He is a sagacious man. He deals with things like this every day, but he is still so kind and calm. He shared a quote that says a lot:

An acquaintance merely enjoys your company, a fair-weather companion flatters when all is well, a true friend has your best interests at heart and the pluck to tell you what you need to hear. E.A. Bucchianeri

Things that bring me joy permalink

Being healthy again permalink

I was freaking out two weeks ago when I discovered I had Corona. But I am so happy that I have recovered fast. I’ve lost my sense of smell, and my taste buds are completely crazy. It’s annoying, and honestly, it removes a lot of the joy in my life. I am still a bit tired but compared to last week... I am a new man.

But I am so grateful to be alive and kicking. And now that is gone, my anxiety about getting sick has vanished—such a weight off my shoulders. Leili recovered way faster than me, and her sense of smell is back.

I have learned a lot of things about Corona. Which is excellent, as I can share information with my loved ones.

Finding new music permalink

I was browsing Youtube and found this artist, Mariana Froes. Her voice is so chill. And this interpretation of Chega de Saudade, a Brazilian classic, it’s so cool.

Healthcheck permalink

Had my diabetes review the day before getting Corona. My usual specialist was not available, so the session was kind of meh. And to make things worse, I think I contracted the virus in the reception —or when I was travelling to the GP practice.

Today I had a follow up consultation over the phone. It was a bit of a bad experience.

Weight: 98 kg Blood pressure: 13/8 Food: Some delivery food, some healthy food. I am experimenting with a diet shake the next 2 weeks. Drinks: No alcohol since last update Smoking: I’ve stopped smoking 2 weeks ago.

Happiness is really just about four things: perceived control, perceived progress, connectedness (number and depth of your relationships), and vision/meaning (being part of something bigger than yourself)- Tony Hsieh

My recommendation for this week is a video. It’s a conversation about how might we best learn from the past. Moderated by Interintellect’s Anna Gat, it’s an informal talk between Olena Bulygina and Bardia Pourvakil. The theme is Learning from the past and they talk about pain and how it relates to learning. The explanation about how bi-directional links can help with discovery and reflection is so cool.

Good things permalink

Practice makes perfect permalink

Org Design is a topic very close to my heart. One specific aspect I am always thinking about is how some organisational boundaries are created. Some for good - like allowing deep technical expertise to flourish - and others are just land-grabbing and politics.

Jared Spool once said: “All design is political”. Politics attempts to address wicked problems. Problems that cannot be solved by a definitive solution. Imperfection is the word here, I guess. And If we are aiming high, we definitely can’t skip the hard conversations. Doing that with candour and inclusivity is what makes design relevant. So there is a place for politics, and we should not merely ignore our role.

There are many good playbooks and a lot of old school stuff in this area. I really like how NOBL’s guide on org design principles, There is some agile flair on it. One of the principles is:

Surrender the past. Honour what’s come before and help individuals grieve the losses that accompany change. Then, move forward together.

Honouring the past and assuming previous failures - so they can become learnings - is usually something all teams struggle. I hope I will be able to help with this.

Decentralisation, contribution permalink

If you work in design systems, you know that there is always 3 topics creating a healthy tension: quality, speed and ownership. One thing that is key to alleviate this tension is how you shape the contribution process. This week the team is iterating on this. Good progress and fresh ideas.

The balance of applying energy on risk mitigation versus scalability. Complexibility versus simplicity.

Reluctant design leader permalink

A few weeks ago, I wrote about delivering a talk about design leadership. It happened two weeks ago. Another one with no public recording or blog post - I am terrible at sharing things like this.
But when prepping for talks, I have the excuse for asking a lot of questions and meet smart people.
In a few weeks, I will join a panel about Design Systems with the fine folks from Prime Motive.

Learned things permalink

Now what? permalink

I was interviewing someone this week, and we talked about what makes a design guild/chapter/department relevant. One thing that we agreed to is that the company mission is just the start. An impactful design organisation is connected by the desire to create “something extra” together.

That “something extra” requires an endless love for new challenges and healthy relationships. Relationships are the fuel to the silo-breaking effect, which is much needed to make design excellent. Emma Boulton describes this as connectedness. I think there is something about keeping that connection and comfort with the ambiguity for long periods.

Things that bring me joy permalink

Argentinean night out permalink

After the lockdown announcement, I decided to escape a bit this Saturday with Leili. Restaurants and indoor places are usually a no go for me. But I needed a good memory. We visited Chimichurris, an argentinean restaurant in Southwark. Jane Austin showed me this place last year, and it’s now one of my favourites. A perfect Chorizo and provoleta to start.

Healthcheck permalink

Eye exams, blood, visiting the nurse, the doctors. Diabetes is such a PITA. But I had some excellent news this week and this November I hope to get all sorted.

Weight: 98 kg
Blood pressure: 11/7 
Food: Quite healthy this week, but maybe I should eat more veggies. 
Drinks: One glass of Prosecco. 
Smoking: A lot. 12 Juul pods.

One important insight is that all organisations are networks. People may draw their organisations as hierarchies, but that doesn’t change that they are actually networks. Jurgen Appelo

The article for this week is a chapter from a book. It's about Choosing to be yourself. From The Almanack of Naval Ravikant.

Good things permalink

Q4 DNA action plans permalink

While refreshing our roadmaps for Q4, we caught ourselves in a complex prioritisation exercise. Nathan and Fred are superstars, and madame Jane Austin jumped in to help us tweak a few parts. Job done, we have a plan.

Afternoon Design review with Uncle Warbz permalink

I've met Fred Warburton for a few hours this Friday. We talked many things. Some work-related matters and a lot about accessibility and inclusive design. I had the opportunity to walk him through a prototype for a new experience. It was like an informal design review - we have one planned with the Design System team. Fred's approach to design reviews is peculiar. He is able to spot affordance errors really fast. I've also noticed how his reactions were similar to Uncle Roger. Uncle Roger is a comedian, who reviews videos of western chefs cooking rice.

The joy of interviewing people permalink

Interviewing talented people every week keeps delivering frequent joy. I was in a zoom room with four people laughing and having a good time this week. Hanging our with content designers is a privilege.

Learned things permalink

Stretching to learn. permalink

A good old friend, Luiz Soyer, reached out this week and asked me to give a lecture to his team about Design Leadership.

I will never feel ready to talk about this subject, but I will do it anyway. I've learned that you have to create time and force yourself to talk about subjects you are not confortable with. Things that matter for your career, not for your current role.

It's going to be also an opportunity to kick-off a project for our design community. I don't have a name for this yet, but the core idea is to invite design teams from other companies to attend our Visual Stand-up. Each group presents one topic, and after the Q&A, we have some impromptu networking activities.

Things that bring me joy permalink

Watching her teaching things permalink

Leili is a natural-born teacher. Besides her resistance to doing that professionally. As a former business process analyst, she can understand how to do anything after listening and watching people. And she can document that later and relay to someone completely new to the subject. She once helped a friend to start cooking. This person never believed she could do it. After 2 hours with Leili, she completely changed her perspective.

Today she will be teaching a lovely girl how to make her own granola and the basics of food photography. Watching her explaining things and connect with people is great.

Healthcheck permalink

A few weeks ago, I had a blood test but never got the results. My expectation was to get invited for the yearly diabetes review, but that never happened. But I received an invitation to attend my GP practice for a flu-jab. There was no booking, and they invited everyone to attend Saturday morning. Definitely not going there, last time I've visited I got an annoying virus. Risk management, my friends, it's a serious thing. It's so vital that you should not outsource it to your doctors or the government. Absorb all information and guidance, but take the lead.

Weight: 98.2 kg

Blood pressure: 14/9

Food: We had great Brazilian food this week, Feijão Tropeiro.

Drinks: None

Smoking: 8 Juul pods

Doctors won't make you healthy. Nutritionists won't make you slim. Teachers won't make you smart. Gurus won't make you calm. Mentors won't make you rich. Trainers won't make you fit. Ultimately, you have to take responsibility. Save yourself - Naval Ravikant

My selected post of the week is the difference between autonomy and independence. The fine folks at NOBL are spot-on: the gap between your values and the ones you have to act on are the real challenge.

Good things permalink

Visual Stand-up permalink

After many weeks, I’ve facilitated a Visual Stand-up edition. It was great to see all the people together. A lot of great work happening across all tribes. Jack Roles presented some bits about Config (Figma conference). We also introduced Nathan Djangoly to the team. And to close, we had a sweet moment of goodbye for Ed Russel and Linsey Fryatt.

KPI’s for design systems permalink

Had interesting conversations with the DNA team about how to measure stuff. Inquisitive Nathan is looking for new ways of measuring contribution.

Attending EuroIA permalink

Had the opportunity to attend EuroIA last thursday. I was not watching the keynotes live, and I’m glad the organisation is making all videos available very fast. Peter Merholz shared a very bold statement:

I’ve been beating this drum that information architecture has been constrained by its relationship to user experience… And I think that has been ultimately to his detriment. Because there is so much information that is not specifically user experience that would benefit from our practices, and it’s not understood or appreciated how it can reach beyond user experience.

