Jithesh Ramesh Lead Product Designer at Mastt March 2022 Beyond pixels at startups Leading design change through research 

Why do I like startups? Or why be the tail of a whale when you can be the head of a barracuda Scale-ups and startups that I have been at Now leading design at a construction tech startup Opportunity to • Learn • Make an impact Autonomy to • Make mistakes • Own your future And the rush you feel every day 

Why do founders design? Or the way designers see it • Felt the pain • Feel the need to act • Time to market • Consider design to be easier than software development • Availability of design talent 

The current state of construction tech and the opportunity out there • Least digitised industry • High labour shortage • High demands on productivity 

The current state of construction tech and the opportunity out there • Processes are fragmented • Scepticism towards the impact of digitisation amongst the workforce • Site safety and network connectivity issues 

What does Mastt do? We help Capital Works projects get built better • Three years old • Conceptualised by Doug Vincent, a Program Manager who felt the pains of managing many projects & programs using spreadsheets • Have 50+ accounts and counting • Growing customer base in Govt 

How are we moving away from pixels? Changing design’s role in product development • Understand the lay of the land • Help others do better research & design • Highlight the impact of visceral design choices • Balance the value between delivery and discovery 

Understand the lay of the land Start by doing internal research Purpose People Product Why? Who informs how? What? 

Understand the lay of the land Start by doing internal research Purpose People Product Uncover resident knowledge Hear their story Audit 

Purpose People Product • 1:1 Interviews • Group workshops on Design Direction • Surveys - NPS, SUS • Accessibility • Training and sales interviews • Design Maturity Survey Uncover resident knowledge Hear their story Audit Understand the lay of the land Start by doing internal research and move outward quickly Customers • Panel, key partners, community Build relationship 

Everyone was doing research & design Help them get better • Stand on the shoulders of giants • Pick established design systems • Start discussing behavioural and reflective topics • Guide others to get better at research and design activities 

Stand on the shoulders of giants There are plenty of established design systems out there now. Pick one and move on 

Start discussing behavioural and reflective topics Join forces with most customer-facing teams • Partner with customer success, support and sales • Help these teams bring back quality insights on customer behaviour • Create interview and note taking cheatsheets to capture situations, motivations and outcomes 

Be an enabler to Help others do research and design activities • Frame better questions • Improve efficient note taking • Instrument better success metrics • Provide reference material, guidelines & cheatsheets 

Examples Be an enabler Customer Success & Product Managers Product Managers & Engineering Sales & Customer Success Founders and Leadership 

The easiest way to sneak in other research activities Look for Trojans • Seek existing activities and opportunities to do research • NPS and customer sentiment results are often sought after by founders and investors 

The easiest way to sell UX & Design concepts Pick Magic potions that sell well. • Don’t overlook NPS, JTBD, Pretotyping & other design activities promoted by non-design leaders in the industry 

UX Magic potions that sell well in startups Some examples Follow me on LinkedIn : jitheshr & Dribbble : mrjithesh to get hold of these 

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Map research value to business value Balance the value between delivery and discovery • Work with Product & Engineering to define the process and the effort involved in research methods 

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Recap Beyond pixels at startups • Start Research internally and then externally • Deliberately move UI discussions to a Design System group • Use existing opportunities to sneak in mixed-method design research • Define the value of design research 

References All frameworks and photographs belong to these authors • Start with why - Simon Sinek • Net Promoter Score - Fred Reichheld • Jobs to be done - Clayton Christensen • Pretotyping - Alberto Savoia • Reach Impact Confidence Effort - Intercom product team • Photographs of Kerala from OFFSET - Marianna Jamadi, Peter Adams, Aaron Joel Sandos, Jakub Sliwa, Alejandro Moreno, Robert Harding, Olaf Kruger, 

Thank you