0:08

Hello and welcome to making Ux work

0:10

that give good UX podcast. I'm

0:12

your host, Jonah. Totally. And our focus

0:14

here is on folks like you doing a real

0:16

often unglamorous UX work in the

0:18

real world. You'll hear about their

0:20

struggles, their successes, and their journey

0:23

to and through the trenches of product

0:25

design, development, and of course, user

0:27

experience. My

0:30

guest today is Jason Ogle, who describes

0:32

himself as a passionate user defender

0:35

fighting for users who are victims of

0:37

bad design decisions. He's

0:39

an influential podcaster who's amazing

0:41

user defenders podcast is continuing

0:43

to inspire and equip and audience of hungry,

0:45

ambitious designers and Ux

0:47

years. Jason believes in failing

0:50

early and learning off it. And as you'll hear,

0:52

every single one of those failures has only

0:54

pushed him to bigger, better,

0:56

and more incredible things. Jason

0:59

Oval in all things has truly

1:02

turned a mess into a message.

1:05

Here's my conversation with Jason

1:07

Ogle on making Ux work. So

1:10

Jason, how are you?

1:12

Hey, quite well Joe. I am just

1:14

starting my morning here. I am

1:16

a morning guy, so I, I'm really,

1:19

I love the mornings man. And I like

1:21

Mondays too. I'm weird.

1:23

Wow. I aspire to both those

1:25

things I have never been able to

1:27

achieve either. Were

1:30

you always that way or did that develop

1:32

over time?

1:33

Not at all. No. I was a night owl for

1:36

a long time and then I heard

1:38

Episode One 50th Pat Flynn, smart

1:40

passive income podcast, and

1:42

it changed my life quite literally a

1:44

he in a nutshell. He

1:47

talked about how he became a morning person,

1:49

uh, by following Hal Elrod, the guy

1:51

who wrote the book called Miracle Morning, which

1:53

I've been reading. Interesting. Oh my goodness.

1:56

Uh, I think your next brother may be,

2:00

I'm telling you it's, it's radical.

2:02

I love it.

2:03

So out of curiosity, I mean, tell me

2:05

more about that. When did you start sort of

2:07

changing your, your morning habits and how hard

2:09

was it to do that at the beginning?

2:11

Yeah, so 2015 was

2:13

the year that it all began for me, my, my

2:15

manager. We were talking about podcasts.

2:17

I just started listening to podcasts.

2:20

Like I actually, let me take that back. I listened

2:22

back in like the

2:25

mid nineties, like when podcasts were brand new. I listened for

2:28

awhile and then I stopped. And then, um,

2:30

I started getting into it again because of my commute.

2:33

And my manager told me, he's like, have you heard

2:35

of Pat Flynn? Smart passive income podcast?

2:37

I said, no, heaven. He's like, oh, it's, it's

2:39

great. You know, it's great for entrepreneurs, it's great

2:41

for personal growth people, you know, all that.

2:44

And I, and I had just kind of begun my personal

2:46

growth journey. Um, I've been trying to kind

2:48

of develop my brain and my knowledge and

2:50

to, to try to help people. And so I

2:53

was like, okay, I'm going to check it out. And it was a Friday, I

2:55

remember, and I, the first episode that I downloaded

2:57

was episode one 50. It was the very first

3:00

one I heard. And it's him basically talking

3:02

about how he started a morning routine

3:04

and it's just really changed everything for him. I'm

3:06

like, you know what, I think this is what's been missing

3:09

in my life and I think this is what I need to do. And

3:11

so I said, I commit Monday, I'm

3:13

starting this and Monday came, I

3:15

woke up at 5:00 AM, which is unheard

3:18

of for me. And I did it. And I'm not

3:20

kidding you. It felt like Christmas morning.

3:22

Wow.

3:22

It just, it was quiet, it

3:24

was dark. And it was just like, I

3:27

just like, I woke up for me. And that's

3:29

the difference Joe and listeners,

3:31

it's how often do we wake up for others.

3:34

We wake up for our jobs, we

3:36

wake up, I'm sure you know, for

3:38

our family, which is good, is important of course.

3:40

But here's, here's the thing and here's what I really learned

3:42

is that we can't pour an empty vessel

3:44

into another. Right? So we

3:47

got to fill our cup in order to actually have

3:49

something to give to others. And so

3:51

that's, that's really when it began for me. I woke up for myself,

3:54

I had my quiet time, you know, I

3:56

had some meditation time for me, which

3:58

is scripture reading and prayer and, and also

4:00

like, you know, doing some journaling. I do the five

4:02

minute journal, which has been really, really instrumental

4:04

as well. And then I go into some physical

4:06

fitness and um, and it really, I'm

4:09

telling you to change my life. Like wicked it for me

4:11

filling up my cup and just kind of getting,

4:13

um, fit, not, not just physically button, but mentally.

4:16

I lost 40 pounds in like six months

4:18

and user defenders podcast was a result

4:20

of my morning routine. I'm not kidding.

4:22

Yeah, I can, I can believe that.

4:23

Yeah. I was driving to work one day and, and

4:26

then I just had this idea, you know, and this

4:28

is actually scientific Joe. There's, there's a

4:30

chemical that's released in when you

4:32

exercise, there's a chemical release called BDNF

4:35

and that stands for brain derived neurotropic

4:37

factor and that that is a chemical

4:39

that is only released when you sweat and kind

4:41

of do an exercise. And what it does is

4:43

it opens new neuropathways and it lends

4:45

to new ideas. I'm not kidding. And I was

4:47

like, this makes so much sense now I

4:50

realized that this is what I need to do. I need to start

4:52

a podcast to help, especially

4:54

a up and coming designers to

4:56

stay inspired and equipped in this

4:58

ever evolving field.

5:00

Yeah, I totally believe that it for two

5:02

reasons. Number one, like I said, I've been reading how's

5:04

book and I'm sort of flirting with this

5:06

in the morning. I'm not very disciplined, I'm going to be honest,

5:08

but the Times that I've done it, it has certainly

5:11

made a difference in the clarity that I have

5:13

throughout the day. And that's the first

5:16

thing. The second thing is that what's funny is when I travel,

5:18

which last year was a lot, my

5:20

mornings when I am traveling,

5:23

when I'm in another country, when I'm in another, even

5:25

in a city in the US, my morning habits are very

5:27

different. I wake up, I don't know, grab

5:29

my phone, I don't grab the laptop.

5:32

It's just total silence and coffee in the morning

5:34

and that's kind of it. Right before I go in

5:37

and do whatever I'm going to do, which is, you know, the

5:39

conference or the or the Gig or the client

5:41

team or whatever the case may be.

5:42

Sure.

5:43

And it's just very different. And what's funny is when

5:45

I come home, I sort of fall

5:47

into this very different routine

5:50

where I'm constantly checking email

5:52

and constantly checking social media of doing this or that. And

5:55

um, it makes a big difference. So really

5:57

encouraging. I want you to know to

5:59

hear you say that awesome. Because

6:02

it's all the more reason to be more disciplined

6:04

about it.

6:05

And I love hearing that Joe and I, I completely,

6:07

I can empathize with you to a certain

6:09

extent. I am, I am not a traveling,

6:11

I'm not a, you know, a, a jet setter

6:14

myself. I haven't, thankfully I've been able to kind

6:16

of stick around here. Uh, you know,

6:18

cause I have a very large family that,

6:20

uh, you know, that requires a lot

6:22

of B and a and I love

6:25

it, but I, I can empathize with you because

6:27

when you're traveling and you know, when we traveled

6:29

as a family, you're just completely in a different

6:31

environment and, and environment is, is everything.

6:34

You know, I'm in the same environment every

6:36

morning practically. You know, so I, I have all

6:38

of the, that, the triggers, I have all the cues

6:40

around me that, that helped me to get into that peak

6:43

state. I've been reading another book too by Benjamin

6:45

Hardy called willpower doesn't work and that's a

6:47

really great read. He actually explains

6:50

kind of why a morning routine is so

6:52

important in a, and I apologize in Idaho,

6:54

I'm not saying that you're, you're less productive.

6:56

I know that you probably are. Everyone's different. That's

6:58

the thing. I encourage

7:00

you, if you're, if you're not getting as much

7:03

out of being a night owl, I encourage you to try

7:05

the morning routine because he explains in his book that

7:07

in order for us to be the best we can possibly

7:10

be and do the most for others,

7:12

we've got to get our bodies into a peak state.

7:15

And the only way to really truly do that

7:17

is to start our day off. That way, when

7:19

you start your day off in, in that peak state,

7:22

you bring that with you throughout your day. And

7:24

guess what? Your empathy increases. I'm

7:26

not kidding. Like I, my empathy

7:28

levels have increased in seismic doses

7:30

because when you feel good, you want other

7:32

people to feel good. I feel really healthy.

7:35

I've never, I'm 43 years old and I

7:37

didn't care about, there's a scripture that says bodily

7:39

exercise profits, little I based

7:41

my life on that teaching for most

7:46

of my life. And then when I turned

7:48

40 this is, you know, about three years ago,

7:50

you know, 2015 this is when it all

7:52

changed for me. And this has been the podcast started,

7:54

this is when I started to kind of, you know, building

7:57

a more influence I guess in the design community

7:59

and, and being able to give back. That's really

8:01

the goal for me is to be able to give back because it

8:03

took me 20 plus years to finally

8:05

do that. And I know you've been doing it for a long time,

8:07

Joe, so thank you.

8:08

Well and that's, you're welcome and

8:11

I appreciate that, but that's, that's part of getting

8:13

older as well. You know, what you just said

8:15

is something that resonates not only with

8:17

me but everybody I know. Like I just

8:19

turned 50 last year. And

8:22

every person I know that's sort of in the same

8:24

age frame, you know as us, the older

8:26

you get, that giving back part

8:29

becomes tremendously important.