He nailed: Information Architecture applied to organisational design is our best chance to escape this madness.

EuroIA also provided a great line-up of workshops; it was hard to choose. I attended a hilarious one about Information X Organisation. It was about our inability to imagine new organisations—a simulation in organisational design. With a team, your task was to assess information flows, decision-making models and communication. The scenario was a change in strategic direction for a startup. My group was really cool: me, a content strategist, a service designer and Birgit Geiberger. Birgit is an IxDA fellow and we always bump into each other in design events. We got lost many times, we had some challenges with Miro but It was fun.

In the afternoon I watched an interesting talk by Dave Hora about pattern languages. He was inspired by Christopher Alexander. His research in patterns is available online.

Things I have learned permalink

Organisational memory, design operations and culture permalink

I was reading an article by Andy Polaine this week about organisational memory, and I had lots of insights. In his article, he shares his perspective working as a consultant in many companies. He says:

If you think of people and practices as the neural pathways in the organisational brain when they’re damaged—through redundancies, attrition or “restructuring trauma”, those pathways are destroyed, blocked or fade. Process is often used as a scaffold to rebuild the pathways. It does help to have an explicit process or methodology that everyone understands and shares the meaning of, but process alone does not preserve understanding and shared meaning.

I agree that process and best practices documentation can’t capture the clarity of intent. I like to think that successful organisations lean heavily in uninterrupted information flows and networks of knowledge — and networks are fuelled by shared purpose.

The work in design operations is to elevate the importance of organisational memory — documentation, lean processes, experimentation and reflective practices are tools to achieve this.

But this isn’t enough. As Drucker said, culture beats strategy for breakfast. Your operations don’t happen in a vacuum. Your culture changes over time, and it affects people.

To understand that isn’t easy. Maybe you can have some perspective with performance reviews. But let’s be honest: rarely we have the opportunity to analyse the information from hundreds of performance reviews properly. It’s not proper research.

Exit interviews are an excellent opportunity to find some of the gaps and points of failure. It’s a true moment of applied radical candour. You can spot invisible patterns, gut reactions to well-known problems. And systemic issues collaborators don’t frequently talk due to risk of damaging interpersonal relationships.

Conversations are the smallest unit of change. We have to make more time for the conversations that surface issues to move forward. No strategy can be successful without this.

Mindful about my limits permalink

This week I had stomach bugs and something similar to the flu. I got the Friday off to recover, as I couldn’t sleep well the night before. I usually will just work anyway. I am happy that I am more respectful about my limits.

Things that bring me joy permalink

The 26th September permalink

On this day, in 2011, we married. It was in Brasília, and I remember how happy I was living in that crazy city with Leili. There was so much energy and challenges ahead.

Travelling a bit in time, and exactly four years ago we landed in the UK, moving from Brazil. Today we drink gin and tea, sometimes we use fancy words, and I don’t hate the weather anymore. Sometimes I still think about moving again, mainly due to the government incompetence. But I feel fine. 26th is a day to celebrate changes.

Baby back ribs and cake permalink

I avoid talking about food too much on this website as it’s a never-ending love. But after four months closed, my favourite restaurant in London opened again. We ordered through Uber Eats (which is terrible compared to Deliveroo) some good Baby back ribs and Burnt Ends.

I’ve also beta tested some fantastic chocolate cupcakes. Leili was working with a photographer this week, shooting cakes. She baked a lot to get the perfect cakes for the session. I am so lucky.

Onward and VR permalink

I don’t play games too much, but since I bought a VR headset a few months ago, I’ve been experimenting more. The Darth Vader trilogy was brilliant — believe me, is the closest thing to using a light sabre. A recent surprise is Onward. It’s a military simulation game. Guns and violence aren’t my thing. But who never enjoyed a good Counter-Strike match or even some hours in GTA? Onward is just starting, but it’s a well designed VR experience.

Health check permalink

This week I visited my GP practice. First time since March, if I am not wrong. Got a blood test as part of my diabetes review.

Weight: 99 kg
Blood pressure: 15/8
Food: A lot of healthy food and we ordered only twice.
Drinks: A glass of rosé
Smoking: 4 pods of Juul.

Life happens at the level of events, not of words. Trust movement. Alfred Adler

How do we find new ways to make sense of Organisational Culture is the blog post I selected this week. Some very interesting points about how to surface cultural norms using artefacts.

Good things permalink

roadmap review, again permalink

This week I am onboarding the new product manager in the Design Systems team. We hired internally, but I can’t be happier with the choice we made.

Nathan Djangoly it’s an incredible human being. In one week he already did some great work on understanding our messy, crazy backlog. We also had a great session using a design system assessment tool.

Learned things permalink

The power of community permalink

This week our team attended a few conferences. Dr. Webster attended one about Behaviour Design in Health and shared some cool notes. There was also Config, Figma’s annual conference. Mr Jack Roles, Nathan and a few others attended. I still have to catch-up on it, but the traditional product release looks great.

But the conference of the week for me was Inclusive Design 24. I had great conversations with Fred Warbz about it, and he recommended a few talks that I watched already.

The first one is by Billy Gregory. It’s about the pains and lessons of working with accessibility and design. His instance of adhering to “good enough” design is intriguing.

I also watched Bruce Lawson’s funny and revealing talk about web standards. I not gonna spoil this one, you should go and watch it now.

And finally, it was refreshing to see a fellow design ops person (and also Brazilian) doing great work explaining the WCAG standards for designers using a toolkit.

There are many other great talks on my list, and I can’t wait to see the blog posts about the conference as well. One thing that I am enchanted with is the caring, energetic vibe of the inclusive design community. It’s nice to be part of something great.

Heuristics for good leadership permalink

There is one sure thing I learned in regards to what makes a good leader. In my experience is a mix of situational awareness and the ability to enable others.

Leaders with this behaviour empower their people to make their own discoveries and they help them to learn and apply new heuristics, along with those that are already known to the team.

In plain language, they get out of the way at the same time they are closer to you enough to make you feel supported — and many times their insights or questions lead you to unexpected greatness.

It’s a very, very hard balancing act. I am learning with my incredible lady-boss, Jane Austin. She knows it all and is a fantastic manager who is always challenging me gently.

Things that bring me joy permalink

Sun and real tomatoes permalink

It was like Russian roulette, but we escaped for a few days to get some sun in Greece. It was terrifying to jump in a plane, and I was freaking out. I am shielding since March, and I’ve left my flat only for a few days during this period. It was taking a toll on my health.

The food was splendid. And how nice and simple the greeks are. I am impressed with how they are following all the rules. They are so thoughtful about the pandemic and so careful. Everyone uses masks. I felt safe, and it was the first time I could glance at this new reality with some positive outlook.

We found terrific restaurants, a beach club that was empty all the time and deserted and sunny places.

I have learned to paint landscapes. Tried to stop smoking. Spent quality time with Leili and we had great conversations about everything. Great times, indeed.

The joy of books permalink

I’ve spent a week without computers and with reduced phone usage—an opportunity to catch-up with my reading. Like many people, I am reading 3 to 4 books at the same time. And during this week I finished 3 fiction books.

Two of the books are from Nick Spalding. His first book, Life with no breaks is hilarious—great use of the fourth wall. I also finished Logging off, which is a modern tale about someone addicted to his phone. Both are amazingly well written and enjoyable. Nick is becoming one of my favourite authors.

The third one is It’s a fascinating book about psychology and philosophy. The title is a bit lame: “The Courage To Be Disliked: How to free yourself, change your life and achieve real happiness”. I never judge a book by its cover or price — 2 pounds on Kindle — and I am enjoying this one a lot.

It’s the story of a young person who engages in a series of conversations with a hermit philosopher. They become friends and decode together the theories of Alfred Adler.

Adler’s Individual Psychology school is remarkable divergent of the prevalent Freudian theories. He talks a lot about inferiority, social interest and community feeling. His work influenced Abraham Maslow and many others.

I am enjoying the book a lot and finding inspiration and even some relief. It touches on praise and how it might have ruined our entire educational system. Here is a quote:

Even if you do derive joy from being praised, it is the same as being dependent on vertical relationships, and acknowledging that you have no ability. Because giving praise is a judgement that is passed by a person of ability onto a person without ability.

Reading this book is bringing great memories of the conversations I had with my Helenas.

One is my therapist, Elena. A lovely and competent professional who took good care of me and introduced me to ACT - Acceptance And Commitment Therapy.

The other one is Helena Araújo Vieira, my aunt. She is a philosopher and one of the smartest person in the world. And I can’t wait to discuss philosophy with her again and argue why Karl Popper is bonkers.

Healthcheck permalink

All is well, and I do have a few weeks ahead of hard work in regards to my health. It’s time for the yearly diabetes review. I am also trying my best to stop smoking, which is very hard.

My sleep isn’t right - a bit of anxiety of coming back to London and work-related things - and I need more focus on changing my diet.

