Summary
Enterprises like Compass need to design experiences for an incredibly diverse audience. These customers pose challenges to our ideas about happy paths and edge cases. How do we build tools for customers with such diverse needs and wants? And how do we build the right teams with the broad perspectives that can best serve these customers? Learn how research can build diverse perspectives and backgrounds into user testing and other research methods. Understand how designing tools for diverse and justifiably demanding customers helps make product design better. Expand our notions of diversity both within the enterprise and with all the customers that the enterprise serves.
Key Insights
-
•
Diversity, equity, and inclusion are distinct concepts: diversity is who is present, equity is who should be present but isn’t, and inclusion is ensuring all voices are heard.
-
•
Focusing solely on diverse recruitment without investing in retention leads to a leaky bucket where diverse talent leaves prematurely.
-
•
Hiring practices biased toward visually polished portfolios overlook strong candidates with valuable but less flashy skills, disadvantaging underrepresented groups.
-
•
Diverse representation decreases at senior levels due to systemic challenges in career advancement and biased evaluations.
-
•
Having design and research staff report to leaders who understand their function is critical for their career growth and inclusion.
-
•
Products should be designed with input from diverse users by intentionally recruiting varied research participants and using globally accessible language.
-
•
Employee resource groups and visible investment in diverse communities help underrepresented employees feel welcomed and supported.
-
•
Allies not personally affected by bias play a crucial role by speaking up and calling out homogenous hiring practices.
-
•
Transparent growth roadmaps and assigning promotable work prevent underrepresented employees from being sidelined with non-impactful tasks.
-
•
Maintaining DEI best practices requires continuous conscious effort; it’s easy for organizations to slip back without vigilance.
Notable Quotes
"Diversity means who is in the room, equity asks who wants to or should be in the room but isn’t, and inclusion asks have everybody’s ideas been heard."
"Diversity is not just about how people look or sound, but also about their capabilities and their place on introversion-extraversion scales."
"If you don’t invest in retention, you get the leaky bucket syndrome where diverse talent keeps leaving."
"Requesting glossy portfolios up front risks excluding candidates with strong problem-solving skills who may not have had opportunities to showcase visual design."
"Design and research people must report to leaders who understand their functions, or else they get assigned irrelevant tasks like social coordinator."
"Bad data in, bad data out — making sure research participants are diverse by race, gender, tenure, and location is crucial for inclusive products."
"Nothing about us without us — cultural content should be created and tested with people who represent that culture."
"If you see homogenous candidate pipelines, ask people to pause and rethink who they are putting through."
"Allies in the room who are not affected by bias are critical voices to help call out inequities."
"Creating clear roadmaps for underrepresented talent shows investment and helps prevent them from being viewed as a means to an end."
Or choose a question:
More Videos
"People said, ‘I get it’ when a peer explained how their day actually changed—not from top-down communication."
Matt StoneScaling Empathy, A Case Study in Change Management
June 11, 2021
"This work does not fit our product program."
Aditi Ruiz Christian Crumlish Farid SabitovA PM State of Mind: Empathy Mapping Your Product Manager, Pt. 1
December 6, 2022
"There aren't learned enough experts; we are still in that nebula trying to figure out how to become a star."
Dave Malouf Meredith Black Farid SabitovThe Past, Present, and Future of DesignOps: a 2-part DesignOps Community Call (Part 1)
February 17, 2022
"Accessibility defects are bugs. If it’s a P1 blocking bug for an accessibility issue, treat it like any other P1 bug."
Sheri Byrne-HaberAccessibility at Scale
June 9, 2021
"I think of a journey map as a suggestion, not a rule, and I might take parts of it to fit the context and people."
Nidhi Singh Rathore Amber DavisEmbracing participation to unlock deeper truths in commercial research
March 12, 2025
"Gender-coded words influence someone’s decision to apply and feel they belong even within internal career ladders."
Laine Riley ProkayHow DesignOps can Drive Inclusive Career Ladders for All
September 30, 2021
"We co-designed our environment and expectations around what we needed as a team during these times."
Ariba JahanTeam Resiliency Through a Pandemic
January 8, 2024
"Some bias against human-centered UX comes from concern that ordinary folks don't understand technical software requirements."
Noreen Whysel Katie SaindonShort Take #4: UX/Product Lessons from Your Industry Peers
December 6, 2022
"Anyone can become a person with accessibility needs at any time, so inclusivity should be a default."
Rittika BasuAge and Interfaces: Equipping Older Adults with Technological Tools
February 23, 2023