8:31

And you find that the work you do. And

8:33

I've talked to a lot of people who share this sentiment

8:36

no matter what you're doing, right? Even if I'm in

8:38

a room with a client, I'm in a room ostensibly

8:40

to improve the user experience of

8:42

our product, to help an organization make or save money,

8:44

blah, blah, blah. But for me, more

8:47

so now these days it's, it's about

8:49

those people in the room. It's about those people

8:51

at that organization. It's about the people using the product.

8:54

And my main concern is the

8:56

amount of discomfort, right? The amount of frustration,

8:58

the amount of stress, the amount of burnout,

9:01

the amount of, of all those things that are transpiring

9:03

because of what's going on. And that's really

9:05

what I want to solve. I really feel

9:07

like I want everybody's lives just

9:10

to me a little better, you know? Absolutely.

9:13

And, and I don't know that that's, I don't know that that's

9:15

the same when you're younger.

9:17

I think you're right, Joe and I can

9:19

identify with you. No, no, I agree.

9:21

I just feel like, you know, you, you have gained a lot

9:23

of experience. You've had 50 years, my

9:25

friend, to gain a lot of experience and

9:27

knowledge and life lessons that you

9:29

can then pour into others who are behind

9:31

you. You know, and maybe they're just a little behind

9:33

you, you know, but you know, you're still ahead of them

9:36

in ways that you can give back. And I think that

9:38

as we get older, and I'm feeling this,

9:40

I think we feel like we, we start

9:42

thinking a lot more about legacy. Like what,

9:45

what, how are we going to be remembered? And I don't want

9:47

to be remembered for being like a curmudgeon.

9:49

Like, you know, my wife and I talk sometimes there's

9:52

just some people and sometimes, unfortunately there

9:54

they may be even being your family where

9:56

you just get older and they just, maybe they

9:58

hadn't taken good care of themselves or they just get

10:00

kind of miserable or you know, grumpy and,

10:03

and it, and it comes out and everything, you know,

10:05

and, and so I, I just, I think that there's

10:07

just, you know, that legacy factor, I

10:09

think we went to just be remembered for somebody who,

10:11

who really did care and really did try to make a

10:13

difference and leave this place better than we found it.

10:15

Yeah, I think so. And I think it becomes a lot more

10:17

important, number one, when you have kids.

10:19

Yeah.

10:19

And number two, as you get older,

10:22

you just, you see the world very differently.

10:24

I mean, I look back when I was in my,

10:26

uh, you know, late twenties, thirties, even,

10:29

to be honest with you, right around 40,

10:32

there are a lot of aspects of

10:34

life and work and everything else that we're just very, very,

10:36

very different than they are now.

10:38

Yeah.

10:39

You know, you look at it differently. Plus

10:41

not to mention the fact that the physically okay,

10:44

you can go a lot harder

10:46

for a lot longer when

10:49

you're younger, you know, and those sleep is no sweat.

10:51

Yeah. Amen. And the older you

10:53

get, time has a way of saying, well, you know what,

10:55

you can't do that anymore. You're

10:59

not going to get away with it.

11:00

Yeah. That's, that's an absolutely true.

11:02

You've been doing this. And I say

11:04

this in a very general sense, right? Because when I look

11:06

down your experience on your linkedin

11:09

profile, for example, there's tremendous,

11:12

various here. I mean, you've touched

11:14

a lot of stuff.

11:15

Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's true.

11:17

Tell me a little bit about that journey.

11:19

I mean, how, because it seems like it's changed. It

11:21

has, you know, like you started out doing

11:23

more interactive work, art direction, work.

11:25

Um, this, the piece at my space

11:27

is tremendously interesting, um,

11:30

all the way to, you know, where you are now,

11:32

where you're focused more on UX stuff. So

11:35

from the time you sort of started in

11:37

this area, I mean, how did all this transpire?

11:40

Yeah, well I was on America

11:42

Online in 1996,

11:46

I think it was 90, 95, 96,

11:49

right. In that, that area where every

11:51

week you'd get a new, I mean the

11:53

CD Rom, uh, from,

12:00

yeah, they were burning money on those things. Oh

12:02

my gosh, what a great investment though

12:05

at the time. Right. But you know, you were happy

12:07

to receive them because it wasn't unlimited.

12:09

It was like you get 60 hours and then you've got to

12:11

pay them. So it was like, as long as you kept

12:13

getting the cds in the mail, like you got, you got

12:15

free Internet service. Right. You know, those were

12:17

actually quite covenant. And I have one

12:20

disk I open still that I kind of, that, that

12:22

just, it's sort of a piece of nostalgia for me

12:25

that my manager at the same manager I told you about, they told

12:27

me about the SPI. He uh, gave

12:29

that to me. But anyway, that's where it all began

12:31

for me. I was a working in a kind

12:33

of a dead end day job. I was a corporate

12:36

lease driver for um, for Ge.

12:38

And we would basically, you know, drive cars

12:40

to people and pick them up and then wash

12:42

them, wash a lot of cars. So, uh, one

12:45

day during a break, one of my associates

12:47

pulled out his laptop and which was about

12:50

like six inches thick. Um,

12:52

and then he like pulled up America Online

12:54

and I'm like, what are you doing man? And he's like,

12:56

oh, I'm online, I'm, I'm chatting.

13:01

You're, you're WHAT?

13:02

"I don't know about this inner webs,

13:04

this internets." You remember that? Uh, when Katie Couric,

13:06

what is this Internet, so what is this email? That

13:09

that was kind of me man, like at that time

13:11

I was like, what? What are you doing? What is chat? He

13:13

said, well, I'm in a chat room right now.

13:14

See kids, there was a time when this stuff didn't

13:17

exist.

13:17

Yes, that's right. And I remember,

13:19

we were there, man. So

13:22

I just remember like going, wow. He's like,

13:24

yeah, I'm just chatting with somebody in like, you

13:26

know, in the UK right now, Mike, how you doing that?

13:28

Like that's crazy. And he's like, here, try it.

13:30

And so I, he, let me try it. And I got

13:32

into some like really engaging conversations

13:34

right away and I was like, I gotta have some

13:37

of this, I need this. And so I,

13:39

I got a, I was able to get online

13:41

using those CDs. I tried it.

13:43

Um, and then I discovered a feature

13:45

called personal publisher that they had

13:47

and it said, make your own webpage.

13:50

And I was like, that sounds cool. I want to, I want

13:52

to do that. And so I got in there and,

13:54

and I started, I discover html

13:56

for the very first time and I discovered that

13:59

that I could be artistic, which, which I have

14:01

a, an artistic background. I've always used

14:03

to draw comic characters like in detention

14:05

in junior high.

14:06

Awesome.

14:06

So I was like, yeah man. I was like, you know,

14:08

and, and so I was like, how I can actually

14:11

be artistic and technical. Cause I had

14:13

a technical bent too. I had an Amiga computer

14:15

in the 80s.

14:16

Nice.

14:16

I don't know if you remember. You remember those, right Joe? I

14:19

actually had my first taste of code, uh,

14:21

from that experience. Like they gave you a manual.

14:24

And I was able to learn some, a basic. So

14:26

I learned a basic, I was, I was able to like make

14:29

little dumb, dumb little games and also

14:31

make her talk, which was awesome. So

14:33

I had like, I had an artistic and

14:35

a kind of a technical background. And when I

14:37

realized I could combine those and create

14:39

a webpage that anybody in

14:42

the entire world could access with

14:44

just a few keystrokes, I was, I was

14:46

in love. It was, I was like, this

14:48

is what I want to do the rest of my life. I

14:50

knew it. And, um, and it took

14:52

me another three years, uh, really

14:54

to get my foot in the door. I did some

14:57

freelancing, um, until then,

14:59

and built people's websites and,

15:01

you know, just for a few dollars here and there. And,

15:04

uh, and of course, David Siegel's book, creating killer

15:06

websites was the very, very first

15:08

web design book I ever bought. And

15:11

it just changed my world, like, you

15:13

know, and, and the guy, you know, he called

15:15

himself an html terrorist or

15:17

back then and our web wank. And, but what

15:19

he put out into the world, even though it wasn't semantic,

15:22

it wasn't, you know, we didn't have a lot of standards yet. That was

15:24

still being worked on.

15:25

Right, yeah. Wild West.

15:26

Yeah, exactly. This was the wild west. What

15:28

he did with that book was he showed us designers

15:31

how to break out of having a just some

15:34

texts on a, like a colored background.

15:36

That's all the web was. At first it was just text

15:38

on a white text on a black background or

15:40

whatever.

15:41

Right.

15:41

Or in a ton of of animated gifs.

15:43

Right.

15:43

Like it's so funny to see. So

15:47

funny to see the revolution, right. Go around

15:49

like now animated gifs are all the rage. I remember

15:51

when we, when we got so sick of

15:53

those things in my space was a part of that too. You know,

15:55

giving people the keys, which we can get

15:57

in, get into as well if you want, but

15:59

you know that that's where it all started for me, my friend

16:01

and then I got my first foot in the door in 99

16:04

at an ad agency. That's where my art director

16:06

title came from. And uh, I had an

16:08

awesome portfolio. I really did because I

16:11

spent a lot of time on the visual aspects of it and

16:13

the web really at that point, commerce

16:15

hadn't come in yet. It was a very

16:17

creative place to be. And, and I loved

16:20

looking at what other people were creating. It was just

16:22

like you said, it was the wild west man and, and

16:24

there was just so much inspiration on

16:27

the web. And you know, people like Jeffrey Zeldman of

16:29

course, who I know we both respect

16:31

greatly, you know, he's a really one of the pioneers

16:34

of, of, of this stuff. Yeah, absolutely.

16:36

And so like, just seeing what he was putting out

16:38

there, his blogging and, and I was just so

16:40

inspired, man. And so I got my foot in the door

16:42

and an ad agency with my awesome portfolio, but

16:44

I had zero client experience.

16:47

And so, you know, ad agencies are cutthroat, man.

16:49

Oh yeah. I worked at several.