Weight: 99.6 kg Food: Some delivery food, including the infamous “Don’t go bacon my heart” sandwich and some good ol’ ribs Drinks: Nome Smoking: 10 Juul pods.

You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make him drink - Proverb.

Starting with my favourite article/post of the week: the article Taming complexity. Hear hear:

The benefits of creating any capability or process may be obvious and immediate (and a customer or a boss may be demanding the innovation in short order), so the organisation mobilises quickly to make it happen. In contrast, the costs of complexity accumulate and manifest slowly or episodically, so removing an element is unlikely to be a priority.

Check it out the article, as there are some pretty solid points. Benefits of complexity, agency, decentralisation and experimentation are some of the topics.

Good things permalink

A herculean task permalink

Another great week with the Experience Strategy team. We keep bumping in philosophical discussions about personalisation and user needs, but is really fun. Things change fast all the time, and making sense of all the complexity in healthcare is not an easy feat. I am lucky to work with so many talented people that are cracking this with a smile in the face.

Contribution methods for design systems permalink

We had some significant progress documenting the process of extending and creating new documentation and components for our design system, Babylon DNA. Linsey and Jack, as always, are shining and delivering great work.

Learned things permalink

Departures in times of Corona permalink

When I joined Babylon last year, Jane Austin made a joke about her role being only to hire talented people. She is spectacular at this, and I've learned a lot with her.

With all the instability in the world, everyone is adapting fast. Location is not a thing anymore. And companies will offer unmissable opportunities for our people. So the new challenge for us is retention.

This week, someone I work with announced its resignation. I was pleased because it is a great opportunity. But I confess it isn't easy to see someone I hired leaving the company. Even when there is no reason for it, you can feel a bit incompetent as a design leader.

I have a lot to learn about this topic. I am glad I can rely on Jane and Dan "Wizard" Harvey to guide me and deliver those pep talks everyone needs sometimes.

Linting permalink

Linting is the process of finding issues that can lead to bugs or inconsistencies in your code. A Bell Labs computer scientist coined the term in 1978. The name of the tiny bits of fibre and fluff shed by clothing inspired him.

I was publishing an update in the design system and the changes I made triggered errors in the build. So I had to spend a few hours learning about Prettier and how to set up linting in VSCode.

There is also a similar process for content and documentation, but it's rocket science. Only a few OG's like Rahel Bailie know this. It requires structured content and a pretty solid style guide. But you can have an automated way to check if your sentences are following the style guide. More on this later, as I will have to interview my content empress for clarification.

Teaching and learning permalink

Had my fourth peer mentoring (skill swap) session with Angelo Lucas this week. I shared with him a few tips on how to explain design work in English, and he taught me CSS and flexbox.

I also joined a new mentorship program initiated by the product guild at work. I am learning about Product Management with one of our Product Directors, and sharing some bits about Experience Design - UX and user research - with two Product Managers.

Things that bring me joy permalink

Brazilian sausages permalink

One of the recipes Leili is writing for her book is how to make sausages. The last two weeks, I am the happiest beta tester in the world. I know the British are very proud of their heritage in producing bangers. Leiliane seasoning, made with the secret Brazilian chilli-peppers is out of this world. The most delicious sausage I've ever had on this glorious island.

More music permalink

Amy Keeling asked me to share with her some of my playlists. An excellent excuse to preach about the good and old rock and roll.

Healthcheck permalink

I am having a series of annoying migraines, due to some absurd variation in my blood glucose. Other than that, I am feeling ok, and I keep trying to stick to healthier food.

Weight: 99 kg

Food: a great week without delivery food.

Drinks: Just one glass of bubbly.

Smoking: About 10 Juul pods

"You know you have achieved organisational adaptability when employees stop complaining about reorganisations and start suggesting new structural changes" - Jurgen Appel.

My selected post this week is Holding on working less, by Meg Howie, who is a service designer. She talks about the differences in working for the government and a design agency, slow days, slack time in the system and building resilience.

Good things permalink

Service design magic permalink

In the last two weeks, I am onboarding myself to a stream of work focused on designing new services and propositions. A lot of things to absorb and understand. But I'm glad I will be able to join a remarkable team and work in something new.

Catching up with Dr Hu permalink

I think I shared before how much I appreciate 1-1's. This week I've met Sophy Hu, and we talked a lot about writing. She wrote a post about the positive aspects of stakeholder anxiety. Short and sweet, full of wisdom.

Learned things permalink

Process, balance, tensions permalink

John Cutler, provocateur extraordinaire, asked in a tweet about the challenges of scaling a product organisation. The question was:

"Technology, design, product management is fundamentally about navigating the tension between X and Z."

Marvellous answers from the community that you can read in the original thread. But I will cherry-pick a few, just to illustrate a point:

Consistency, Growth/innovation
Trust and Autonomy
"Bias for action" vs "Strive for excellence."
Gut feeling and data
Exploring and generating results
Specificity and Versatility
Depth and Breadth
Scalability and reliability\

Someone commented in the thread that the question might be a reductionist approach to the complexity we have in Product. While I was reading Intertwingled, this part resonated a lot with me:

"We should take these lessons online to plan-build sites and systems because the binary opposition of agile-waterfall is just as much a myth. The Agile Manifesto backs "responding to change over following a plan" but makes a point of saying that both have value. Yet Agile is used often as a platform for proclaiming the wireframe is dead. Meaning shifts from intent to interpretation, and plans go out of the window. We all know death by documentation sucks, but to pivot and sprint into an Agile death spiral isn't a whole lot of fun either". Peter Morville

I do have an opinion that Information Architects and Service Designers can help to reduce this ambiguity. They are equipped and trained to deal with abstraction in language and models, which is a rare skill.

The reasons for writing permalink

Anja Maerz asked me why I write every week. She opened a can of worms. For context, I started because of Amy Hupe's positive influence. For a few weeks, she was guiding me and acting as my editor and coach. When she left, the habit stuck. And I keep doing every Saturday as the closure of my week. I feel that after publishing these notes, I am ready to enjoy the weekend.

It is a learning journey for me, and I am always reading and practising. I've also found a lively community talking and learning about writing. David Perrel is someone I recently discovered. He shared this pearl on twitter recently:

"You don't just write to share what you think. You write to discover what you think in the first place."

This is the structure I use for writing. Publishing every week is the tactic to consolidate these discoveries over time. And it helps me to think better and reflect. With a note-taking method, this is my current strategy for compounding knowledge.

Good things permalink

Zoom fatigue and old school calls permalink

This week I experimented calling people, in their regular phone numbers, like a boomer. I called my mom and dad, my work colleagues and friends.

There is something fabulous about a phone call: since no one is looking to a screen, it feels like there is more connection, it flows better.

Photography and drinks permalink

We are getting ready for some shooting and cooking this weekend. Leili will try the Caipirinha recipe again.

Finding the perfect coffee permalink

Leili is also becoming a coffee connoisseur. Recently, she found single-origin coffee from Brazil called Das Almas, roasted by Origin. It is fantastic.

Healthcheck permalink

Besides the weather, I only had one migraine. I have to be more careful about diabetes management.

Weight: 97.1 kg
Blood sugar level: 10.1 mmol/L
Food: a great amount of healthy food this week.
Drinks: One Gin and Tonic
Smoking: 10 Juul pods

"Mistakes are the portals of discovery." James Joyce

The blog post of this week is an old Lifehacker article. Something that Jane told me once and I am always trying to remember: Assuming positive intent.

Good things permalink

XD Operations lemonade permalink

An exciting challenge in regards to research operations appeared this week. Emma Boulton, our specialist, is enjoying a few days off. I had the opportunity to work with Anja Maerz and Dr Rosie Webster in the case. All fixed, but what stood out for me was the bold approach by Anja and Rosie. They not only solved the issue with speed and rigour. They created a moment for deep reflection deeply about the matter, and created the relational space and knowledge to propose a long term change. In operations, process change is the lemon. Shared understanding and envisioning change in behaviours and values is the lemonade. A new and interesting initiative is growing up in a smart group of people.

Sweet goodbye to lovely people permalink

Friday was Elliot’s last day with us. In the morning, me and Fred listened to his last handover session about our release process. CRP's, CI, release cuts. My mind was blown in 30 minutes. I have learned so much with him and I am so grateful for his attention to details and willingness to teach us how to code again and do complex stuff.

I also met Mingxi, who will be leaving us next Wednesday. We had a heartwarming conversation about expectations, confidence and writing as a tool to clarify your thoughts.

It's a privilege to spend time reflecting about how they felt about their contributions and being part of our team. I am grateful for their openness, sincerity and all learnings. Onwards.

Ruminating about Design Operations permalink

Since the talk about design operations a few weeks ago I can't stop thinking about the things that make the discipline important or fun. Two critical aspects of Design Operations that have the potential to create long-lasting impact:

1. Constant effort to make information open, accessible and clear;
2. Purposefully nurturing learning networks.

Design best legacy is organisational memory, this goes way beyond shipping. it's the people and their creative narratives. Memories and stories are resilient when they are sparkled and mantained by networks.

