Swimming With the Sharks Without Becoming One - Enterprise UX Politics
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(Please click on "Notes" for the context of the slides.) Being genuine and kind does not equal being a doormat. Learn to navigate the waters of the enterprise UX environment without bowing to politics or changing who you are.
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Swimming With the Sharks Without Becoming One - Enterprise UX Politics
- 1. Swimming With the Sharks Without Becoming One @amymarquez Enterprise UX Politics
- 2. I love my job but…
- 4. ten·et (ˈtenət/) noun a principle or belief, especially one of the main principles of a religion or philosophy.
- 5. Tenet #1: Be honest with others
- 8. Tenet #2 Be honest with yourself not as easy as it sounds
- 10. Tenet #3 Have two friends… who will kick your butt!
- 12. Tenet #4 Know the shadow you cast
- 13. No, not that kind of shadow Others’ perceptions of you.
- 14. Yes ma’am?!
- 15. Tenet #5 Don’t take haters too seriously you seriously have better things to focus on
- 17. Tenet #6 Assume everyone is good but don’t be stupid
- 18. Tenet #7 Don’t network It’s icky.
- 19. Don’t be this guy
- 20. Tenet #8 Keep your schadenfreude to yourself No smack talk, no gossip
- 22. OH: I just sat in Sigourney Weaver’s butt aura.
- 23. Tenet #10 Remember what matters most
- 25. One last thought Mentor, mentor, mentor
- 26. Your thoughts?
Hinweis der Redaktion
- I’m a UX designer. I’ve worked for the good the bad and the ugly. I’m fortunate enough to be working for the goodest right now. But even in the best environments, once in a while…
- Yeah that. You get that one project or one person that throws you into a sharknado of internal politics. You know the sharks. Those are the people who are so good and slick at politics that they scare you. They are the people who seem to be out for themselves and will use questionable tactics to get where they want to go.
- Why am I defining a tenet for you? Because tenets are only useful when they’re uncomfortable. Otherwise it’s just a practice or rule. And those can be ignored or broken. That nugget of wisdom is from a great conversation I had with Jared Spool (thank you, Jared!).
- Improv thrives on “yes and” story telling. If someone has a terrible idea for your designs, find the kernel at the heart of it that you agree with and “yes and” that sucker. Here’s another example. I was working as the only web designer/developer at a nice, smallish fund raising company. It was a good company. Then they hired a slimy CMO, and I started looking for other opportunities … then found MY EXACT JOB posted on an online job board. Me and my manager were like…
- Oh no he didn’t! And we both flipped out a little. She asked me what I wanted to do. Sabotage? Tattle? Key his car? Nope. Confront him with the truth.
- He looked like a kid who was caught with his hand in the cookie jar. He literally, verbatim said “Oops! Well, you caught me!” I told him then and there that I wanted three months pay and I was out of there.
- Knee jerk reactions. Emphasis on jerk. Someone else gets the shiny new project you wanted or the accolades you felt you deserved and you’re all…
- Why? Before you react, reflect. Gut check, ego check. I’d give you a for example, but I have coworkers in the room.
- Why two? One outside of work. Who knows the real you and will laugh in your face when you start to think you’re something you’re not, or punch you in the face if you continue to think that. And one at work. Preferably someone who is…
- Extremely sarcastic. Why sarcasm? Because I have always believed that people with sarcastic personalities tend to be more honest and upfront with their friends. It’s a quote I saw recently on Twitter. Can’t find the attribution anywhere, but perhaps it’s because it’s a truism.
- Perception is reality to the perceiver. You are, in the perceiver’s mind, who and what they think you are. It’s concrete to them.
- An example of not knowing what shadow I cast: When I was working in Arizona, I intimidated one of the developers at the company so much, he started calling me ma’am. I knew then I had a perception problem. Intimidation is the manifestation of fear. That fear means being afraid a person will hurt you, emotionally or otherwise. You can’t trust someone if you believe they can and may hurt you. My goal in my career and in my life is to make people’s lives easier. Not scarier! I had to fix that perception. Thankfully that one was in my control. So I baked for him. Books say not to. Books on being a woman in the workplace and being assertive and being powerful. But I brought in baked goods a few times a week, and made sure he got some of them each time, until he called me Amy. If someone perceives me as being under handed, dishonest or self-serving, I have to understand why and change my behavior that led them to think that. They may never change their minds, but I’ll change the way I behave so that no one else feels that way.
- Whether they think the world of you or whether they think you’re a slimeball, at the end of the day, the only people you need to be proud of you is yourself and the people you love. Everything else is gravy.
- You may have heard this one before. Assume positive intent. Someone is Trustworthy until proven untrustworthy. It’s true - people will have agendas. But try to understand the rationale behind theres. Try to get to the root of it. You may find out you have the same goal in mind.
- Networking is about “ME”. Get to know people. Make it about them. Become friends with people. Ask about their family, their dogs. Take a risk and invite them to lunch to learn more about them. ACTIVE LISTENING! Example - I worked for a health insurance company and inadvertently inherited haters from my boss. One by one, I took them to lunch to get to know them and to let them know I was on their side. I’ve made life long friendships because of that.
- If you take pleasure in someone else’s misfortune, it’s not ok to talk about it. It’s barely ok to feel it. But we’re only human, so we do. But if you verbalize it, or - God forbid - write it down, it will come back to bite you. This is where your two friends will keep you in check.
- This is something I learned working in the entertainment industry. OK, well, I learned it before that, but it only started being meaningful when I lived in Los Angeles.
- I worked at a motley collection of companies in my time in the entertainment industry. At one of the companies I worked for, a manager attended the Oscars. The next Monday, she told me a story about being in the ladies room. She was next in line and Sigourney Weaver came out of a stall. When she went in and sat down, the seat was still warm. And she thought “I just sat in Sigourney Weaver’s butt aura!” That one silly sentence has made me rethink how I chose to react to people who seem intimidating. Bottom line (pun intended) - don’t get intimidated by role or title. And don’t become overly impressed with it either. In others and in yourself.
- What really matters. The people who you love, who love you back. I said it once and I’ll say it again. At the end of the day, they are all that really matters. Don’t let people who don’t love you define you or ruin your day.
- Find a mentor, be a mentor, mentor mentors. Did I mention mentoring? Share what you know with someone, and you will realize just how well you know it. And you will be passing on that knowledge, leaving a legacy behind you in your career.