16:51

so you know, you know what it's like man, it's, and

16:53

so I got in there and they gave me my first

16:55

project and it sucked. It

16:58

absolutely sucked.

17:05

I have suspicions as

17:07

to why, but tell me.

17:08

I didn't know I, you know, I

17:10

didn't know what I was doing and that's the thing. Like

17:13

I hit the ground running and I guess there's a,

17:15

there's a lesson in that.

17:16

Was it a web project?

17:17

It was, it was a web project

17:19

and it was, I'm trying to

17:21

remember cause it was so long ago. I'm trying to remember if it was a

17:23

way, it might've been a print project now that I'm

17:26

thinking of it. It might have been a print project that might've been

17:28

part of the problem that way. It wasn't my

17:30

wheelhouse, it wasn't what I had been focusing on.

17:32

Um, so I just had to put a bunch of

17:36

shapes. It was so embarrassing, man. I just, I

17:38

put like some cool shapes on a,

17:40

on a, on a page and some text and

17:42

I, I thought it was good enough. And you know, I

17:44

really didn't think it was good. I, I think I knew it was

17:47

bad and I just didn't know what to do.

17:48

Yeah, but that's part of the experience, right? You gotta...that's

17:51

really the only way. Okay.

17:54

I always feel like when you tell that story

17:56

and you're telling me, you know, the time that you came up

17:59

when the Internet was totally in its infancy

18:01

and nobody really knew very much about this,

18:03

right. And you threw yourself into a situation where

18:06

you didn't know the lay of the land and you

18:08

gave it a shot in the first instance was

18:10

terrible. And all this stuff. And the reason I interrupted

18:12

you to talk about this is because

18:14

I hear variations on this question every

18:17

day where young designers,

18:19

young UXers, even developers talk

18:22

to me about this fear that they have of

18:24

screwing up, right? And

18:26

I, and I almost, I feel like I cannot say enough:

18:29

DO IT

18:31

ANYWAY.

18:31

Amen.

18:31

So the story you're telling it is proof

18:34

positive. All right. For those of you that are listening,

18:37

look at, take a good look at Jason's career

18:39

and then think about this story that he's telling right

18:41

now. All right, this is proof positive.

18:44

This isn't going to stop you. It's how you learn.

18:47

Anyway, I'll shut up now. Keep talking.

18:48

No, no, that's, I appreciate you injecting

18:50

that because that is, that is a really important part

18:52

of that story. And I will

18:54

tell you that after I shipped that

18:57

I got some interesting looks from my manager,

19:00

I'm sure. Um, who then, uh,

19:02

I'll be honest with you, kind of like took me aside

19:04

probably a day or two later and said,

19:06

I don't think this is going to work out.

19:08

Oh Man. Did

19:11

they keep you or did you leave?

19:13

So here's, here's the twist. He was

19:15

actually trying to help me find another place to

19:17

work. Wow. He was ushering

19:19

me out. I mean, I get it. I get

19:21

it. It was not agency level

19:23

work. Um, and they thought because

19:25

of my portfolio that I, and I was,

19:28

it was an awesome portfolio. I put a lot of creativity

19:30

and thought into it. And they thought because of my portfolio,

19:32

I'd be able to just jump right into agency work, hit

19:35

the ground running. And you know, and I wasn't able to

19:37

offhand, but you know what? This is where growth

19:39

mindset comes in and anybody who's

19:41

listening to me talk on my podcast and, and

19:43

even just in my, my writing, like I always

19:46

just really reinforced that that

19:48

point is have a growth mindset because

19:51

I was so hungry to stay

19:53

on, to continue doing this work

19:55

and, and, and also really terrified to try

19:57

to find another foot in the door.

19:59

Of course.

19:59

I, you know, and I interviewed for a company,

20:02

it was like a semiconductor company was like this. I

20:04

would probably hang myself, you know, like a

20:07

day into working at this. It just was not

20:09

something I was interested in. So I,

20:11

I basically, I told my manager,

20:13

I said, look, I said, I know my, I know it wasn't

20:15

good, but I want this. Like

20:18

I will do whatever it takes

20:20

to make this work. Like, what, what

20:23

do you, what suggestions do you have for me? How can I stay

20:25

here? How can I make this happen? And

20:27

he said, you know, he's like, maybe enroll

20:29

yourself in some courses, take some courses.

20:32

There's a, there's an extension campus nearby.

20:34

It's a night school. You can jump

20:36

right in and start doing that. And

20:38

he's like, but it's on your dime, you

20:40

know, he's like, it's your, your, your pennies for

20:43

that. And it was a, certainly a lot more than, than pennies.

20:45

But um, I, okay. I said

20:47

done. And I that like within minutes

20:50

I enrolled myself into a graphic

20:52

design and visual communication, the certification

20:54

course over here at this place. And

20:57

um, four nights a week

20:59

after work I was there and

21:01

doing this, getting, getting my

21:03

education. I'm on the fly and

21:05

still staying on at my job. And

21:08

you know, what happened? And this is a really

21:10

good lesson for, for all your listeners

21:12

who may, may be feeling like that imposter

21:14

syndrome of like, I'm not good enough. I can't

21:16

just get my foot in somewhere and just start

21:18

doing work. You got it. Like Joe said, do

21:20

it anyway.

21:21

Yep.

21:22

You will regret it if you don't. That's

21:24

a big lesson. You'll look back, you know, like, like

21:26

30 years, 20 years later, and you'll regret

21:28

not having tried.

21:29

Not quitting is important. I always say

21:31

you either win or you learn. You know,

21:34

there is no in between. There are no wrong turns. There's

21:36

no... nothing's going to stop you.

21:38

Yes. Just shortly after I

21:41

started enrolling and taking these courses, one

21:43

of the biggest projects that

21:45

I had at this agency landed in

21:47

my lap. I was able to, to

21:49

be a lead on

21:51

designing the first like global

21:54

website that was connected to a database, to using

21:56

ASP, working with developers. Like I was able

21:59

to be the lead on this. And the

22:01

client was blown away by the comps

22:03

that I have made. And, and the actual

22:05

outcome was, was huge, was a huge leap

22:07

for this, this a global business. Perfect.

22:09

And so that was like, that was it

22:11

for me. And unfortunately, the unfortunate

22:14

thing is that dot. Bomb happened. It

22:16

wasn't my, my work, my work got better

22:18

and better as I got hungrier and hungrier

22:20

and pass more and more passionate to do this

22:23

stuff in an agency setting. But

22:25

dot bomb happened, you know, in 2000

22:27

and that just killed it. I, everybody,

22:29

my whole department got laid off. Basically,

22:31

they shut down the, uh, the.com side

22:34

of things.

22:34

Oh yeah, my first company, it

22:37

hurt us. It hit us hard. I mean,

22:39

that was, Oh

22:41

GOD.

22:41

It hurt and nobody could find... hardly

22:43

any web designers could find any work for a while.

22:46

Yeah. It was really bad.

22:47

You know, and so that's when I was like, I

22:49

can't, I got a family. I had just been married. I got married

22:51

in [inaudible] 99 and we had

22:53

our first child on the way. Um,

22:56

and, and, you know, and then we got pregnant with our second

22:58

child shortly thereafter. And so I'm like,

23:00

I got to do something. I got a family, I've got

23:02

mouths to feed, you know, my wife stays, uh,

23:05

wanted to be a stay at home mom. And so that was important

23:07

to me too. And if I did whatever, I took, whatever it took

23:09

to make that happen. And so, anyway, that's

23:11

when I kind of like, I need insurance

23:13

for the family. And I was like, and I got

23:15

to jump in somewhere quick. I work, I got a job

23:17

at Starbucks as a shift manager.

23:20

I mean, that's weird. That's not on my

23:22

LinkedIn either, I don't think. But I was,

23:24

uh, probably for obvious

23:26

reasons. It's just not really related, but, um,

23:29

but that was a really, that was a crazy time

23:31

too. I worked there for a year, opened the store Monday through

23:33

Friday up at 3:45

23:36

AM Monday through Friday. And, uh, that wasn't

23:38

enough of a, of a salary to

23:40

provide for my family. So of

23:43

course I had to do freelancing at the time,

23:45

so I was working at Starbucks

23:48

and I was freelancing and,

23:51

uh, that wasn't quite enough either. So I had to get a

23:53

third job and that's when I got a foot

23:55

in the door in a print shop. You know, it's like, you

23:57

know what, I can't find anything on the web right now.

24:00

And everybody's lost a lot of confidence and faith unless

24:02

you're Amazon. Right.

24:04

And so, and you know, and there's a story

24:06

there to be told, but um, you

24:08

know, I was like, okay, well I'm gonna try print. I would

24:10

love to kind of get a well rounded view of

24:13

kind of how you get ink on paper. As

24:15

I heard you mentioned in one of your other episodes,

24:17

you were talking about that, you know, and, and so

24:19

I figured that out. I was able to, to kind of

24:21

to be a lead. I eventually elite at

24:23

that organization and um,

24:26

and so that's kind of been a big

24:28

part of my well-roundedness and, and I got into

24:30

another agency after that doing a lot of

24:32

print work still. I'm a little bit

24:34

of a interactive and then I got laid

24:36

off from that job. I mean it's, it's crazy. Looking

24:38

back, I've been laid off probably five or six times, Joe,

24:41

in this field and I just keep, I keep coming

24:43

back, you know. Like

24:44

Obviously.

24:44

I have a tattoo on my arm. It says fall

24:46

seven rise eight. I love that.

24:49

So it's like it's inked, it's as

24:51

long as I rise more than

24:53

I fall, then I'm on the right track. And

24:55

that's for everybody.

24:56

That's right. This is what I mean when I say

24:58

nothing can stop you.

25:00

Yes.

25:00

Okay? I said this

25:03

a couple weeks back to somebody online.

