Optimal Blog

Natalie and Lulu have forged a unique team culture that focuses on positive outputs (and outcomes) for their app’s growing user base. In doing so, they turned the traditional design approach on its head and created a dynamic and supportive team. 

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Natalie, Director of Design at Hatch, and Lulu, UX Design Specialist, recently spoke at UX New Zealand, the leading UX and IA conference in New Zealand hosted by Optimal Workshop, on their concept of “radical collaboration”.

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In their talk, Nat and Lulu share their experience of growing a small app into a big player in the finance sector, and their unique approach to teamwork and culture which helped achieve it.

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Background on Natalie Ferguson and Lulu Pachuau

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Over the last two decades, Lulu and Nat have delivered exceptional customer experiences for too many organizations to count. After Nat co-founded Hatch, she begged Lulu to join her on their audacious mission: To supercharge wealth building in NZ. Together, they created a design and product culture that inspired 180,000 Kiwi investors to join in just 4 years.

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Contact Details:

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Email: natalie@sixfold.co.nz

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LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/natalieferguson/ and https://www.linkedin.com/in/lulupach/

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Radical Collaboration - How teamwork makes the dream work 💪💪💪

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Nat and Lulu discuss how they nurtured a team culture of “radical collaboration” when growing the hugely popular app Hatch, based in New Zealand. Hatch allows everyday New Zealanders to quickly and easily trade in the U.S. share market. 

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The beginning of the COVID pandemic spelled huge growth for Hatch and caused significant design challenges for the product. This growth meant that the app had to grow from a baby startup to one that could operate at scale - virtually overnight. 

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In navigating this challenge, Nat and Lulu coined the term radical collaboration, which aims to “dismantle organizational walls and supercharge what teams achieve”. Radical collaboration has six key pillars, which they discuss alongside their experience at Hatch.

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Pillar #1: When you live and breathe your North star

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Listening to hundreds of their customers’ stories, combined with their own personal experiences with money, compelled Lulu and Nat to change how their users view money. And so, “Grow the wealth of New Zealanders” became a powerful mission statement, or North Star, for Hatch. The mission was to give people the confidence and the ability to live their own lives with financial freedom and control. Nat and Lulu express the importance of truly believing in the mission of your product, and how this can become a guiding light for any team. 

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Pillar #2: When you trust each other so much, you’re happy to give up control

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As Hatch grew rapidly, trusting each other became more and more important. Nat and Lulu state that sometimes you need to take a step back and stop fueling growth for growth’s sake. It was at this point that Nat asked Lulu to join the team, and Nat’s first request was for Lulu to be super critical about the product design to date - no feedback was out of bounds. Letting go, feeling uncomfortable, and trusting your team can be difficult, but sometimes it’s what you need in order to drag yourself out of status quo design. This resulted in a brief hiatus from frantic delivery to take stock and reprioritize what was important - something that can be difficult without heavy doses of trust!

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Pillar #3: When everyone wears all the hats

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During their journey, the team at Hatch heard lots of stories from their users. Many of these stories were heard during “Hatcheversery Calls”, where team members would call users on their sign-up anniversary to chat about their experience with the app. Some of these calls were inspiring, insightful, and heartwarming.

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Everyone at Hatch made these calls – designers, writers, customer support, engineers, and even the CEO. Speaking to strangers in this way was a challenge for some, especially since it was common to field technical questions about the business. Nevertheless, asking staff to wear many hats like this turned the entire team into researchers and analysts. By forcing ourselves and our team outside of our comfort zone, we forced each other to see the whole picture of the business, not just our own little piece.

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Pillar #4: When you do what’s right, not what’s glam

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In an increasingly competitive industry, designers and developers are often tempted to consistently deliver new and exciting features. In response to rapid growth, rather than adding more features to the app, Lulu and Nat made a conscious effort to really listen to their customers to understand what problems they needed solving. 

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As it turned out, filing overseas tax returns was a significant and common problem for their customers - it was difficult and expensive. So, the team at Hatch devised a tax solution. This solution was developed by the entire team, with almost no tax specialists involved until the very end! This process was far from glamorous and it often fell outside of standard job descriptions. However, the team eventually succeeded in simplifying a notoriously difficult process and saved their customers a massive headache.