On hierarchies versus networks, Julian Stood's new book Socially Dynamic Organisation inspired me this week. After reading it, I suggested a warm-up in our weekly XD Leads meeting. We designed a network map with the Experience Design team. Put your network goggles on, you will find so much novelty and opportunities.

Learned things permalink

Big IA and org design permalink

My IXDA brother Jason Mesut is co-chairing the EuroIA conference this year. The line-up is hot! Great workshops and a spectacular talk by Peter Merholz. He proposes to use Information Architecture for organisational design practices.

He makes an interesting statement about the nature of Organisations. They are complex systems of people and information: Org charts, policies, roles and responsibilities, status reports, journey maps.

The obvious conclusion I am making is that information spaces can make or break the experiences and services we create. Peter Morville, in Intertwingled, talks about the choices and cognitive costs of dealing with new information.

“Many people may not want information, and they will avoid using a system precisely because it gives them information. Having information is painful and troublesome. We have all experienced this. If you have information, you must first read it, which is not always easy. You must then try to understand it. Understanding the information may show that your work was wrong, or may show that your work was needless. Thus not having and not using information can often lead to less trouble and pain.”

Information is hard. Context switching and reframing can be painful. The Wardley maps fella might disagree, but there is no playbook or doctrine to tackle this. We are all overwhelmed with information. Attention scarcity is a bigger challenge - collective interpretation of maps isn't easy et all.

I just bought my tickets and I can't wait to spend time with the IA nerds.

Things that bring me joy permalink

Green juice permalink

This week we tried to get back to an old habit: green juices in the morning. Leili created this recipe that I try to replicate every day with little success. You need to mix one lemon, a bit of ginger, one carrot, half apple and kale. It doesn’t taste good, but it helps to reduce the sugar cravings.

Weekend and movies permalink

Fridays and Saturdays we watch movies. The highlight for this week is Official Secrets. It's a drama based on Katharine Gun's real story. She was a British whistleblower who made a very brave move trying to expose some shady government tactics. In one scene, there was a zip-drive and I had that technology nostalgic feeling.

Healthcheck permalink

With the heatwave, I had a few migraine episodes, but all is well now. Still struggling to get exams with the GP, but hopefully will make it next week.

Weight: 97.6 kg
Blood pressure: 13/8
Food: Plenty of healthy food this week.
Drinks: One beer and one gin
Smoking: 6 Juul pods

My recommended blog post this week is by Indi Young, who doesn’t need introductions. In the post Compassion is a type of empathy she introduces types of empathy and how it relates to compassion.

Good things permalink

On compassionate colleagues permalink

One of the things I enjoy most working at Babylon is the people. It’s a bunch o very talented ones, and the scope of different skills and knowledge is impressive. This week something also caught my attention: how empathetic and compassionate they are.

After an hour of a very dense user research session, I had to stop watching. The participant was an alternate timeline version of my deceased grandma. She was battling a chronic condition that I have as well. It was triggering me, and it took me some time to understand that. I have been doing design research for more than a decade for now, but research in healthcare is new for me.

As soon as the session finished, two lovely colleagues reached out. Dan Harvey and Emma Boulton, slacked me almost at the same time, to check-in. I am grateful for the kind humans I have the privilege to work with: they are not only smart but caring.

Good principles permalink

We are on our way to having a robust version of our design principles. The work started in our offsite last year, with a great session led by Ben Sauer.

This week we had a workshop with the entire team, to present a first draft of the themes. Kudos to Michael Delange, who led a significant part of this work and the team for the great contributions.

I had the opportunity to work with the team to develop the criteria we used to test design principles. I was so happy to see that we landed in a fantastic set of hygiene rules and tests. I am planning to write a blog post about this soonish.

Right after the workshop, I got a message from Ben Brignell. He is writing a book about design principles and curates a website with a great list. I have been exchanging ideas with him and asking infinite questions for months.

He shared with me an excellent example of how to test if a principle is memorable. He is writing a blog post about this topic, so I will not spoil the surprise.

Advanced Markdown with Elliot permalink

Our developer, Elliot, is leaving next week. Of course, we could not be happy with simple handover notes. Elliot suggested to teach us advanced markdown tricks. It will allow non-developers to publish any documentation in our design system. Learning something complex was fun and rewarding, and just spending time with Lindsey and Fred Warbz was great.

Learned things permalink

Be kind with yourself permalink

I have my dream therapist, Helena, this Wednesday. Every session, I learn something valuable, and our time together is always great. We had a conversation about the things I’ve learned this year about myself. It was a revelation moment for me.

The year I’ve learned not only how to be more flexible with others, but also with myself. How to control my expectations about myself when I am not in my best moments. The year I’ve learned about my limits like never before.

Many others helped me with this, but Helena’s approach was pivotal. Get a therapist: you will never regret

Unstructured peer mentoring permalink

In Brasília, about five 13 years ago while working at AgênciaClick (later renamed to Isobar), I met three brothers who work creating things for the web. Estevão Lucas, Angelo Lucas and Rafael Lucas. We worked together in a few projects and agencies, and we became great friends. I use to joke saying that they are a full service agency as Estevão is a very senior engineer, Rafael is a talented designer and Angêlo is an excellent front-end developer.

Recently, I tried to hire Ângelo to join the Design System team, but he was not interested in relocating to the UK. Our conversation was great, and we decided to keep meeting every week and try a peer mentoring scheme.

He will teach me CSS again. We are redesigning Leili’s website. This website was designed a long time ago by Rafael and was coded by Lucas. And I am keen to learn how design proper responsive breakpoints and to improve accessibility and performance. In exchange, I will help him with design, accessibility, and business English.

Things that bring me joy permalink

My quarantine love permalink

With the impossibility of travelling as we always do, we are making the effort of being comfortable in our lockdown cave. Leili pampers me so much. This week we tried new pillows, she bought special grapes for me and cooked my favourite pork steak—all of this while writing her book and shooting amazing photos.

Using the force permalink

I have treated myself with a new game this week: Vader Immortal, Episode 2. The plot is about meeting Darth Vader and learning the Jedi tricks. In Episode 1, you learn how to use a lightsaber. In this one, is all about using the force to manipulate objects. It is awesome. The sound design is incredible, and the haptic feedback interaction is so cool. Lucasfilm transmedia storytelling practices are the best in our industry. The entire world-building and story is impressive, and everything is connected and new at the same time.

Healthcheck permalink

I am having some trouble with my diabetes this week and some migraine attacks due to the heatwave.

Weight: 98 kg Food: Great week, with my favourite salad and home-cooked rice. Drinks: One Caipirinha Smoking: 8 juul pods.

When people realize they’re being listened to, they tell you things. Richard Ford

This week's favourite blog is about threaded thinking, by Anne-Laure Le Cunf.

Things that bring me joy permalink

Travelling without planning permalink

I like to plan everything. I am that type of person that spend days thinking about all details on a trip. But I was so busy that this time this wasn't possible. We decided to go for a random trip, to escape a bit from our flat and enjoy some outdoors. All went well, and I am feeling rested. It was also a nice way to celebrate Leiliane's birthday. The criteria we used to decide where to go:

1. no airplane travel required
2. the place should have way less COVID cases than London and no crowds
3. availability of Pinterest-like Airbnb places with obsessive cleaning

Glorious Maidstone permalink

Maidstone is a town with about 110.000 people and a busy city centre. It might not be a place people consider for holidays, but actually, it was pretty nice. We could walk to some beautiful landmarks, and the streets were virtually desert. Sailing River Medway was quite cool. We spent an afternoon visiting Leeds Castle. The gardens there are amazing. Birds, bees, swans, ducks, and beautiful flowers everywhere.

Ancho and Choripan permalink

We had dinner at Buenos Aires Nights, an Argentinean steakhouse, twice. I confess we were freaking out in the beginning to be in an indoor place without masks. But over time, we relaxed, as we observed how careful the team was. For starters, we ordered some sausage and bread and improvised our own choripan. For the mains, we had Ancho. The meat was cooked to perfection, probably one of the best I had in the UK.

Healthcheck permalink

Health is under control. Finally got my prescriptions from the GP without friction, but it required a consultation. This week I did some exercise and we walked a lot.

Weight: 98.1 kg
Food: Homemade pasta was the highlight of the week.
Drinks: Beers, wine, gin - this week my liver was working hard
Smoking: 7 Juul pods

Excellence is the best deterrent to racism or sexism. - Oprah

My blog post of the week is The Post Corona World by Matthias Horx. It is a very positive perspective of the future. He wrote this in March, and I keep reading every week as it gives me an extra boost of hope.

Good things permalink

DNA release is live with a focus on a11y permalink

This week we closed the sprint with a release on Thursday. I was proud of the team and the work—lots of small improvements and two significant changes. We now have our accessibility guidelines and a search feature.

Linsey and Kevin Telfer drafted a Content Strategy specific for a11y content. This release is our phase one. I am excited about this. Creating documentation to support developers is always a challenge. Plain language for guidelines is something we have been talking a lot.