25:05

Okay. Was someone who was saying, you know, he couldn't find a job,

25:08

was frustrated and you know, this,

25:10

this sort of thing where the world is conspiring against

25:12

me. And I did my best,

25:14

you know, to try and pump them up and say, look,

25:16

you've got to stay at it. You know, you're good

25:18

at what you do. You've got evidence that says you're

25:21

good at what you do. You know, people are

25:23

saying positive things about you and your work... And

25:25

I couldn't get through. And finally the last

25:27

thing I said was, look, all I can tell you is that in

25:30

a career that's like almost three decades at this

25:32

point, I will tell you unequivocally

25:34

that the only thing that has

25:36

ever stopped me was ME.

25:39

Hmm.

25:40

Okay? And if

25:42

you live on this earth, if you get

25:44

up and put your pants on in the morning, life

25:46

is gonna throw you some hard curve balls.

25:49

Yeah.

25:49

Right? It's just, that's the gig.

25:52

Everybody has struggles. Everybody

25:54

has had moments where they think to themselves, I

25:57

don't know if I can do this. I don't know if

25:59

I'm cut out for it. I don't know if I'm right for it. And you mentioned imposter

26:01

syndrome.

26:02

Yeah.

26:02

That's gonna be there. What

26:05

you do in those times, how you react,

26:08

um, how hard you push, how, how

26:11

often do you say to yourself, I got to just keep

26:13

trying. Has everything to do with

26:15

getting where you're going.

26:16

Yeah.

26:17

All right? So I, to me your story, just

26:19

that little piece that you shared with us just now, is

26:21

tremendously inspiring and, and you know,

26:23

not because, well, you're my guest and I want to make you feel

26:26

great — which I do — but it

26:28

really truly is a prime

26:31

example of how this works. All right.

26:33

This is what it takes. You get, what'd you

26:35

say, knocked down seven rise eight?

26:37

Yeah. Yeah. Fall seven, rise eight.

26:39

Fall seven, rise eight. That's the Gig.

26:41

Yeah, it really is. So think it's fantastic

26:44

to hear you tell that story.

26:45

Thank you Joe. And it's,

26:48

it's hard. It's not easy.

26:50

No.

26:50

And that's the thing. That's why like I never,

26:52

I never buy into the build an audience

26:54

in 30 days thing, you know, it's

26:57

not possible. It's

26:59

not possible. It's not, and not

27:01

in the right ways.

27:02

Nah, this is a marathon. This is a marathon,

27:04

not a sprint.

27:05

Exactly. Exactly. And I

27:07

mean, I remember when I, you know, before I worked at my

27:09

space, I was in a band and

27:12

I discovered a really cool piece of software

27:14

called Friend Blaster Pro. Yeah,

27:20

man. Guess what? Within

27:23

two or three years I had 40,000

27:25

fans of my band.

27:26

Yeah man!

27:27

Quote unquote quote unquote "fans."

27:29

Yeah.

27:30

Right. And, and you know, it looked

27:32

good. Like I was able to kind of get a few

27:34

opportunities for my band as a result of

27:36

what they saw on the surface. But

27:39

guess what, when I put a new song, when

27:41

my, my buddy and I put a new song out, we

27:43

got maybe a hundred listens in

27:45

the day and you know, and I mean, I guess that

27:47

was okay when you look at the numbers, but when you look at the numbers

27:49

it's like, Jeez, if those people really cared

27:51

about my band, I should have like 40,000

27:54

listens in a day.

27:56

Yeah. It's, it's a... I remember that

27:58

distinctly because I was doing the same thing.

28:00

I've been in and out of bands most of my life, okay.

28:03

I could tell that about you.

28:04

Really.

28:06

I could, yeah. Just, listening to a few episodes.

28:08

Dude, you are a music lover, man.

28:09

Yeah, and I remember the time you're

28:11

talking about, right. We were all over

28:13

MySpace and then I had the nerve to

28:16

start independent record label, which

28:19

was a lot of fun, but was also an exercise

28:21

in frustration.

28:21

Oh, I can imagine.

28:22

Um, partly because of the kinds of things that you're talking

28:24

about. And we, we leveraged the heck

28:27

out of MySpace.

28:28

That was the thing to do.

28:29

All right. And Friend Blaster Pro, when you said that, that's, yeah,

28:32

that's why I started laughing. And it's

28:34

this false sense of confidence, like, WOW, I'm connected

28:36

to all these people and you assume

28:38

that there's a correlation there.

28:39

Yup. Yup.

28:41

And then you find out that there isn't.

28:44

Yeah, it's true. And you know what, it's the same thing with a mailing

28:46

list. I always, you know, I think, and there's the gurus

28:48

out there that they're like, build your mailing list built,

28:50

you know, here's seven tips on how to

28:52

do it and you know, a month or whatever. Like

28:55

Yep, here's the thing. And, and here's what I learned

28:57

really quickly being a podcast

28:59

host also in trying to develop, build an audience.

29:02

It doesn't matter how many people are on your email

29:04

list if they're not opening your emails.

29:06

That's right. That's

29:08

right.

29:09

So I actually go in and I actually

29:12

purge my email list every

29:14

few months. If somebody has an open my email in three

29:16

or 4 cents, they don't want to hear from me.

29:18

So they aren't on my list anymore. And

29:21

guess what? I get a 50 plus percent open

29:23

rate, which is I think, pretty good with an email

29:25

list.

29:25

It is, it's excellent. I mean, so

29:28

you're, you're preaching... My wife is a

29:30

business and marketing consultant,

29:32

right. And she works a lot with entrepreneurs in particular.

29:34

So all the things that I've learned are all the things

29:37

that you're talking about. And her thing

29:39

in general is the antithesis

29:42

of all that stuff you just mentioned. Like, you know,

29:44

build a list in 10 days, like

29:46

rule the world. It's

29:49

not possible.

29:51

It takes 10 years to be an overnight success.

29:53

Yeah, and there has to be a tremendous

29:55

amount of substance.

29:57

Yeah.

29:58

You know, that you're delivering outside of these

30:00

empty sort of marketing promises.

30:02

Yes, absolutely true. Yeah. You, it's,

30:05

it's how well you're serving people that will determine

30:07

how successful you are. That's the bottom line. If

30:09

you're trying to build something.

30:11

Yeah. I just, and I can imagine,

30:13

I mean, how long have you been doing the

30:15

User Defenders podcast? Couple of years at least?

30:17

It's, it, it has started 2015,

30:19

when I started my morning routine.

30:22

So it was like, you know, I realized one

30:24

day on the way to work, like I've been trying

30:26

to find kind of my, my

30:28

identity I guess in a way, like on, on,

30:30

on how I can serve people. And,

30:32

and then I, it just, it just hit me, I was listening

30:35

to a song on my Spotify playlist. It's

30:37

by a guy named Morgan page and it's called fight for

30:39

you.

30:40

Nice.

30:40

And I realized for a long time, yeah. I was like,

30:42

I was like jammin' to that, and, and, and for the

30:44

longest time after having seen Tron,

30:46

I always put "I fight for the users" on

30:48

my social media bios. That was it. That's all I put.

30:51

I fight for the users.

30:53

Yeah.

30:54

And it clicked, man. That the neural

30:56

blink I was talking, we were talking about in the beginning, the BDNF,

30:59

the, the, uh, you know, the brain derived neurotropic factor.

31:02

It just triggered those new neural pathways. It connected

31:04

those two things. Whereas like, this

31:06

is what I need to do. I need this, I love podcasts.

31:09

I'm benefiting so much from podcasts.

31:12

I needed to start a podcast that

31:14

reaches, especially aspiring

31:16

designers who I'm, I've been at this

31:18

for 20 plus years and I think, I'm sure you can relate

31:20

to this Joe, but I still don't really know exactly

31:23

what I'm doing.

31:23

No!

31:25

You know, you

31:30

gotta you gotta kinda, you know, we're always making

31:32

it up as we go along.

31:33

That's right.

31:33

You know, we have pillars, you know,

31:35

like, like we were talking about earlier, you know, the longer you live,

31:37

the longer you're alive, the more life lessons and knowledge

31:40

and wisdom you have to share of course.

31:42

But this industry, it's, it's constantly

31:44

evolving. It's ever evolving. There's always

31:46

something new to learn, which

31:48

is both, both incredibly exhilarating

31:51

and terrifying at the same time. So

31:53

I just started kind of using, I put on

31:55

my empathy shoes so to speak, and

31:57

I thought, you know what, if I'm struggling

32:00

with what to learn next and what to do, and then

32:02

I bet you the people just diving into this

32:04

are wanting to dive into this are too. That

32:07

was my hunch. And it ended up being a really

32:09

strong one. I really good hunch.

32:11

You couldn't have been more right about that.

32:13

I mean, I remember the first time

32:15

I saw it. Okay. And

32:18

the two words like USER

32:20

DEFENDERS, I'm like, okay, I gotta, I

32:22

gotta see what this is. So, and then I went

32:24

to the site, right. And I see the logo,

32:26

now I'm a comic book Geek from

32:29

way back. Okay. From the time I was like...

32:31

Oh, yes.

32:31

You know, when I was little, I love it.

32:33

So number one, this is, this is tripping on

32:35

all levels for me. And

32:38

then I see that

32:40

USER DEFENDERS and, and then I listened to a couple of podcasts and I'm like, and I

32:42

remember, I think Gina reached out to you first, right?

32:45

Yes. Yes she did.

32:45

I said to her, I'm like, we have to

32:48

talk to this guy. This is one of the coolest things I've

32:50

ever seen, you know, and

32:52

even even the name, right. I thought,

32:55

have you ever, have you ever read a book or

32:57

heard a song and you thought, you know, "I wish I wrote that," or "I

32:59

wish I came up with that?" This was one of those

33:01

things when I saw those two words, I'm like, ah,

33:04

genius. So...

33:08

it's just perfect. I mean, it couldn't be more perfect.

33:10

So...

33:10

Thank you.

33:11

And it was even more gratifying after listening

33:13

to a couple episodes. Right. And, and,

33:15

and hearing you put yourself out there

33:18

and the kind of guests that you

33:20

have in the stories that are being told,

33:22

um, it's, it's all really, really, really

33:25

valuable. And you and I both know there are a lot of

33:27

UX podcasts, right?

