Vitaly Friedman

Great design delivers value to users faster. In my Glaringly Obvious conversation with Thomas Sutton, he made the case that product design teams must clearly define what design quality means, own it, and connect it directly to both user and business value. Without this clarity, design risks being misunderstood, undervalued, and ineffective. Love the conversation, check it out: https://lnkd.in/gVTU5jS5 Thomas’s product design quality framework maps a causal chain: → If design, technology, and support are good, people use the product. → If people use it and it works, you get product outcomes like user benefit, business value, and systemic impact. But here’s where it got me thinking: the speed of that chain matters. → Time to value for users How quickly someone feels the product is usable, useful, and enjoyable. → Time to create value for users   How fast the team can release improvements that increase that value. These two clocks run in parallel. When teams reduce the lag between user benefit and product iteration, design signals become clearer, trust builds faster, and business value compounds sooner. When they drift apart, users wait too long to see progress, and teams stall in endless refinement. In my conversations, here are some of the reasons decisions slow down: 1. Teams wait too long to test ideas, losing momentum. 2. They don’t have fast, clear ways to see what’s working. 3. Design work gets stuck in narrow solutions or tech limitations. 4. Research is incomplete, feedback overlooked, or siloed. 5. Too much refinement, not enough real signals. 6. Confirmation bias clouds decisions. 7.  Leaders struggle to align on user needs vs. business goals. 8. Limited resources stall iteration. That’s where collecting the right signals comes in. In our open framework Glare, we use UX metrics like usability, usefulness, and sentiment to quickly test whether design quality is landing. Helio helps us gather the metrics. They shorten both timelines: showing where users already get value, and where teams must act to deliver more. Building on Thomas’s framework: design quality goes beyond end outcomes. Quality also ensures the path to those outcomes is fast, clear, and measurable. #productdesign #uxmetrics #productdiscovery #uxresearch

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This is very interesting and shows vision. The fragmented landscape of tools for US citizens and international users are not nearly good enough. Fundamentals like a unified and polished design system with UX telemetry (anonymized) and with basics like IAM and federated log in might make the biggest short term impact. My hope is that it is focused on everyday beautiful essentials and is fully non-partisan. Democracy and access are the greatest opportunities here.. Ben Sheppard shared this in another thread and gave a UK perspective (thanks). https://lnkd.in/eDrMWdWe. @bensh

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Why I don’t ask people to think aloud in evaluative research 💭 The ‘think aloud’ method has been a staple of usability testing for decades. But in my experience, the way a lot of researchers use it can introduce some issues: 🚫 Some participants take it too literally, narrating every tiny action. This isn’t how they’d behave at home. 🚫 It makes an already unnatural setting feel even less realistic. 🚫 Once someone starts overanalysing, it’s very hard to bring them back. Instead: ✅ Most participants will talk naturally if you just observe them. ✅ If they’re quiet, you can nudge with simple prompts like “what are you thinking?” I’ve found this leads to more authentic behaviour and better insights than briefing people to ‘think aloud’ from the start. 📨 I cover this in more detail in this week's Desk Notes, my free newsletter. Link in the comments.

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🌱 Tools & Practices in UX Design for Sustainability – Part 1: Systems Mapping When we design products or services, we don’t just shape user interactions – we influence entire systems. Systems Mapping helps us uncover which components make up our system, how they are connected, and what direct and indirect – both social and ecological – impacts our design decisions can have. ✨ Why it’s powerful: ➕ Visualizes complex relationships ➕ Reveals second- and third-order effects ➕ Anticipates unintended consequences 💡 Example: A video-based social network → More time spent on social media → less time studying/socializing (–) → Less time studying/socializing → decreasing mental health (-) → Lower mental health → more time spent on social media (+) By mapping these connections, we make more informed and sustainable design choices. 🧠 Want to dive deeper? This method (and many more) is explained in detail in the book chapter “Werkzeuge und Praktiken für Nachhaltigkeit im UX Design” I co-authored together with Thorsten Jonas and Martin Tomitsch. The chapter and the book (User Experience Design und Sustainability) are currently available in German only 🇩🇪. ----- 📖 References: Clasen, K., Jonas, T., & Tomitsch, M. (2025). Werkzeuge und Praktiken für Nachhaltigkeit im UX Design. In O. Lange & K. Clasen (Hrsg.), User Experience Design und Sustainability: Status Quo verstehen – Zukunft gestalten (S. 79–108). Springer Vieweg. Tomitsch, M., & Baty, S. (2023). Designing Tomorrow – Strategic Design Tactics to Change Your Practice, Organisation & Planetary Impact, BIS Publishers. Tomitsch, M., Borthwick, M., Ahmadpour, N., Cooper, C., Frawley, J., Hepburn, L.A., Kocaballi, A.B., Loke, L., Núñez-Pacheco, C., Straker, K., & Wrigley, C. (2021). Design. Think. Make. Break. Repeat. A Handbook of Methods (revised ed.). BIS Publishers.

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In current mainstream design practices, chiefs manage strategies to support the business model, design leaders manage the design process, and senior/junior designers deliver a product (or service, environment, system, etc.). In this context, design leaders and designers have to prioritize identifying profitable biases to deliver a product that captures value. However, the generation of value for people is often limited, and they have to endure a product that often deceives them. In a desirable mainstream design practice, design leaders and designers are more strategic and manage up by questioning and influencing their managers. Designers would be more effective at gathering actionable human insights, and people would become collaborators. In this view, people desire products that satisfy them.

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Design Systems should evolve — but with intention. I just published a new article about the Design System Contribution Process — how to propose new components, avoid duplication, and keep consistency intact across products. Start with the problem Reuse before reinventing Propose non-breaking, well-documented changes I also included a great visual flowchart from Helsinki Design System that helps teams make better decisions. 👉 Read it here:https://lnkd.in/d9agFNpQ #DesignSystems #UXDesign #ProductDesign #DesignOps #ComponentLibrary #DesignProcess #MediumArticle

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Excited to share a new chapter I co-authored ✨ "Wellbeing-Centered UX: Supporting Content Moderators" In Trust & Safety, we talk a lot about protecting communities. This work reminds us that the people behind the tools matter too. Trust and Safety experts face some of the hardest challenges online, and the way we design their tools directly impacts both their wellbeing and the quality of their decisions. Our chapter explores how applying UX principles — clarity, usability, and a focus on human needs — can make Trust & Safety systems more sustainable and humane. I’m deeply grateful to the Trust and Safety Foundation for the opportunity to contribute to their book "Trust, Safety, and the Internet We Share: Multistakeholder Insights" and for fostering a space where design, research, and policy intersect. I see this as part of an ongoing conversation: how can UX and Trust & Safety continue to learn from each other? I’d love to hear how others are thinking about designing for the people who keep our platforms safe. Leaving the link to the pre-print of the chapter, as well as many others from the book (which will be out later in 2025) in comment below. 

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