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Pillar #5: When you own the outcome, not your output.

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Over time Hatch’s user base changed from being primarily confident, seasoned investors, to being first-time investors. This new user group was typically scared of investing and often felt that it was only a thing wealthy people did.

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At this point, Hatch felt it was necessary to take a step back from delivering updates to take stock of their new position. This meant deeply understanding their customers’ journey from signing up, to making their first trade. Once this was intimately understood, the team delivered a comprehensive onboarding process which increased the sign-up conversion rate by 10%!

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Pillar #6: When you’re relentlessly committed to making it work

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Nat and Lulu describe a moment when Allbirds wanted to work with Hatch to allow ordinary New Zealanders to be involved in their IPO launch on the New York stock exchange. Again, this task faced numerous tax and trade law challenges, and offering the service seemed like yet another insurmountable task. The team at Hatch nearly gave up several times during this project, but everyone was determined to get this feature across the line – and they did. As a result, New Zealanders were some of the few regular investors from outside the U.S that were able to take part in Albirds IPO. 

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Why it matters 💥

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Over four years, Hatch grew to 180,000 users who collectively invested over $1bn. Nat and Lulu’s success underscores the critical role of teamwork and collaboration in achieving exceptional user experiences. Product teams should remember that in the rapidly evolving tech industry, it's not just about delivering the latest features; it's about fostering a positive and supportive team culture that buys into the bigger picture.

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The Hatch team grew to be more than team members and technical experts. They grew in confidence and appreciated every moving part of the business. Product teams can draw inspiration from Hatch's journey, where designers, writers, engineers, and even the CEO actively engaged with users, challenged traditional design decisions, and prioritized solving actual user problems. This approach led to better, more user-centric outcomes and a deep understanding of the end-to-end user experience.

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Most importantly, through the good times and tough, the team grew to trust each other. The mission weaved its way through each member of the team, which ultimately manifested in positive outcomes for the user and the business.

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Nat and Lulu’s concept of radical collaboration led to several positive outcomes for Hatch:

• It changed the way they did business. Information was no longer held in the minds of a few individuals – instead, it was shared. People were able to step into other people's roles seamlessly. 
• Hatch achieved better results faster by focusing on the end-to-end experience of the app, rather than by adding successive features. 
• The team became more nimble – potential design/development issues were anticipated earlier because everyone knew what the downstream impacts of a decision would be.

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Over the next week, Lulu and Nat encourage designers and researchers to get outside of their comfort zone and:

• Visit customer support team
• Pick up the phone and call a customer
• Challenge status quo design decisions. Ask, does this thing solve an end-user problem?

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Every month we have fun and informative “bite sized” presentations to add some inspiration to your lunch break.  These virtual events allow us to partner with amazing speakers, community groups and organizations to share their insights and hot takes on a variety of topics impacting our industry. 

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Join us at the end of every month for Lunch n' Learn.

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Ally Tutkaluk

A multi-faceted approach is key when creating digital products for users who may be in a vulnerable, sensitive, or distressed state. Adopting an approach to copy, design, and testing that considers the unique needs of your main user group not only enhances their experiences, but improves the product for everyone.

From user interviews, to copywriting, to IA decisions, to testing - Ally will cover tools and tips for how you can ensure vulnerable users needs’ are considered at every stage of the digital design process.

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Speaker Bio

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Ally has worked in digital experience in the higher education, FMCG, and not-for-profit industries for over 14 years, most recently at Australian healthcare charity Lives Lived Well. She’s passionate about working with users to create data-driven, meaningful and valuable digital content and navigation pathways. She lives in Brisbane and also teaches Design Thinking at the Queensland University of Technology.

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Grab your lunch, invite your colleagues and we hope to see you at our next Lunch n’ Learn 🌮🍕🥪

Every month we have fun and informative “bite sized” presentations to add some inspiration to your lunch break.  These virtual events allow us to partner with amazing speakers, community groups and organizations to share their insights and hot takes on a variety of topics impacting our industry. 

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Join us at the end of every month for Lunch n' Learn.