33:28

Yes. Yeah.

33:29

And I'm certainly not bagging

33:31

on any of them. All right. Because every,

33:33

every show has its audience.

33:35

Yes.

33:35

But to me, okay. And it's going to sound

33:38

like I'm blowing smoke again and I'm really not

33:41

the kind of things that you are covering,

33:43

the kind of things that you're talking about, the kind of guests that

33:45

you're having on. I think of the kinds of

33:47

things that don't get enough airplay

33:49

that we don't talk about enough. That we don't speak

33:52

about enough. It's outside of just,

33:54

practice, right? It's outside of just, how do I do

33:56

the tactical work?

33:57

Yeah. Oh Wow.

33:58

You know, I think this other stuff is tremendously

34:01

more important and they're the things that we all wonder

34:03

about and struggle with on a daily

34:05

basis.

34:06

Oh, Joe, that, that means a ton to me, man.

34:08

Coming from you. Honestly, I'm a, it's

34:10

getting a little dusty for me.

34:11

No, no,

34:14

it's, it's the truth Jason.

34:15

I appreciate that a lot.

34:16

Like the one you did with Seth Godin for example.

34:19

Um, you know, there was one that was just you where you really

34:21

sort of fearlessly put yourself out there. And

34:24

I thought, I mean, what a wonderful thing, right?

34:26

You just said a minute ago that we're making it

34:28

up as we go along. That's the truth.

34:30

Yeah.

34:30

Okay?I hate the word expert. I hate

34:32

the word Guru. I get

34:34

really uncomfortable when people describe

34:36

me in those terms because

34:39

I feel like that's just not true.

34:41

Okay. It's a false status

34:44

then I think people think they need to aspire to,

34:46

right. I'm going to get to this point where I always know what

34:48

I'm doing. I'm always confident and I'm always have

34:51

all the answers and all that stuff. It just, it's not

34:53

true.

34:53

Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. And you

34:56

know, I'm a, I'm an introvert, man.

34:58

Me too.

34:58

For me, if you had asked me like three, three

35:00

and a half years ago or four years ago, if

35:02

I would be starting a podcast and like

35:05

getting on a microphone and talking to people

35:07

and like talking to other designers

35:09

that I've like respected and looked up to for

35:11

many years, they'd be like, no way not

35:14

going to happen. And you know, and there's

35:16

that little, there's that fear. Every time I put the

35:18

pull this mic up to my face, you know, even this

35:20

morning before this conversation with you, there's

35:22

that fear, you know? And we all have it. We

35:25

have to like a Seth Godin says, I love what he says. He

35:27

said, you have to dance with the fear.

35:29

Yeah.

35:29

You gotta dance with it. You've got to go forward anyway, despite

35:32

the fear. And that's what courage is. Courage

35:34

isn't lack of fear. It's going forward despite

35:36

it.

35:37

Yep.

35:37

And I just, I just think that there's so many

35:39

of us in this world that are going to get

35:42

on our death bed and we're going to have, we're going

35:44

to be like, I wished I'd done that. You

35:46

know, I, I wished I'd done that thing that

35:48

I felt I was supposed to do, you know,

35:50

10, 20, 30 years ago. You

35:52

know, the comfort zone is a beautiful place,

35:54

but nothing ever grows there.

35:56

No.

35:56

Right? And so comfort zones are expanded

35:58

through discomfort and, and you

36:00

know, I, I love what Tim Ferriss says too. He says, I tried to

36:02

do at least one thing a day that scares me and

36:05

I really think this world would be a better place

36:07

if we all did a little bit more

36:09

things that scared us that we know will help other

36:11

people.

36:12

Yeah, I agree with that sentiment. I really do.

36:15

I really do. I mean I'm, I'm working on something right now,

36:17

a really large sort of workshop bootcamp

36:19

kind of something or other, right? And it's,

36:22

it's intimidating the hell out of me. I'm going to tell you

36:24

the truth. What happens is I get

36:27

a couple of steps through it. Like my drawing board right

36:29

now is littered with paper taped to it

36:31

and a bunch of notes and it's all pencil and it's all,

36:34

all these scribbles, right? And

36:36

what happens is I get

36:39

a certain amount of progress

36:41

and then I get stuck, right? It's

36:43

like all thinking just stops and I'm stuck.

36:46

And I'm like, okay, where the hell was I going with

36:48

this? And it's uncomfortable. And it, and,

36:50

and then in those moments you

36:52

go, "okay, maybe I really don't know what I'm doing here." Um,

36:56

and you have to, like you just said,

36:58

you have to push through that because the

37:00

other voice is going, "look, you

37:02

do this all the time with clients.

37:05

You do it with other people, like just chill out,

37:07

relax, take a step back, go do something else, come

37:09

back to it, whatever."

37:10

Yeah. Great advice.

37:12

But you can't get the good part

37:14

without that part, I guess is my point.

37:16

Yeah. I've, I've heard a lot of authors

37:18

say that the time

37:20

that they declutter is the time that

37:23

after they get the book proposal.

37:24

Yeah. Yeah, exactly.

37:27

Exactly. Don't do anything else.

37:30

Right. Absolutely. It's absolutely

37:33

true. Absolutely. Like, "okay, I

37:35

should probably move those boxes...hmmm,

37:38

why do I have so many pencils?"

37:39

Yeah. Procrastiworking, I think is one

37:41

of the terms that we hear.

37:44

Totally true. Let me ask you a question

37:46

though, related to all this. Like you mentioned you're an

37:48

introvert —

37:49

I sure am.

37:50

Right, which I relate to and people are

37:52

shocked when I say this. I really

37:54

am at heart an introvert. But

37:57

what happened to me at an early age when I first

37:59

started playing in bands, okay... when I got on

38:04

stage... the world opened up in a, in a very

38:06

different way.

38:07

Wow. How so?

38:08

In that I felt like

38:10

this is what I'm supposed to be doing,

38:13

right? When I started speaking publicly, when I started

38:15

doing more consulting work with clients, where I was in the

38:18

room talking, facilitating, working on a whiteboard,

38:20

you know, as opposed to head down in a

38:22

laptop doing design work, it

38:25

felt natural. It felt right. And

38:27

the response was very different

38:30

as well, in that people started paying attention

38:32

and saying, okay, can you help us do this and would you

38:34

able to do this? But that part is

38:37

absolutely 100%

38:40

sort of natural to me. Now, I have the same anxiety

38:42

and trepidation that you described, before

38:44

I do it. On the day when I'm speaking, that's...

38:48

the waiting is the worst thing in

38:50

the world.

38:50

Oh Man.

38:53

The hours just do not go fast enough,

38:55

you know? And I'm, my, you know, my

38:57

heart is kind of going. I'm not worried that I'm going to

38:59

screw up, it's just this anxiety.

39:02

But what's funny is that the time

39:04

in between is really difficult.

39:06

Yeah, yeah.

39:07

Right? Even doing this podcast right now

39:10

is something I just truly love

39:13

doing. It feels normal to me. It feels natural,

39:15

feels sort of second

39:18

nature. Um... Speaking is that way.

39:20

Consulting is that way. A lot of these things where I'm

39:22

outward facing are that way. But at heart

39:24

I am very introverted. So

39:28

my question to you, I'm curious

39:30

whether you sort of feel any of

39:32

that in, in that when you're doing the podcast for example,

39:35

do you have this sense of, like, this

39:37

is exactly what I'm supposed to be doing?

39:39

Yeah, that's a really fascinating question Joe.

39:41

I, there are moments there

39:43

are, and it's not always, I

39:46

love some,

39:48

of Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi's work, especially on flow. That's

39:50

what he's most known for. And I defy you to spell

39:53

that name without googling it.

39:54

No thanks!

39:57

But I, I, and I also defy you to find

40:00

any personal growth and or psychology

40:02

related book that does not mention this man

40:04

and his work on flow. And

40:07

it's fascinating for sure. And basically

40:09

just to kind of sum it up, uh, in, in a

40:11

layman's way is, flow

40:13

is when you are doing something that

40:16

you, like you just touched on Joe, you just

40:18

feel like, I am meant to do it. I

40:20

was made for this. Right?

40:22

And, and it's, it's where there's a sense of timelessness,

40:25

there's a sense of absolute joy

40:27

and creativity flowing out. And

40:30

so, um, it's super fascinating that

40:32

that whole study itself, but there are,

40:35

there are moments in, in a podcast

40:38

when I'm podcasting or interviewing others, uh,

40:41

and where I will get, I will just feel

40:43

that flow and, and I'll just lose

40:45

sense of time. And I mean, there's some by episodes

40:48

of run way over to as a result.

40:50

And thankfully my guests were feeling that too

40:52

because they and, or didn't have a hard stop because

40:54

the conversation just kept going. And, you know,

40:56

and I feel, I feel like this conversation, even

40:59

if I'm feeling in flow, I feel like, you know, we're,

41:01

we're, we're jelling, we're connecting and engaging

41:03

as a lot of kindred spirits here. And

41:06

so to answer your question, that's, you can't

41:08

feel the flow unless you go forward.

41:11

You can't feel the flow unless you face the fear.

41:13

Yep. That's right.

41:14

So yeah, that's kinda my answer to that is,

41:16

you know, you've got it. You got to try it. You, you don't

41:18

know until you go forward.

41:20

Yeah. I think that's, I think that's totally

41:22

accurate. I mean, I hate,

41:25

I'm going to be honest with you. I hate preparation.

41:28

I hate planning. I hate all

41:30

the work that goes into

41:33

all the sort of, you know, preproduction,

41:35

or whatever you want to call it, beforehand. I

41:37

just want to do it.

41:38

Yeah. Yeah.

41:39

You know, I don't like

41:41

I, I stopped rehearsing my talks years

41:44

ago because it made me insane.

41:45

Wow.