I can’t forget how many small acts enabled this. The expression “Building on the shoulders of giants” always comes to my mind. The fantastic work that Fred and the Tetralogical team started will continue now with a new format in DNA. Onward.

Facilitation Lab #002 permalink

Had the opportunity to run another facilitation method experiment. This time we talked about ice-breakers. It was an opportunity for me to reflect on different types of ice-breakers and how to translate some of the techniques for this screen-based world.

Design Principles permalink

Another highlight of the week was a conversation about design principles. There is not too much literature and content available. One resource I found useful is the book Orchestrating Experiences.

We talked about how principles can lose their meaning. If we only focus on the conditions needed for good design to happen, they will suck. An example is the obvious "Start with user needs". The capacity to enable better decisions is pivotal. I had the same conversation before with Ben Sauer. We were organising the team offsite last year, and he shared a litmus test for this.

Principles are contextual to organisation design maturity and product-market fit stage. As there is a lot of change in the business, I am curious to see how this work will unfold. The wizard Daniel Harvey is leading on this, so we are on a good path.

Learned things permalink

Don’t forget the Alt text on Google Slides permalink

Fred Warburton reminded me about Alt Text on Google Slides one hour before a big meeting. He showed me how to do it, and I found some guidance on the Shopify UX blog on how to write alternative text. This is something I am interested to learn more about, so if you have tips, send me!

Things that bring me joy permalink

Ossobuco and my first Instagram live permalink

Ossobuco is a monthly event (and community) I co-founded in Brazil 10 years ago. Ossobuco helps people to tell their life stories, in 10 minutes. This week I joined them on Instagram, to talk about storytelling. I created a method to support people who are new to speaking in public. The conversation was about the elements that make an impactful presentation. Thum, an eternal partner in crime for crazy creative stuff, was moderating. Pedro Sangeon Gurulino, one of my favourite Brazilian artists, was also in the panel. I had the honour to support him when he delivered his first talk, and Pedro shared how this was important to his career as an artist.

Tender loving care permalink

I learned this expression with Jane Austin a few months ago. Taking care of others is a hard mission. This week I am grateful again to have Leili with me on this lockdown. She is more attentive to my health than me. And also, she bakes incredible banana cakes.

Healthcheck permalink

This week an odd episode of food poisoning got me. Later on, I had a minor leg injury. I was mad with all this bullshit, to be honest, but now I am better.

Weight: 96.7 kg Food: Good food and some deliveroo. Terrible Pizza. Drinks: No alcohol this week Smoking: 5 Juul pods

It is impossible for a man to learn what he thinks he already knows.” – Epictetus

My selected weeknote of the week is by Leanne Griffin. She is a service designer working at Citizens Advice. She wrote about storytelling, service design and good conversations.

Good things permalink

Inspiring One on Ones permalink

My previous employer had a solid Learning and Development practice. And the Sapient-Lloyds team leadership was great extending this, with virtually unlimited training budget. I learned a lot there, and specifically about One on Ones. Shalom Thomas and Jeff Collins, my former people managers at Sapient, were masters of purposeful and useful One on Ones. Is something I enjoy a lot to learn about it, as I think they have a great impact on my career.

Every week I have the privilege of meeting people that I admire. What I try to do all the time is to make myself available in a consistent way. There is no secret sauce: One on Ones every week, 30 minutes, with the right attention and intention. I try to be a good listener and help to spot patterns. I make my best to support what they want to do: agency is key. I rarely try to influence in any manner, but I ask lots of questions. Many times I have to say: “But we are talking too much about work again, let’s go back to you”.

I am surprised by the progress they are making every week. The creative ways they find to thrive. The resilience to navigate a complex organisation in and unpredictable world. I feel is a privilege to get to know them better and observe their journey.

Learned things permalink

A big smile and great questions permalink

Julia Whitney is a design leader I’ve met at Leading Design 2018. To understand her work, I recommend this talk at LX 2017, The Human Blueprint. You will have great insights about organisational change and psychological safety.

After meeting her at Leading Design, I had the opportunity to attend a few sessions with her at Babylon. After this, we talk infrequently and I follow her work closely.

I had the opportunity to catch up with her this week. I am a big fan of Julia’s communication style and sagacity. One topic that I am reflecting now after our conversation: how hard it is for me to let go of my previous skills that aren’t quite needed in my current job. I will be talking more about this in a few weeks in the DesignOps Virtual Meet-up if I beat my Impostor Syndrome.

BIPOC permalink

A few weeks ago, I was sharing with you folks about my origins and the history of my great-grandfather. This research is ongoing, and I will write more about it soon. This week, I want to share something I learned recently: the definition of BIPOC.

It’s important to remember that a lot of people others assume are “white” are in fact Indigenous, Arab, Persian, Turkish, Latinx, etc. Their identities are complicated, experiencing both the advantages of being assumed white and the prejudice against their communities, often being told they’re not “enough” of or “really” either

The article What is Racism by Rebecca Barret-Fox is a joy to read and a good starting point if you are interested to learn about racism.

Accessibility and neurodiversity permalink

This week Fred Warburton presented his accessibility work in the Manchester a11y meet-up. He will write a post about this so I will not gonna share anything about it to avoid a spoiler.

There was a bunch of other great speakers. The one I learned most was Rachel Morgan-Trimmer. She spoke about things you can do to make your information accessible for a neurodiverse audience.

The panel was quite good. All presenters answering questions from the audience. The facilitator used the traditional fishbowl technique with Miro and Zoom. I am definitely stealing this idea.

Things that bring me joy permalink

Nonsense YouTube videos and personality tests permalink

Great Friday night with Leili. We watched a funny video, where a psychologist and a quantum coach debate their practices. After that, we compared our DISC profiles and talked about dominance and compliance. With gin, of course. A curious fact: DISC personality tests were invented by the same couple who created the Wonder Woman and the techniques used today in lie detectors.

Brazilian cheese permalink

We got this huge delivery yesterday, a cheese box from Ireland. It’s a Brazilian guy living in Dublin, who managed to replicate the taste of the cheese from my home town. I’ve spent some time this morning grating the mature cheese. Leili will be working her magic preparing Pão de Queijo. Life is good.

Healthcheck permalink

I am not doing my exercises and meditation, and this is clearly affecting my sleep. Have to get back on track.

Weight: 98.1 kg Food: More delivery than expected. Drinks: 1 gin Smoking: 6 Juul pods. 3 CBD’s.

Culture isn’t a set of beliefs, it is a set of actions. Don’t listen to what they say, watch what they do - Rob England.

My selected blog/weeknote this week is from a Babylon colleague. He is an engineer with a quirk sense of humour. He wrote about his experiences working remotely in different countries and companies.

Good things permalink

1 year of DNA permalink

Approximately one year ago, DNA, our design system was created. Defining what is or what is not a design system is always a challenge. There were a few design systems initiatives in Babylon when I joined. A dozen component libraries, lots of design documentation and confluence pages.

Understanding what we had in place took me a few days. I am still grateful to everyone who helped me with conversations and documentation. I was able to understand the challenges very fast. After two weeks, I was presenting the roadmap, vision and investment proposal to the CEO, and it was approved almost instantly.

My first slide to present the idea had a citation to an old adage I still use: Standing on the shoulders of giants. I believe that the most critical part of working with design systems is community. And nothing creates community and drives adoption faster than acknowledging contributions.

One person that shares this way of thinking with me and plays a pivotal role in our Design System team is Jack Roles. He was my first hire at Babylon, referred by Chris Clarke, one of our design leaders. They worked together building the Design System team at Tesco, which is a great in terms of accessibility.

Jack is completing one year in this journey next month. Jack is a rare breed of designer. One of his qualities that I admire is that he knows how to achieve balance. He is passionate about UI aesthetics but cares about accessibility a lot. He is exceptionally talented but really, really humble. You can learn more about Jack’s work and the initial months of Babylon DNA in this blog post. Edited by Amy Hupe - and probably peer-reviewed by Linsey and Elliot - the article shows the challenges we faced when formalising NVL, our design language. You will find cool details about using Figma libraries to create consistent components and improve design documentation.

My favourite wizard permalink

Daniel Harvey just completed 3 months with us this week. Dan is our Global Creative Director and a force of nature. His laid back and soft manners are just incredible. But don’t confuse good manners with omission: Dan is always stepping in difficult conversations that can make or break good design. He writes a weekly newsletter, 20 minutes into the Future. It's a critical look at how technology is shaping our lives. Go read Dan the Wizard, you gonna love it. PS: The wizard nickname was coined by Sophy Hu, our own Phoebe Waller-Bridge, after we had another meeting with a goat.

Learned things permalink

Not doing, just talking permalink

I shared a reflection with Jane Austin this week about the time we spend talking and thinking about design. Design as a discipline, the philosophical aspects of it. An interesting topic I want to explore is the distinction between design and science. I found this gem, Philosophy of Design: An Introduction by Per Galle. He made a good point:

‘Does your “insights about design” help us improve our products, increase our share of the market, or boost the productivity of industry?’ such people might ask. If you are one of them, don’t expect me to answer ‘yes, they do’. No-one can seriously make such promises on behalf of an emerging field of research. Try instead to consider the negation of my claim: Would you be prepared to tell professional designers working for you, that understanding how to do their job is all they need while understanding what they are doing is a waste of time?

