Creativity and Culture
Summary
By focusing on key operational concerns like methodology, tooling, design systems, org models, and business rationale, DesignOps helps evolving design orgs succeed at their core purpose: Making the Experience. But there’s an important and sometimes overlooked flip-side to that operational coin: The Experience of Making. How do you keep teams inspired, engaged, and intrinsically motivated to deliver meaningful, resonant, innovative work? Miles Orkin, UX Vision and Culture lead for Google Cloud, will describe (and maybe even demonstrate) some key ingredients for cultivating culture.
Key Insights
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Culture is an intangible but crucial aspect of workplace experience, blending process, authenticity, and emotional connection.
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Miles reframes enterprise UX as design for creators, not consumers, helping teams feel ownership and pride.
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Fun and entertainment at work engage teams and create a more vibrant culture, even for introverts.
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Authenticity in leadership and work allows people to bring their full selves to the organization.
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Emotional and psychological safety—acknowledging the full range of emotions—is fundamental for thriving teams.
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Culture cannot be imposed through rigid frameworks; it must grow organically, like cultivating a garden.
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Small acts of emotional openness at work can build a fabric of trust and compassion, deepening connections.
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Miles links compassion, beyond empathy, as a key behavior for teams to truly support each other.
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Language shapes culture; the semantic difference between 'consumer' and 'enterprise' can alienate enterprise workers.
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Reflecting on emotional interactions using a 'post-mortem' approach fosters emotional intelligence and growth.
Notable Quotes
"Culture is like poetry: when it’s good, it works and you don’t quite know why; when it’s bad, it’s horrible."
"If you want kick-ass teams, you have to think about the experience of making and how people feel at work."
"Enterprise is not a noun or a verb; you don’t say, I’m an enter-priser. That needs to be changed."
"The real hook for enterprise design is that you design for creators, makers, doers, and thinkers."
"People want to feel like their leaders are authentic and have opportunities to be their authentic selves."
"Only the pavement can teach you how to skate. You can’t just explain authenticity; people have to feel it."
"If you can’t feel pain, you can’t feel joy; if you can’t feel sorrow, you can’t feel delight."
"You can’t separate emotion from work; telling people not to get feelings involved is like saying don’t use your left leg."
"Culture is messy and a big mess, and you have to work at it with intentionality but not heavy processes."
"Ask yourself: are we having fun? Are we being authentic? Are we honoring our emotions? Those are the key questions."
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