41:46

Okay? It just made me insane. I'm

41:48

like, I can't do this. And

41:51

I would get so bent out of shape,

41:53

right, trying to rehearse and do all this. I'm like,

41:55

you know, I would just, I'm actually better the

41:57

more off the cuff I am and the less

41:59

I think about...what I'm supposed

42:02

to be doing, you know, and that, that doesn't mean

42:04

I don't prepare and I don't plan. I certainly do.

42:06

Sure. But I hate it. Okay. I would rather

42:08

somebody drive splinters under my fingernails

42:11

then do that work. I just, I detest

42:13

it.

42:14

Yeah.

42:16

I don't know what that is.

42:17

No, I, you know what, and it takes a while to get there.

42:20

It takes a while to get there and, and I'll be honest,

42:22

you know, everybody and anybody listening

42:25

who's heard heard user defenders

42:28

podcast, I'll be honest with you, I used to script

42:30

a lot of my answers. Like I used to script my,

42:33

my my questions I like and even like,

42:35

you know, notes that I would like think of and

42:38

I would read it, I would read a script and, and,

42:40

and I'll be honest with you, I needed that. I

42:42

needed that in the beginning.

42:44

At the beginning, yeah, yeah, yeah. Of course.

42:46

Yeah, I did. I needed it because I didn't

42:48

have the confidence yet.

42:49

Sure.

42:50

To just go off the cuff and you

42:52

know, and just kind of let things flow.

42:53

Yeah. Same here.

42:54

And so, but you've got to get the wins. That's the thing. And

42:56

I, and I mentioned this in the imposter syndrome episode,

42:58

we all have it. That's the first step

43:01

to overcoming it is to just realize you're not

43:03

alone. And we all are making it up as we

43:05

go along. But it's also too, to

43:07

know that you need to just go forward. Like,

43:09

like we keep saying, you know, just, just go forward anyway.

43:12

Um, and, and you'll get the confidence you

43:14

need by, by getting the little wins. You can't

43:16

get the little wins unless you do something that scares

43:18

you.

43:18

That's right. There is no other path.

43:20

Yeah.

43:20

Okay?

43:21

Yeah.

43:22

There is no other path. I mean like

43:24

I'm thinking, you know, movie metaphors in

43:26

my head and for whatever reason — this

43:28

is how much of a Geek. I am — I just

43:30

flashed back to, um, the

43:32

Star Wars movie. I think it's

43:34

Empire Strikes Back. Are you familiar?

43:36

Oh, of course.

43:37

It's where, you know, Yoda is trying to

43:39

teach to face his fears.

43:42

Yes.

43:42

Right? And he has to go through this sort of

43:44

dark, frightening, scary forest and deal with

43:46

all the things that he's afraid of and he

43:49

comes face to face with Darth Vader.

43:51

But that's kind of, it's a life

43:54

truth reflected in a science fiction movie. Right.

43:56

You, you have no choice but

43:58

to go into that dark area,

44:00

that place that scares

44:02

you, you have no choice but to

44:05

go there if you want to do

44:07

anything that's worth doing that you care about, that

44:10

means something to you.

44:10

Oh, I love that.

44:11

It's a necessary part of the program. I

44:13

don't know why that is. I just know that it is.

44:15

Yeah, that's so interesting that you mention Empire

44:17

Strikes Back. In that scene particularly, cause

44:20

I'm just now kind of remembering that. Remember

44:22

when he went into that, like that swamp

44:24

that like dark chasm of that swamp.

44:26

Yeah. And then he, and then he faced, he faced

44:28

Darth Vader, which was one of which was really

44:30

his fear, uh, for understandable

44:33

reasons right at that moment. But

44:35

then you remember whenever the, he struck the face mask

44:38

off and he saw that it was himself.

44:40

Exactly.

44:41

That is so, so deep, man.

44:43

And I never really, when I was a kid, I was like, why is

44:45

it his face?

44:46

Right, I didn't get it either!

44:48

Now I realize like we're our biggest, we

44:50

can be our biggest enemy sometimes, right?

44:52

Right. We can be the ones, like you said earlier,

44:54

the only thing holding us back is ourselves. It's

44:57

true. So the thing that we think we're afraid

44:59

of, really, it's a, I think it starts

45:01

with being afraid of ourselves.

45:02

I think that's totally true. It's totally

45:04

true. It's, there

45:07

are always going to be things that pop up.

45:09

They're going to be extenuating circumstances. There are going to be difficulties.

45:12

You're going to have difficult people come in

45:14

and out of your life. You're going to have different difficult circumstances

45:17

come in and out of your life, right? You're going to be hurt.

45:19

But at the

45:22

end of the day, the thing that really has the power to stop in

45:24

your tracks is almost always

45:27

yourself.

45:28

Absolutely.

45:29

Right? So, we talked about the

45:32

podcast, right? The User Defender podcast, and

45:34

how that came about. Now to me, you

45:36

have just taken another gigantic

45:38

leap. And this to me is a very, what most

45:40

people would think of as fearless to

45:43

do. But when I look at it, I go, I'm

45:45

thinking to myself, he's gotta

45:48

be, he's gotta be sweating

45:50

bullets over there. You just launched the User Defenders

45:52

Community.

45:53

Yes, yes, I did. Just

45:55

a couple of weeks ago.

45:56

That's a tiny little thing. Tiny

45:59

little undertaking.

46:00

Oh my goodness. My goodness. Yeah.

46:03

Yeah.

46:03

My GOD, what a step forward! Because you didn't,

46:06

you didn't say "Oh, I'm going to start a private Facebook group, or

46:08

I'm gonna..." which is what I'm doing, because it's easy.

46:11

Um, you said we're going to build a community and build a community

46:14

site. We're going to, we're going to make sure it's designed

46:16

well. We're going to make sure it's, it's the

46:18

interactions are, are really simple and

46:20

clean and well designed and, and

46:23

Jason, it's impressive as hell.

46:25

Thank you Joe. And thank you for joining. You

46:27

are a valued member, man. And uh,

46:29

you know, other other defenders notice

46:31

too. And that's just really neat,

46:34

it's great that you're there.

46:35

Riff on that. Tell us about it.

46:36

Oh goodness. So, first of all, I want

46:38

to say, and I cannot take the credit

46:41

for the look and feel

46:43

and the, the UI and the interaction. I

46:45

am using a platform that exists.

46:48

Really?

46:48

Yes. I did not build this thing. I,

46:51

Gosh, I wish I had, it's kind of one of those

46:53

things they give to you.

46:54

What is it?

46:54

It's called mighty networks and

46:57

anybody can start one.

46:58

Wow.

46:59

Okay. So, and that's the neat thing. And they

47:01

have a free plan. I was on the free trial

47:03

and thankfully, I was able to avoid the empty room

47:06

syndrome, because that

47:08

was honestly, that was my biggest fear in

47:10

launching this was like, oh nobody

47:12

wants, maybe nobody wants this. Maybe, maybe

47:14

people are kind of sick of having another

47:16

social network and you know, like maybe

47:19

there's too much, too much noise. And, and so there

47:21

was that fear, you know, that kind of, that fear we were talking

47:23

about. And I was like, ah. And I, I

47:25

kinda like, I wrestled with it for a little while and I was like, I got

47:27

to do that. This is what needs happen. I just know

47:29

it in my gut.

47:30

Yep.

47:31

Um, I need to bring us together. I need to bring

47:33

all the defenders, as I fondly refer to

47:35

them together into one place. And,

47:37

and I'll be honest with you, it was something I thought

47:39

about years ago. I and I just didn't

47:41

know how to do it yet and I didn't think

47:43

Facebook was the best place for that. Um,

47:46

and, and frankly I couldn't do it on Facebook if I

47:48

wanted, cause I deleted my account cause

47:50

I don't like Marl, I don't like Mark Zuckerberg at

47:52

all. I don't like the 'bergs. Either

47:54

of the 'bergs. So I just, I, I

47:56

fled that platform and then

47:58

this thing came along and I didn't even know about it. And

48:01

so I just am like, I'm going to give this a shot.

48:03

You get two weeks to try it,

48:05

and so I tried it and I sent out

48:07

some, some invites and thankfully, the

48:09

response has been incredible. There's already

48:11

300 active members in the

48:14

community and it's like the conversations are,

48:16

are starting to kind of thrive and people are starting to

48:19

feel more confident to ask questions and

48:21

it's, it's like I'm just, I'm kind of

48:23

pinching myself still that this happened and this, this

48:25

exists.

48:26

Well, I think it's awesome. I mean, I really

48:28

think it's awesome and you know, like

48:30

you were saying, that was my thought was, it's kind of

48:32

like, all right, I'm going to throw this gigantic party and

48:37

I wonder if anybody's going to show up. And

48:41

that to me, all right. Again,

48:43

I think that's, it's a massive leap

48:45

of faith in the face of

48:48

what I imagine was an extraordinary amount of doubt.

48:49

Yeah.

48:50

And, and you did it, you got 300

48:52

people. And from what I've seen so far, everybody

48:54

is really, really committed to the

48:56

idea. People are engaged.

48:58

And I think it's important. I also

49:01

think kind of like, you know, it maybe in

49:03

the same way that you and I came up at a

49:05

time where we were, it was, we were lucky to be

49:07

born when we were born, right. Because the Internet was a new

49:10

thing when we started. So I think we had a lot more leeway

49:13

than most people do sort of certainly now.

49:15

Right. Cause it's all established. But I

49:17

wonder if this isn't sort of a perfect storm

49:20

situation as well because saturation

49:22

online with, with these kinds of things,

49:25

right, with articles and videos and communities

49:28

and Facebook groups and whatever, you know, saturation

49:30

is at an all time high. And as a result it

49:33

takes a lot of effort to sift through

49:35

the things that are sort of really worth your

49:37

time, you know? Yeah. So I have to wonder about

49:40

that as well. You know, I, again, you're,

49:42

you're providing something in a way that

49:44

maybe it's not being done anywhere

49:46

else. And I think there's, there's something to be said for that.