More on this next week. If you have any book or article recommendation, ping me.

Arrogant prick permalink

In my latest weeknote, I shared some bits about the results of my 360 feedback. I had some reflection and observation time in my week, so here is some oversharing.

There were consistent comments about the things I am doing well. The community aspect of my work was the winner. Psychological safety was not cited directly, but a lot of the comments were related to this, including creating space for people to share their concerns and ideas. And enabling people to do better work through coaching and support. It was important to hear people valued these things as it connects with my values.

This feedback relates to Peakon surveys. Peakon is a tool that helps managers to understand culture and engagement. In Peakon we have criteria called “Freedom of Opinion”. One of the questions we ask to check this is: “At work, my opinions seem to count”. My current score is a perfect 10.

On the improvement areas, there was one new thing that stood out for me. A comment that sometimes “I can get dogmatic”. I confess I panicked when I read this. I did some detective work and talked with a few more people to understand.

One person that I had a follow-up was Amy Hupe. She is someone I trust a lot, and we worked together for about four months. She left the company recently; thus, her perspective was unique. Amy’s ability to clarify things is remarkable.

One lesson that I learned talking with her: I need to create more space for people to learn by themselves.

Reflecting on this has been great. There is a conflict in the feedback, and it’s okay. I do think my belief that things can be better all the time needs some fine-tuning. But I also aware of the costs of code-switching and my communication challenges. I can’t ignore that after almost 4 years, I am still learning how to work in the UK. Dealing with the subtleties and lack of directness is new for me, I am sometimes confused. It feels sometimes like I am living in a WH1 episode.

Accepting constructive criticism is an art. The beautiful thing about it is that over time this learning becomes a treasure. Some of the things I always keep in mind in each feedback round.

1. How to digest feedback without running my confidence
2. How to use the feedback to help me focus on my growth areas - the things that matter to me, beyond my current job.
3. How to own my progress, building up my intrinsic motivation

This reflection led me to a refreshing conversation with Leili that was life-changing. With her radical candour, she said: “Sometimes you can sound a bit arrogant”. It was the first time someone calls out my arrogance.

Her choice of words made a lot of sense for me. It gave me a new context to frame things. My communication style can affect people as well, and I can improve this. Finding more flexibility, being more balanced. I am grateful for all the lovely people who inspire me to be a better person. Onward.

Things that bring me joy permalink

Celebrating Gilberto Gil birthday permalink

Gilberto Gil is an inspiring musician, artist and thinker. This week, people around the globe celebrated his birthday. Artists around the world met online to record a song that I love: Andar com Fé.

Gil is so relevant that even international artists joined the celebration. Stevie Wonder, David Byrne, Almodovar and Sting are just a few.

At home, we listened to his songs. And we danced forró in our living room. Long live to Gil, the culture hacker who transformed Brazilian culture. My song of the week is his version of Bob Marley's epic Three Little Birds. The 3D animation, by the talented Seagull Fly folks is a piece of art.

Getting cool swag on the mail permalink

Last March, I attended training in remote working practices, with a focus on async methods and distributed teams. The Officeless team is just awesome. This morning, I received a sweet package of stickers and a cure notebook. Beautiful, huh? I love purple.

Healthcheck permalink

Just 20 minutes of meditation this week and about one hour of exercise.

Weight: 98.9 kg Food: Lot’s of healthy and delicious food this week. Drinks: One gin Smoking: 8 Juul pods. 4 CBD

“The difference between ordinary and extraordinary is that little extra.” Jimmy Johnson

Good things permalink

Organising my first social for the DNA team permalink

One of the things I love most about agile is the dedication to rituals. Socials are a special one for me. One of the sweetest memories I have about working in the UK: a social with the LBG Commercial Banking team. I prepared 23 caipirinhas that day.

I joined the DNA team social this week. No drinks, but I guess was not bad. Our former Product Manager and content wizard Amy Hupe was the special guest. We also had the cute goats Shakin’ Susan, Cuthbert and Daisy on zoom.

a11y and design operations on stage permalink

Fred Warburton will share his journey in accessibility next month. Fred’s experience is impressive and touching, and I had the privilege to watch him practising his talk.

I am also lined-up for a talk in July. BT and Capital One are hosting the first DesignOps Virtual Meet-up in London. The original invitation was a few months ago, but COVID happened.

For a few weeks now I am collecting ideas and facts to write this talk. It has been an interesting reflection exercise. I will share my ramblings about design management, culture and community 23rd of July. Tickets are free.

Learned things permalink

Feedback loops, servant leadership and mercury retrograde permalink

360 performance review results were out this week. I also joined retros for two different teams, and some patterns are quite revealing. Collaboration, community, organisation and documentation are some common topics.

One piece of feedback shared by my teammates was intriguing, and I decided to call Rahel Bailie after work. Rahel, as always, listened to me with her candour, patience and positivism. Her jokes about astrology made my day.

Equality and Equity permalink

Adobe 99u Conference happened this week. I watched Antionette D. Carroll talk. She is the founder of the Creative Reaction Lab in St. Louis, Missouri. Her speech was superb, and it felt like being struck by lightning:

Those who are most directly impacted by inequities are also closest to the approaches to address them

Things that bring me joy permalink

Souza origins and the detective work permalink

I had a few more conversations with my dad and my aunt Celia about my ancestors. We are still trying to find more stories about my great-grandfather Bernardino. My dad shared with me an interesting fact about him. In his late life, he adopted Candomblé as his religion. Candomblé mixes Roman Catholicism and Yoruba, a traditional West African religion. The rituals are exotic, and there is no concept of good or evil.

Banzo and Girls from Ipanema permalink

After an intense week at work, I was still wired Friday night. Leili noticed my disorientation. She distracted me with fantastic food, music and good conversations.

We watched the first episode of Girls from Ipanema. It’s a Netflix original production set in 1950s Rio de Janeiro. The life of four strong women fighting against sexism, racism and inequality. The lead character, Malu, opens a nightclub after being abandoned by her husband. A perfect excuse for the producers to introduce amazing music in the series. Great interpretation of jazz classics, bossa nova and Samba. Highly recommended - but not appropriate for watching with kids.

After that, she introduced me to a few new brazilian musicians. Here is part of her selection:

A Cor é Rosa Silva Banho de Folhas Luedji Luna Zero Liniker

Two excellent words are familiar to any Brazil expat. The first one is saudade - which is missing someone or something you love. The other one is banzo [1]. Talking with Leili triggered both. Sharing that banzo with Leili made me reflect how lucky I am. Having someone that loves you and makes you feel comfortable in any situation or place is a privilege.

And to make things even better, our delivery from the Brazilian shop arrived. A great weekend ahead, indeed. Two words: Farofa de Banana.

Healthcheck permalink

My immunity is a bit low, but I am sleeping well.

Weight: 98.1 kg
Food: This week had more healthy stuff and less delivery food.
Drinks: Two glasses of wine
Smoking: 10 Juul pods and 3 CBD

"Ask what makes you come alive and go do it. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive". Howard Thurman

1. The psychological process caused by the removal from culture that put black slaves from Africa, transported to distant lands, into an initial state of arousal followed by impulses of rage and destruction and then a deep nostalgia that induced apathy, starving and, quite often, madness or death. Houaiss”

I try to recommend a weeknote here every week. This week I will share a blog instead. Allison Coward is strategist, trainer and workshop facilitator. She writes fantastic articles in her blog. Her book, A Pocket Guide To Effective Workshops is a delicious treasure trove of tips to improve your facilitation skills.

Good Things permalink

Content first, please permalink

My week was full of great surprises working with the content team. It started with some good work sessions with Linsey, Chris Brunner and Kevin.

And with joy I accepted the invitation to attend the Content guild chapter offsite, Content Day. A great session with two external speakers and smooth facilitation by our Rahel 'Content Empress' Bailie.

She rocked, even with the usual Zoom crashes. I've learned a lot about localisation, and we had exciting conversations about plain language, readability score methodologies, personality types and team shapes.

Adoption, bets and life in product permalink

We are now half-way through sprint 3. Release notes are ready for the next release and we have a good idea about what comes next. From a product perspective, we have been doing well. The team is so rad and they keep surprising me. We also have been receiving so much support from Content, Design Managers and developers that I am impressed. Spontaneous adoption is happening. Teams are now reaching out to start using our design system and are excited about creating and improving documentation.

In one of these conversations, I was asked to find the original investment proposal for DNA. It was interesting to reread and reflect about our progress. The way we shaped our initial bets and measurement strategies was fairly right. We still have lots to improve, but it felt good. Product Management in systems feels like an infinite game of Tetris. But we had some good moments and we are collecting the benefits.

