Aaron Patel

Read this before you hire another designer. Seriously. Most teams don’t have a hiring problem. They have an ownership problem. People hire for craft and hope for clarity. But without the right setup, even great designers get stuck delivering screens instead of outcomes. I’ve worked with so many high growth teams who thought they had a talent gap but what they really lacked was a culture of ownership. Once we clarified roles, gave designers the right context and support, and shifted expectations from execution to leadership, projects that had been stalling for months started moving again within weeks. Stakeholders began trusting the work and delivery sped up. You do not fix this by adding more hands. You fix it by creating the space for someone to lead. The designers who make a difference are not waiting to be told what to do. They read the room. They connect the dots. Hiring is easy. Enabling ownership is the hard part. So ask yourself: do you really need more headcount, or do you need someone who owns more than just the UI? If this resonated, share it with someone leading a complex team. Follow Joe Woodham for weekly insights on design leadership, systems thinking, and what actually scales.

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“Everything is design and design is everything.” - Emily Campbell Today, Kim Lenox, Emily and I had a conversation with a thousand people to discuss Figma’s new study exploring how work is changing for 7 roles involved in product development. The quote above sums it up. Roles are blurring. And, more people than ever see design as an integral part of their work. The full story is longer and even more interesting: - 64% of respondents identified with two or more roles, and over a third said their responsibilities span three or more roles. - 56% of non-designers say design tasks like prototyping are a major part of their work, up 12 percentage points in a year - 19% of time is now spent with AI tools, expecting to increase to 27% in the next 12 months. This time is taken from solo work time rather than work with colleagues. And, 57% say they’re spending more time on work that’s higher value and strategic. - 53% say deep knowledge is still needed to do a task well, less than a quarter believe AI reduces the need for expertise. Matt Walker and team built the study of 1200 respondents and 50 interviews, covering 67 tasks. Alia Fite, Emma Webster, and Alex Praeger created an amazing report from the findings. Chad Bergman and Greg Huntoon answered so many questions in today's discussion. The key here is it’s not just design. It’s not just product development. And, I would guess this trend is actually is bigger than just this field. I think at the heart of these changes are a strong desire to communicate intent from one expertise to another. From marketing to design. From design to development. From PM to development. And, I think we’ll see even more of this blurring moving forward.

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6 UX Design Tools Actually Worth Paying For (Coming from someone who’s spent $100s testing new ones.) If you are in UX right now, it feels like there is a new tool dropping every single week. It is overwhelming and honestly getting very expensive 😂 These are the 6 tools I actually pay for because they help me: - Save time - Design smarter - Streamline my workflow Here’s the list: 1) Landbook – Web Design Inspiration ↳ For unique layouts and visual ideas that don’t look like the same homepage you’ve seen 1,000 times. 2) Mobbin – App design patterns ↳ Where I go to study real UX patterns from real apps. 3) UX Pilot AI – AI wireframing ↳ Let's me quickly test flow ideas and layouts before finalizing in Figma. 4) Relume – AI website builder ↳ Generate real copy and layouts (no lorem ipsum). Export to Figma or Webflow and everything actually works. 5) Cursor – Prompt-to-code prototypes ↳ Turn client ideas into clickable, interactive prototypes for: Investor demos, User testing, etc 6) Figma – The design home base (this one's obvious) ↳ Even with AI tools everywhere, Figma is still where everything comes together. This my current UX design stack. Am I missing anything? Drop your favorite tools below! (And if you found this helpful, save it for later.)

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UX costs nothing—until it costs everything. Every ignored friction point eventually resurfaces as support tickets, dropped leads, stalled onboarding, or lost renewals. We've seen this consistently across B2B platforms, member portals, and internal tools: → Poor navigation floods help desks → Inconsistent UI slows adoption and erodes trust → Bloated workflows quietly push users toward competitors Organizations often think they're avoiding UX costs, unaware they're already paying—through wasted time, constant patches, and staff burnout. High-performing teams don't see UX as a line-item luxury. They treat it as preventive ops. They measure it. Fund it. Protect it. Because solving root problems always costs less than endlessly triaging symptoms. If your support team is swamped or onboarding is stalled, it's probably not just a content issue. It's a UX issue—and you're already footing the bill.