49:48

You know, your intentions have a lot to do. I

49:50

believe your intentions have a lot to do with whether

49:52

or not something is a value.

49:54

Yeah, absolutely. And the thing I love

49:56

so much about this net, this platform is that

49:58

it had very familiar interactions.

50:01

Like, yeah, I mean a billion people on Facebook

50:04

kind of have figured out how to use it pretty well

50:06

now even though they have changed things and they do

50:08

that often. I think that Facebook

50:10

has actually, I guess we should thank Facebook

50:13

in in some weird way for like teaching

50:15

a lot of like older people how to use

50:17

the web, how to use interactions

50:19

and user interfaces. Yeah, I guess in a way

50:22

we can kind of thank them and I'm not saying going

50:24

at a hamburger menu to your website,

50:26

just Facebook did it or you know, apple dead

50:28

is something, I'm not saying that, but I think

50:30

that older people, and that's why there's not

50:33

that many younger people on Facebook anymore is because

50:35

their parents and grandparents started joining the

50:38

Facebook, but the thing I liked

50:40

about this platform is that it had

50:42

a lot of similar Ui and interactions

50:44

like as Twitter and Facebook does, so

50:46

it's super easy to use. That

50:49

was kind of a big selling point for me. And knowing

50:51

that people, people needed a place.

50:53

I, I wanted to give people a place that's

50:56

free of distractions, like Facebook, my wife

50:58

was just telling me she's on still. Um, and

51:00

I actually transferred the management rights,

51:02

the admin rights to the User Defenders page

51:04

before I deleted my account. I was kinda, I was doing

51:06

some due diligence there, but she

51:08

was telling me last night that she

51:11

doesn't even see content from the people she cares

51:13

about anymore on Facebook.

51:14

Yeah, yeah. It's, it's constant struggle.

51:16

Like she'll see maybe one post and then

51:18

like 10 ads. That's a fractured

51:20

experience. And so one thing I realized

51:23

that where this platform would be an advantage is that

51:25

it's completely focused on what the members,

51:27

the people there care about UX and

51:30

good design and the fact that good design

51:32

can quite literally changed the world

51:34

and for the better. So, and I kept,

51:36

I'm just blown away by the caliber of

51:39

designers and you know, many aspiring

51:41

but also many seasoned, like yourself. And there's

51:43

several others that have joined the platform as

51:45

well. And that's what I was hoping for is to, you

51:47

know, just to, it's a way for everybody to feel like

51:49

they're giving back.

51:50

Right.

51:50

Right? Cause it's like, oh, somebody has a question

51:52

about landing a job. And that's kind of a recurring

51:55

theme with a lot of newer designers, even people

51:57

switching careers later in life. Oh Wow. You

51:59

know, I think I can help offer some wisdom,

52:01

some, some knowledge, some things I've learned

52:03

on that journey so far. It's everything

52:06

and even more that I was hoping that UD community

52:08

would be.

52:09

Yeah. And you know, again, Kudos

52:11

to you for doing it. Like I said, um, I,

52:13

I run a private Facebook

52:16

group, you know, and I was thinking along the same lines. And for

52:18

me, there's two parts of that, right? Number one,

52:20

the infrastructure part of it

52:22

and running it and having another platform, like another thing

52:25

to deal with was just too much. But

52:27

to your point, it takes a lot of work to,

52:29

if you're going to run a group, it takes a lot of work to run

52:31

it in a way where the content is always

52:34

substantive.

52:34

Yeah. Yeah.

52:35

Okay. Myself and the admins, we do a lot

52:38

of work to prune things too.

52:40

Unfortunately. Delete things too,

52:43

in some cases remove people.

52:45

Sure.

52:45

Um, just because

52:47

you, you want to make sure that the content

52:50

there is helpful, right?

52:52

We want to reserve that space for people asking each other

52:54

questions, help each other out, collaborate,

52:57

communicate, share value and

52:59

that takes a lot of effort. Give

53:02

folks here the the URL and I'll share it in

53:04

the notes as well, but give them the URL where

53:06

they can check it out or how they can get an invitation or

53:08

whatever the case may be.

53:09

Thanks Joe. So, if you go to community.user

53:13

defenders.com, that'll take you to

53:15

the landing page and you can request to

53:17

join there. Um, I did open

53:19

it up for free for a limited time just

53:21

to kind of fill the room and so to speak

53:24

and let the people in really truly wanted

53:26

to be there, off the cuff. But

53:28

I will in order to, to grow the show and

53:30

to offset cost, cause I do have to pay for the

53:32

community as well. The platform I

53:34

will, I will start charging for memberships. But

53:37

I, I think it's going to be around #14.99

53:39

a month or it's like $150 a

53:41

year or something, which you save like

53:43

20% yearly if you do an annual

53:45

thing. But it is a, it's an investment. It's

53:47

an investment into your education,

53:50

your growth as a designer.

53:52

Absolutely.

53:52

And you're like rubbing elbows with like

53:54

some, some of the most inspiring and I'm, I'm biased

53:56

but I really truly believe there's some

53:58

of the most

54:01

inspiring, empathic, um,

54:03

passionate designers I've ever met in my life already,

54:06

in the community. You're one of them, Joe.

54:08

Yeah, I agree that the investment is well worth your

54:10

while. I totally agree.

54:11

Thank you. Thanks for mentioning that.

54:12

So I, I don't

54:14

even want to ask this question because I don't want you to feel any pressure...

54:17

but what's, what's next? What's,

54:21

or, or, you know, what do you feel

54:23

like is in front of you right

54:25

now? Or is it these

54:27

two things? Because you have

54:29

a job as well and

54:32

a family.

54:33

I do, yes. And a lot of children. I've

54:35

got many, many children.

54:37

How many?

54:37

Six.

54:38

Wow.

54:39

So I say, I always say I actually caveat,

54:41

I say seven, one's in heaven. We lost one

54:43

of our, our children about, uh, four years ago.

54:45

Oh, I'm sorry to hear that.

54:47

Um, so yeah, so we, you

54:49

know, I count him still. We met him, he lived for a day.

54:51

And, uh, so...

54:52

I've been there.

54:53

Oh, have you? Oh...

54:54

Yeah.

54:55

I'm so sorry man.

54:56

Yep. Same here. So...

54:57

That's one of the hardest things you could ever face.

54:59

Yeah, yeah. Talk about adversity,

55:01

okay... And you know, I don't know if

55:04

this is the, this is the place, but, um, you,

55:07

you definitely learn something about,

55:09

about what you're made of and what your resilience is

55:12

like. It takes faith.

55:14

It truly does. Well said. Uh,

55:16

it's, and honestly, it's, there's

55:18

those moments that, you know, especially within,

55:21

you know, the first, you know, length of time

55:23

after, you know, going through something so

55:25

difficult where, you know, like, I mean,

55:27

I'm a person of faith, so I, you know, I, I

55:29

do believe in God. I believe in divine

55:31

providence and, you know, I'll be honest, I shook

55:33

my fist at God for a year, you know, like,

55:35

how could you let this happen?? How??

55:37

I did too.

55:38

You know, but then I, you know, but then as

55:40

you, you know, and my brother-in-law told me

55:42

something, he lost his father, you know, in a, just

55:44

really suddenly, unexpectedly, um,

55:48

around the same time. And he

55:50

told me, he said, you know, time doesn't heal, but

55:52

it does dull the pain.

55:54

That's right.

55:54

And so that's, that's something that I've always kind of

55:56

remembered. And it's true. It does help. Though you never

55:59

heal from something like that, but it does

56:01

dull the pain. Um, but

56:03

you know, you just realize like after you get through something

56:05

so difficult, you kind of start to

56:07

see the gifts. As weird as that sounds.

56:09

You start to see some of the gifts and

56:12

what happened in kind of later in life, through your own,

56:14

through your own life, like your empathy.

56:16

You can identify with other people. You can

56:19

almost quite literally get into their shoes

56:21

that have gone through something like this. That's

56:23

a really critical design skill.

56:25

Absolutely.

56:26

I'm huge on empathy and, and,

56:28

and unfortunately or fortunately,

56:31

um, it says sometimes it just takes a lot of pain.

56:33

It takes having, going through pain in

56:36

your own life, um, to, to really

56:38

build, uh, those levels of empathy

56:40

and to be a better designer. I mean, it's, it's

56:42

really, it's, it's weird saying

56:44

that, but it's actually really true. And the longer you're

56:47

on this earth with breath in your lungs, the

56:49

more experiences you have to draw from.

56:52

And I think that's when you, we get to this place

56:54

where we started of giving back.

56:55

That's right.

56:56

Okay. Now it's time. There's people who need

56:58

me. It's...I use the superhero metaphor

57:00

and I just think it's so accurate.

57:02

It is.

57:02

To, to this field, right? It is like

57:05

people need me, I've, I've, I've got

57:07

super powers that I can offer to help people.

57:10

Right? And I have empathy because I,

57:12

you know, a lot of superheroes are also human. A

57:14

lot of them also have, are some of the biggest failures

57:17

you can imagine.

57:17

Yep.

57:18

But guess what? They put on the suit,

57:20

they get out there anyway and they...they

57:23

serve a greater good. They serve the greater good and

57:26

they give back.

57:26

Yeah, at the...and I, I totally

57:29

understand all that and I agree with it. Um, at

57:31

this point, I'm

57:33

grateful for a lot of things, uh,

57:36

that have, that have come my way. Even things

57:38

like this that were unbelievably difficult

57:40

because I don't believe that

57:43

I would be the same person. We're

57:45

not for some of that. I mean, um, last

57:48

year at one point I had somebody

57:51

contact me who was literally

57:54

in a place where they were seriously

57:56

contemplating ending their own life.

57:58

Oh God.

57:59

Based on struggles

58:01

with imposter syndrome as a result

58:04

of being out there in the world and doing this work

58:06

in some very difficult corporate

58:09

environments. Right. And if you're, if you're young

58:11

and you're inexperienced, um,

58:13

you can take a hell of a beating.