Elliot Greaves, our talented Front End engineer, can be credit for a a lot of this success. He was my third hire on the DNA team. I learn so much stuff with him, I am even interested in coding again after so many years. He found a new job and is leaving the company soon. I will miss his work ethics, collaboration skills, curiosity and devotion to make everything great.

Learned things permalink

The balance on participation and facilitation permalink

Had a few challenges while facilitating sessions this week. Two lessons learned. Number one is improve my ability to read the room. And second, being more intentional about clarifying structure, agenda and the role of facilitation. And this remind me of Dr.Hu's Radical Clarity which is now another post-it note in my monitor.

Peer mentoring permalink

I've met Justin Stach this week for a chat. He is a design leader that I respect a lot. He is sharp, honest and a great communicator. We have shared interest in many things and similar challenges in working in scale-ups. We also have two great designers in our common network: Jack Roles and Deborah Nogueira.

We discussed many topics. Remote work, agile, designers becoming product people. And the ethical challenges for design in late capitalism.

It was an open and honest conversation. Talking with someone that doesn't have skin in the same game as you is helpful. Perspective is a blessing. He reminded me that what matters is to have fun and enjoy the work.

Agile, Design and Strategy permalink

Designers have their brains wired with the double diamond. Navigating ambiguity, politics and possible futures is part of their skillset. Architects love to discuss ways of solving a specific problem. Developers prefer to start with clarity: what we can ship and iterate. So each discipline has its planning processes and expectations about envisioning and planning. The lack of shared language sometimes moves the focus on only optimisation - between disciplines and feature teams.

We tend to see the world through our discipline lens and bias. The role of Product is to create the balancing act. Its ok to disagree and commit.

That is why strategy is a different animal. A conversation debt needs acknowledgment before moving forward. Alignment and attention are key. You need to surrender the past to create space for imagination. In the book Intertwingled, Peter Morville shared one of the reasons why this can be hard to achieve sometimes:

We plan events, trips, families, sites, systems, companies, and cities. We do it all the time but make the same mistakes. First, we procrastinate. We fear complexity, so we start too late. Then, in a hurry, we split ideas and execution into phases or roles. We draw lines in our minds that segregate. The binary oppositions of think-do and plan-build are myths. Like yin and yang, these seemingly separate forces interrelated and entangled.

Strategy is a beast - you have to find the joy of not knowing things and ask too many questions. This is usually uncomfortable. Rob Campell recently shared this gem on twitterthat touchs in the nerve:

Strategy is inherently political because strategy is about what is going on in culture and politics is always entrenched in that. If some strategists think politics isn't part of culture or culture isn't part of strategy, they've got some really big issues they need to work on.

A black swan event just happened. The global crisis makes predictions just silly. So no matter how smart you think you are, you gonna be wrong. Optimism is a starting, energy to adapt and perseverance goes a long way. There are many ways. But there is no Way of Ways, unfortunately.

Things that bring me joy permalink

Valentines Day with her permalink

12th of June is Valentines in Brazil. I forgot to buy flowers, and Leili was a bit disappointed. But we celebrated anyway. We danced, shared a gin and watched This is Us. Tears and smiles. So much love in that show...

Tai-chi permalink

I am practising Tai-chi for about a month now. The choreography is more natural for me, and I can focus on breathing and slowing down my movements. It's remarkable how this exercise disconnects me from the world. I rarely keep any habit related to fitness, so I am so happy with this.

Discovering the BBC catalogue permalink

After a long time, I finally decided to pay for a TV license. I could not see much value before, as I have many streaming options and not enough time. But I could not afford not to watch Killing Eve. I asked #lazytwitter recommendations for BBC shows, and I got some great suggestions from Dr Rosie and a Brazilian friend. Here is the list of suggested BBC shows and will be watching next:

• Inside Number 9
• Happy Valley
• Devs
• Line of Duty
• Peaky Blinders
• Gavin & Stacey

Healthcheck permalink

Some pain in the back and neck, due to ergonomic problems in my home office setup. Meditation and painkillers helped me with this.

Weight: 98.5 kg
Food: Some junk food but not too many. Dishoom, Honest. Delicious cake in the saturday.
Drinks: A gin
Smoking: 12 Juul pods. Trialling CBD.

"A man who has no imagination has no wings." Muhammad Ali

Good things permalink

Sprint 3, Marie Curie permalink

DNA team rocket my boat again this week. Despite the immense complexity of the work, it is clear how much we evolved this week in terms of internal coherence. It was a joy to observe all things getting together, sliced and groomed in sprints. The next milestone is crystal clear: to improve access to our accessibility documentation for developers, designers and QA Analysts. To get there, we will revamp the Information Architecture and enhance the way we create and store content. I am thrilled about this.

In related good news, our component library was updated this week, with no breaking changes in production. And in our design system weekly meet-up, we had significant progress with design tokens. Excellent attendance and contribution from designers and developers and fruitful and structured conversations.

ZoomVJ permalink

Everyone is spending a lot of time in zoom meetings. I'm trying to make every meeting or workshop an opportunity for enjoyment. Is part of my learning journey on facilitation skills. My pillars are: enabling good conversations, practicing deep listening, creating structure and goal setting.I also think that facilitation role in inclusion and allowing space for authentic conversations is much needed. This week was positive, and I felt like I was doing a good job. I am also now measuring satisfaction on some of the ceremonies.

Next week I will share with the team a short talk about practical workshops. I am glad it will be an opportunity to share what I have been learning.

Unplanned 1–1 with Dr Hu permalink

Sophy Hu is a young, talented British doctor. I have a deep respect for her work. Like me, she is a generalist. She writes, designs and she gets AI in healthcare like a handful of people in the UK. We had a long, joyful conversation about work and many other things. Sophy's sense of humour is incredible. I always learn something new about Babylon when talking with her - she is one of the first 100 Babylonians. We talked about productivity, how doctors take notes, strategy and the best cities in the UK for hipsters.

Learned things permalink

Spotting the pattern permalink

The past few days have been very hard. Not only because of what is happening in the US, but also because of the scenario in my country. Just for context, a brazilian dies by Covid every minute and the government decided to stop updating the statistics. I caught myself worrying too much and crying sometimes.

The learning for me is that when I spot earlier my lousy brain trying to take over, It's easy to fight back. I am finding relief with therapy, meditation, exercises and talking with friends.

Place of Speech, Standpoint Theory and the Black leaders I follow permalink

In Brazilian Portuguese, we have an expression: "Lugar de Fala". The meaning is weakly represented in the academic circles in Standpoint Theory. Short version is:

A standpoint is a place from which we view the world that determines what we focus on as well as what we don't know. The social groups we belong to shape how we see the world and how we communicate societal inequalities generate distinctive accounts of the world

Interestingly, you will not find any mention or references to the Brazilian Brazilian Black feminist, journalist, and philosopher Djamila Ribeiro's original concept in the English wikipedia.

A shortcut to understand Place of Speech is to explore related concepts. The Spiral of silence is one that resonated with me:

Individuals have a fear of isolation. This fear of isolation consequently leads to remaining silent instead of voicing opinions.

Many people will not feel in a position to talk about racism and Black Lives Matter. Besides being a person of colour, I don't think is my place of speech. I have too many privileges: I am a male, educated, employed and living in a posh neighbourhood. A few times I have been affected by racism. I have been offended many times, but never been beaten by a cop.

I am confused. I don't know yet if there is a right/wrong way of engaging in this subject. But complete silent is not an option. I am educating myself, donating and trying to keep my mouth shut. If you want to educate yourself I recommend following the amazing black women who are in the front lines of this debate and speaking truth to power on the web:

Tatiana Mac

Viviane Castillo

Antionette Carrol

Things that bring me joy permalink

Brazilian literature permalink

I've found a piece of article news about Machado de Assis and the successful launch of his book in the US. He is the most famous Brazilian writer. He was also the founder of the Brazilian Academy of Letters. That got me in a beautiful rabbit hole searching about his life. I found this paper about his work, racial identity and racism.

He was in a very shitty situation. He needed to protect his job and love for literature while writing about an unfair society:

Some of his contemporaries criticised Machado for not writing more openly about the evils of slavery. And yet, for the grandson of freed slaves writing for a predominantly slave-owning elite, we are left in little doubt about what a controversial and sensitive subject it was for Machado, or where his sympathies lay.

From the book The Collected Stories of Machado de Assis

Machado was so important and famous that he was not considered a black person by the elite. Until recently, his official photo was whitewashed.

I had a great conversation about his books and Brazilian literature with Leili. We both read many of his books. It was a joy to remember classics like Dom Casmurro and Memórias Póstumas de Brás Cubas.

Getting to know about my origins permalink

I messaged my father this week to understand a bit more about my blackness. My raw question: "What about our ancestors?". He shared a picture and the story of my great-grandfather, Bernardino. Bernardino was a son of freed slaves, who joined the army to fight against Lampião. I am now really excited to dig his story with my father.

Healthcheck permalink

Weight: 97 kg
Food: 3 days of eating Deliveroo food. Some good bits. Too much sugar
Drinks: A glass of wine
Smoking: 15 Juul pods.