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Whether you’re trying to get hired or promoted, we’ve developed an obsession with “showing impact.” I’m guilty of it too. Many talented designers struggle with this. They work in organisations where tracking is incomplete, and they’re forced to choose between showing nothing or making up numbers. But here’s something to keep in mind: Awareness beats access. I’d rather work with someone who doesn’t have data but understands what their work affects. Than someone who has all the data and no idea what to do with it. If you don’t have perfect data, you can still show impact by thinking through these layers: 1. Behaviour --- What are the smallest user actions your design is meant to influence? For example: • Form submissions • Button clicks • Page visits These are leading indicators. You can directly influence them with design. 2. Product --- If hundreds or thousands of users perform that behaviour more often, what product metric would it influence? For example: • Activation rate • Engagement • Discoverability These are team-level outcomes. Your work should support one or more of them. 3. Business --- If that product metric improves, what business impact would it have? For example: • New MRR • Retention • Expansion These are your lagging indicators. They show up later, but they matter most to leadership. Even if you can’t measure these directly, talk about what you believe your work affected. Be honest about the gaps. You can also share what you would have tracked if the data had been available. If you can tell a plausible story using these three layers—behaviour, product, and business—you’re already showing strong strategic awareness. And you’re pointing to the organisational gaps that made measurement difficult. That mindset matters more than a dashboard.

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Figma is skipping the traditional IPO roadshow and going public via direct listing. And it's 40x oversubscribed. Most companies avoid direct listings. In a traditional IPO, investment banks buy shares at a discount and then sell them to institutional investors. The banks act as underwriters, which means they guarantee a minimum price and provide stability. Direct listings are different. No underwriters. No discount. No roadshow presentations to convince investors. Existing shares just start trading on the exchange at whatever price the market decides. This creates volatility risk as there's no price floor. But Figma doesn't need to worry about that. There's massive demand already baked in. When Spotify went direct in 2018, everyone predicted chaos. Instead, it traded relatively smoothly. Same with Slack in 2019. But why does this really matter for Figma? They capture the full market value instead of giving banks a discount. In traditional IPOs, banks often price shares 10-20% below market value to ensure a successful launch. That's money left on the table. Why give away value when you don't have to?

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What does "Investing in Design" look like for companies? Large companies are Investing in design. Earlier stage companies are saying "Design matters to us". Where does that actually show up? There's a lot of layers this can permeate through. Some broad ways in no particular order; - Design in Leadership roles, working together to steer strategy and impact - Investment in Design resource, what's the head count? - Investment in Design Headcount in specialty areas, Motion, illustration, Brand, Writing, Dedicated Design Systems - Market salaries (don't have to over pay, but definitely don't be under-paying!) - % of Designers work time freed up for play and exploration - Offsites, work trips...bringing Designers together to inspire them and fuel their creative cups - Retention incentives, learning and development stipends, equipment etc etc. - Access to tooling resources (Want them to bolster their ai skills...get them access to ai tools!) What else you can add, I'm barely scratching the surface right? If a company is doing these things - great. Those are quality signals. If they're not, but they say they're "invested in design"... dig deeper and think twice.

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Too many design challenges focus on visuals. Pretty UIs. Dribbble shots. ✨This one is different✨ https://lnkd.in/gapgvZ6E I’ve been quietly building something for designers who are ready to move beyond pixels and start creating work that drives real product impact. Over 8 weeks, you’ll get: ➡️ Real-world prompts grounded in business goals and research insights ➡️ Practice in balancing user needs with product outcomes ➡️ The chance to articulate the “why” behind every design choice Because good design isn’t just beautiful—it’s defensible, strategic, and impactful. If you’ve ever wanted to: ✅ Build a portfolio that shows impact, not just screens ✅ Move from executor to influencer ✅ Confidently present and defend your designs …then Why Before UI is for you. Because the future belongs to designers who can communicate, not just create. 💡 Don’t miss the boat Join the first wave of designers leveling up their skills → https://lnkd.in/gapgvZ6E

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