58:16

Now that story has a happy ending, thankfully.

58:19

Okay, but afterward

58:22

it really sort of hit me that

58:24

I don't know that I would've been able to

58:26

deal with it the same way,

58:30

okay, or with as

58:32

much. um, and it, maybe it is empathy. Okay. In

58:35

my heart. Had it not

58:37

been, you know, for the, for this

58:39

experience, I don't know that that would have been possible.

58:42

So that's kind of what I mean when I

58:44

say I, I'm grateful and a lot of

58:46

ways I'm grateful to be in a

58:48

place where what I care about first

58:50

are the human beings involved. Right?

58:52

And everything else flows from there.

58:55

Yeah.

58:55

You know? And I, and without knowing this

58:57

and without knowing your story at

59:00

all, I think that that

59:02

speaks volumes for you as well. Because it's, it's quite

59:04

obvious in everything that you

59:07

do, how much you care about the human beings who

59:09

are on the receiving end of

59:11

it all. Right. That's, it's really

59:13

obvious. Okay. It really is.

59:16

So, um, I hope that's

59:18

positive fodder for anyone out there who's listening

59:20

to this and, and, and who's struggling.

59:23

Okay? It's, it doesn't always feel, at the time, it

59:25

doesn't feel like there's any value in that struggle. It

59:27

doesn't feel like

59:29

there's anything good in it, doesn't feel like, uh...

59:31

It doesn't feel like life makes any sense.

59:34

Right, right.

59:35

Right? But, uh...

59:37

Yeah.

59:38

...there's a lot that can

59:40

come from painful experience. and there's a lot of good

59:42

that can come from that experience. So

59:45

I really appreciate you sharing.

59:46

Absolutely. And likewise, man. Aye. You

59:48

know, words fail.

59:49

Yeah. Same.

59:50

That's, that's, that's the point, words fail. And

59:53

I just appreciate you

59:55

also sharing that shared experience and um,

59:58

you know, there's something I heard, um, at

1:00:00

church not long ago and

1:00:03

it's really, really good and I think it kind of lends

1:00:05

to this. It's "your mess is your message."

1:00:09

Yeah...that's brilliant. I love that!

1:00:11

Your mess is your message.

1:00:12

Your mess is your message. I

1:00:15

love that. I'm writing it down. Literally.

1:00:17

I think, I think we just named named

1:00:21

the episode.

1:00:22

AH! Your Mess is your message! Oh my GOD! You

1:00:27

know, when I woke up this morning, I had no idea

1:00:30

this was going to be THIS good.

1:00:34

Uh... That's phenomenal. It really is. It really

1:00:37

is. So we're, we're at

1:00:39

an hour, but I want to go a little bit longer if you have time.

1:00:41

I do have a hard stop at 10 my time.

1:00:43

So that's about six minutes.

1:00:45

Okay. Then let me ask you a couple of really quick hot

1:00:47

seat questions and then I will leave you

1:00:49

to your life.

1:00:49

Okay.

1:00:50

Tell me one thing that nobody knows

1:00:52

about you. Something, maybe it's

1:00:54

a hidden skill, a hidden talent. Um,

1:00:56

something that you're really into, really love.

1:00:59

Um, I don't know, something that, that most people don't know

1:01:02

about you, but maybe they should.

1:01:04

Well, that these are, this

1:01:06

is an interesting, um, I

1:01:08

think that one of the things that comes to mind

1:01:10

is, uh, I am very OCD

1:01:13

about laying my clothes out the

1:01:15

night before my morning routine.

1:01:16

Yeah?

1:01:17

So like I will actually, I

1:01:19

will actually go to the trouble of like finding,

1:01:22

figure out what I'm going to wear the next day. And I'm a man, I'm kind

1:01:24

of a minimalist. So for me it's usually like all black,

1:01:26

like jeans and a tee shirt. So,

1:01:31

you know, and so I'll just like go to the trouble

1:01:33

of laying that out and the place

1:01:35

that it needs to be. So I don't

1:01:38

have to think about that in the morning. And

1:01:40

so that's kinda one of those little known things

1:01:42

about me, but, and my wife is just, she just

1:01:44

like lays into me on it. She thinks it's hilarious

1:01:47

that I do that, but, but you know what, listen, listen,

1:01:49

success starts the night before.

1:01:51

That's right.

1:01:52

Think about it. The success starts the

1:01:54

night before the new day, right?

1:01:55

There's another one. Write that down, folks.

1:01:58

And there's, there's a reason for it. There's

1:02:00

actually a scientific reason for this too. As

1:02:02

a leader, you only have so

1:02:05

much capacity in your brain

1:02:07

to make sound decisions each day. So

1:02:10

if, if finding, figuring out what you're going to wear the

1:02:12

day after the day's already started, and then trying

1:02:14

to get it in the right place, that's taking away, that's

1:02:16

creating decision fatigue. So that's

1:02:19

of the reasons I do that. But my wife just cracks

1:02:21

up about it. I used to be really OCD. I used

1:02:23

to like put my plate out, my fork

1:02:25

and my little pan. I have, I have eggs every morning.

1:02:28

I'm serious. Like I used to have my mug

1:02:30

ready, like...

1:02:31

Wow.

1:02:32

So I'm a little bit, lot more lax. My vitamins

1:02:34

even, she used to make fun of me. She's like, Oh, you've got to line up your vitamins

1:02:36

again, huh?

1:02:37

I wish I was like that. I

1:02:39

wish I was like that. I'm serious. You think I'm kidding?

1:02:42

Try it, man. Try it.

1:02:43

I'm not, I wish I was that, I wish I was that organized

1:02:45

and I aspire to that.

1:02:46

Give it a shot, give it a shot. You know we have, we

1:02:48

all have again that decision fatigue. So why

1:02:51

not save that, that brain power for the

1:02:53

most important decisions you need to make that

1:02:55

day.

1:02:55

It makes sense!

1:02:55

As a leader especially.

1:02:57

Yeah, it makes total sense. Let me ask you one

1:02:59

more question before I let you go.

1:03:00

Sure.

1:03:00

And it's of course it's a big one. If you

1:03:02

were able, this is a classic right?

1:03:05

But I love this question.

1:03:06

I'm afraid...

1:03:07

Yeah, you should be. Because

1:03:10

the pressure's on. If you were

1:03:12

able to go back and give your

1:03:14

younger self, let's say when you were just starting out

1:03:16

in this industry, if you

1:03:18

were able to give your younger self and it could be life advice as

1:03:20

well. One piece of advice, something

1:03:23

that you know now at 43 right. If

1:03:26

you could tell yourself one thing,

1:03:28

your younger self one thing, what would it be?

1:03:31

I was really honest when I said I'm scared, cause

1:03:33

it's hard for me to think on the fly like

1:03:35

this.

1:03:35

I told you it was gonna be hard.

1:03:37

Um, so, uh,

1:03:41

I would say love

1:03:44

well and

1:03:46

I guess... There's a few pieces of this. Uh, I'd

1:03:49

say love well, go

1:03:51

forward despite the fear and

1:03:54

um, soft skills trump hard

1:03:56

skills.

1:03:57

All. Day. Long. I

1:03:59

think that's an excellent place to stop

1:04:01

with that piece of advice. Folks, if you just

1:04:03

listened to this episode, I strongly suggest you do so

1:04:05

again with a pen at your side and you write

1:04:07

some of this stuff down.

1:04:09

Oh, I'm blushing.

1:04:12

Jason, I cannot thank you enough for

1:04:14

your time today. I salute you

1:04:16

again for all you

1:04:19

are doing with the User Defenders podcast,

1:04:21

for what you're doing with the User Defenders community.

1:04:24

You are providing something that I, again, I

1:04:26

will say I think is tremendously valuable,

1:04:28

especially to younger

1:04:30

up and coming designers,

1:04:32

UXers developers, anyone who has anything

1:04:34

tangentially related to do with product

1:04:36

design. And I hope you're

1:04:38

proud of that, because you should be.

1:04:40

Well Joe, that that just means a great deal to me.

1:04:42

Um, I am proud of it and

1:04:45

I thank you for having me on. Like

1:04:47

this is truly an honor for me and this

1:04:49

has been a really deep dive and

1:04:51

I love that. On my Twitter profile I

1:04:54

put, one of the first things I put is "deep diver" and

1:04:56

I just love doing that and I, and I

1:04:58

I thank you for, for making it that way, for,

1:05:00

for providing this platform and this

1:05:03

show to, to kind of to do that as well.

1:05:05

So thank you for all you have done

1:05:07

and you continue to do for our community also.

1:05:09

I feel like we're kind

1:05:11

of, you know, it's, we've got like that superhero

1:05:13

kind of a partnership, that

1:05:15

Avengers kind of thing going on here. So I appreciate you

1:05:18

and all you do and thanks for having me on. Thanks

1:05:20

for shining a light on, on what I'm doing and, and

1:05:22

I hope that, I hope it was inspiring for

1:05:24

the listeners, for your listeners.

1:05:25

I'm sure it will be. Thank you

1:05:28

sir. I will talk to you soon.

1:05:29

All right, fight on, my friend.

1:05:31

You too, man. That wraps

1:05:33

up this edition of Making UX Work.

1:05:35

Thanks for listening and I hope hearing these

1:05:37

stories provide some useful perspective

1:05:40

and encouragement, along with a reminder

1:05:42

that you're not alone out there. Before

1:05:44

I go, I want you to know that you can find, show

1:05:46

notes and links to the things mentioned

1:05:48

during our conversation by visiting. givegoodux.com/podcast.

1:05:53

You'll also find links to more UX

1:05:55

resources on the web and social media

1:05:58

along with ways to contact me. If you're interested

1:06:00

in sharing your own story here. Until

1:06:02

next time, this is Joe Natoli, reminding

1:06:04

you that it's people like you who make

1:06:06

UX work.