Quote of the week permalink

A champion is defined not by their wins, but by how many times they recover when they fall.

Serena Williams

On a positive note, I had a moment of joy reading something unedited things that I wrote 10 weeks ago. It is nice when you past self sends you that bit of insight. It renewed my energy to keep doing this.

My random #weeknote of the week is from Eero, a designer who works at @nordkapp. What I liked about his weeknote it is because it is full of design goodies. He shares the weekly highlights for each team member and cool design links. The one that got my attention was about Fiskars, a (real) product design that won the Red Dot awards. Hooray to Finnish design! Onward.

Good things permalink

Back to basics permalink

With Amy Hupe's early departure, the DNA Design System needed an interim Product Manager. So I was happy to join the team again and help to reshape/refresh the backlog. They are so talented and united! This week, we worked together to improve the Design System information architecture. The goal is to support a new platform and provide better accessibility documentation. Linsey, Elliot and Jack provided great perspectives that helped me a lot. Information Architecture is about contexts. It was such a joy to work with them and discover more about theirs. I got the opportunity to do some wireframing and content design, but I feel really rusty. More news about this next week.

Interviewing smart people permalink

One of the perks of my job is interviewing people. We are not hiring as much as we need, but we are recruiting for a few specific positions. I interviewed three incredible people for the Product Manager role in the last two weeks. Diverse backgrounds and experiences. A pattern I spotted: All candidates were so honest and open and asked hard questions. This is something I value a lot.

Super Warbz, Accessibility Lead permalink

He works so hard that I am sure he hadn't shared in public yet. So the breaking news: Fred Warburton got promoted to Accessibility Lead! We joined on the same day at Babylon. A few months later, we started to work together in Design Operations. His progress is incredible: he created a new practice, trained hundreds of people and defined new standards. He worked in strategic plans and business cases. At the same time, he worked in hundreds of QA tickets to make sure everything was right. It's a pleasure to see that his work has been recognised. Now he is moving to his next chapter, and I am honoured to help him in such an incredible mission. Elevating our inclusive design practices and making every possible experience accessible, starting with digital.

Learned things permalink

Self-care permalink

My boss and mentor Jane Austin is out, recovering from a surgery. While she is away, I feel privileged to have people like Daniel Harvey to support me. Dan's ability to be pragmatic and at the same time empathetic and positive is refreshing. This week we had great conversations. One specific thing about self-care was an important reminder for myself. Thanks, Mr. Harvey.

**ResearchOps permalink

This week Emma Boulton invited me to watch the Global Design Operations conference. I watched a few talks live. Some good stuff and the feeling that design teams across the globe have the same problems. Her talk was really, really good. She shared her practical approach in Research Operations. Having the full context of the work and the opportunity to observe how someone really talented talks about it is great. I am sure the knowledge she shared will be very helpful to many in the near future, including myself. It was also a great opportunity to reflect about the impact of research operations in the experience design community at Babylon. Emma is excellent, a great speaker and a wonderful human.

Metacognition permalink

I am always helping the teams with reflective practices, as this is part of the job of a design leader. But I never had the chance to explore and learn about how individuals learn and think. One thing that I am interested in is Metacognition. Is about thinking about thinking. The strategies and mechanisms that help you to learn. An interesting subject that I am exploring next. I recommend the article Getting started with Metacognition if you are curious.

Things that bring me joy permalink

Having the right excuse for shopping permalink

Boris decided to open the country again, besides scientific advice. I can't be flexible as my risk factors are too high. One of the things I miss a lot is exceptional coffee. So we decided to invest in an espresso machine. It started wrong, with me trying to surprise Leili with a Delonghi model. She hated. We returned the next day. After many hours watching YouTube videos, reading reviews, and debating we finally made a decision: Sage Bambino. Can't wait to learn the dark arts of the perfect espresso.

Getting used to exercising permalink

This week was incredible from a perspective of sticking to a plan. I might be starting to enjoy physical activity. I had at least 30 minutes of lightweight cardio every day. Big progress for me.

Health check permalink

The week before, I thought I was having COVID-19, but the fever is gone. I still have some strange pains in my body and stomach. I am recovering, for sure. But following up with my GP next week anyway. The practice is allowing video consultations but removed the ability to book online.

Weight: 96.5 kg (significant progress from last week)
Food: Some healthy stuff. We are back on track this week, and we didn't order too much on Deliveroo. I bought some fantastic mangoes from a Spitalfields vendor.
Drinks: One beer
Smoking: 20 Juul pods.

“Nothing in life is to be feared, it is only to be understood. Now is the time to understand more, so that we may fear less.” - Marie Curie

My favourite weeknote this week is Amy Hupe's update about her health incident. She also shares her perspective on healthcare and inequality. Good stuff.

Good things permalink

A calm week and good progress permalink

After a week away from work, I felt a bit out of loop and slow. It was refreshing to observe excellent progress in many workstreams. Also, it got me thinking a lot about how things change fast. Catching up was a massive effort.

Learned things permalink

Enthusiasm is the key \

There is real magic in enthusiasm. It spells the difference between mediocrity and accomplishment.

• Norman Vincent Peale \

Process and capability goes a long way, but enthusiasm can't be ignored. Fred Warbz inspired me again this week with his pragmatism and clear intention. It was also beautiful to read all the great posts about the Global Accessibility Awareness Day, an online movement that is creating an amazing positive change.

Things that bring me joy permalink

Tai Chi and Box permalink

I am famous for hating any kind of exercise. Cycling was the only exception. I hate the gym environment for many reasons. I never tried classes that interest me because of this. In the last few days, I learned more about box and tai-chi, activities that I wanted to try for years. I have been practising every day in VR. It feels good, but a bit odd. For a self guided experience, that is helping me to create a good habit, I think VR is being very effective and cheap.

The best one permalink

Leili, as always, is my rock and my lighthouse. This week she was extra supportive and lovely. She surprises me every day with her small acts of kindness.

Books permalink

I am reading many books at the same time. Asimov's Naked Sun is the one I like most. The parallels with our current social isolation reality are shocking. I was laughing (and also worried) while reading a part where the hero struggles when visiting someone who was isolated for years. The way Asimov describes the character reactions and emotions is brilliant. I discovered as well that the BBC filmed a version in 1969 and it got lost or wiped out. Cool story. I will now try to find the Out of Unknown series.

Health check permalink

This Thursday, I felt COVID-19 like symptoms for the first time. I was freaking out. Fever, pain in the body and some crazy stomach bug. I am feeling better, but I will test again as recommended by the GP.

Weight: 100.0 kg
Food: Too much delivery food and chocolate this week.
Drinks: Gin and one beer
Smoking: 12 Juul pods

Good things permalink

Enjoying my break permalink

At the beginning of my break, I decided to block all work-related content. Slack and Outlook deleted from all devices. Some twitter filters. Locking my computer in a cabinet. Living with less information is hard.

Learned things permalink

Decompressing takes time permalink

I thought that I could switch off from work fast. While I am not waking up everyday 4-5 am, I am still thinking a lot about it. Lesson learned: from now on, at least two weeks.

Things that bring me joy permalink

Spring Staycation in silent London permalink

As everyone, I follow the government guidance strictly, and I am staying at home all the time. And with the break, my only plan was to enjoy this time doing nothing. Listening audio-books, taking pictures, eating Tiramisu. Appreciating small moments with Leili and being present. Staycations are good.

VR is better than ever imagined permalink

I have significant reservations about some Facebook products. I have been trying to shut down my Facebook account for years without success. A lot of my friends and family only use Facebook as a social media channel, and I don’t want to lose contact. When I was looking for a VR headset, this was a big concern: getting stuck in a platform. After a lot of research, I decided to try the Oculus Quest VR headset. I am impressed.

Oculus Quest interaction design is a masterpiece. Two highlights for me: The guardian and the sound design. Guardian is how you set up boundaries in your virtual environment. It helps you to protect yourself from hitting things in the real world. The interface metaphor is brilliant and effective. Getting in and out of the immersive experience is so smooth that you feel in complete control. The sound equipment is also a great surprise. I don’t think it is binaural, but it feels like it. The ambient sound quality is incredible. When the game joins up haptic feedback with sound is impossible, your full attention is captured in a very interesting way.

I have tried many apps. The two I enjoyed most are Tripp (meditation experience) and the Tai Chi virtual class. Highly recommended. I am sure therapeutic uses of VR will be really important in the near future.

Leili is also enjoying a lot, which is rare - she doesn’t jump with happiness with a new gadget. The only video game she liked until now was the Nintendo Wii. She spent a few hours beating a giant boxer on Creed, dancing and even shooting some spaceships.

Health check permalink

I am having trouble with my GP practice when getting prescriptions for a while. Due to the COVID crisis, the practice finally allowed me to choose an online pharmacy. Still required me two calls and two emails. Let’s see.

Weight: 98.0 kg Food: We considered this a vacation week, so I ate all the things unhealthy and delicious. Drinks: 2 Gin and Tonic, a Caipirinha and a beer Smoking: 12 Juul pods