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Susanna Carman

The world is growing increasingly volatile and uncertain. Design practitioners working during these times are tasked with bringing skills and professional expertise to help solve complex customer and internal-facing challenges. However, many of us are operating in professional contexts that are resistant to change, struggle to understand what we do, or are unable to fully embrace the value we have to offer. Trying to do ‘good’ work in these conditions can be isolating, frustrating and anxiety producing. In order to sustain our capacity for impact, now is the time to invest in integrating our own well-being into our design practice.

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Design Leadership & Learning specialist, Susanna Carman, returns to offer 60-minutes of sanctuary for those who would like to explore the questions:

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• What does it take for us and our practice to BE well?
• What’s the relationship between well-being, self-leadership & impact?

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Susanna will present and share restorative practices that deepen understanding, enhance capacity for self-care, and reframe the quality of impact we can have with others in our professional roles.

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Speaker Bio

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Susanna Carman is a Strategic Designer and research-practitioner who helps people solve complex problems, the types of problems that have to do with services, systems and human interactions. Specializing in design, leadership and learning, Susanna brings a high value toolkit and herself as Thinking Partner to design leadership and change practitioners who are tasked with delivering sustainable solutions amidst disruptive conditions. 

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Susanna holds a Masters of Design Futures degree from RMIT University, and has over a decade of combined experience delivering business performance, cultural alignment and leadership development outcomes to the education, health, community development and financial services sectors. She is also the founder and host of Transition Leadership Lab, a 9-week learning lab for design, leadership and change practitioners who already have a sophisticated set of tools and mindsets, but still feel these are insufficient to meet the challenge of leading change in a rapidly transforming world.

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Grab your lunch, invite your colleagues and we hope to see you at our next Lunch n' Learn 🌮🍕🥪

We all want to be experts in what we do. We train, we practice, and we keep learning. We even do 10,000 hours of something believing it will make us an expert.

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But what if our ‘expertise’ actually comes with some downfalls? What if experts can be less creative and innovative than their less experienced counterparts? What if they lack flexibility and are more prone to error?

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Ruth Brown, freelance Design Lead, recently spoke at UX New Zealand, the leading UX and IA conference in New Zealand hosted by Optimal Workshop, on how experts can cover their blind spots.

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In her talk, Ruth discusses the paradox of expertise, how it shows up in design (and especially design research), and most importantly - what we can do about it.

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Background on Ruth Brown

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Ruth is a freelance researcher and design leader. She currently works in the design team at ANZ. In the past, she has been GM of Design Research at Xero and Head of User Experience at Trade Me.

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Ruth loves people. She has spent much of her career understanding how people think, feel, and behave. She cares a lot about making things that make people’s lives better. Her first love was engineering until she realized that people were more interesting than maths. On a good day, she gets to do both.

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Contact Details:

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Email address: ruthbrownnz@gmail.com

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LinkedIn URL: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ruth-brown-309a872/

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When expertise becomes our achilles heel 🦶🏼🗡

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Ruth is an avid traveler and travel planner. She is incredibly organized but recounts a time when she made a mistake on her father’s travel documents. The error (an incorrect middle name on a plane ticket) cost her up to $1,000 and, perhaps worse, dealt a severe knock to her confidence as a self-stylized travel agent!

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What caused the mistake? Ruth, after recovering from the error, realized that she had auto-filled her father’s middle name field with her own, voiding the ticket. She had been the victim of two common ways that people with expertise fail:

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1. Trusting their tools too much
2. Being over-confident – not needing to check their work

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This combination is known as the Paradox of Expertise.

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The Paradox of Expertise 👁️⃤

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While experts are great at many things and we rely on them every day, they do have weaknesses. Ruth argues that the more we know about our weaknesses, the more we can avoid them. 

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Ruth touches on what’s happening inside the brain of experts, and what’s happening outside the brain (social).

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• Inside influence (processing): As the brain develops and we gain experiences, it starts to organize information better. It creates schemas, which makes accessing and retrieving that information much easier and more automatic. Essentially, the more we repeat something, the more efficient the brain becomes in processing information. While this sounds like a good thing, it starts to become a burden when completely new information/ideas enter the brain. The brain struggles to order new information differently which means we default to what we know best, which isn’t necessarily the best at all.
• Outside influence (social): The Authority Bias is where experts are more likely to be believed than non-experts. Combined with this, experts usually have high confidence in what they’re talking about and can call upon neatly organized data to strengthen their argument. As a result, experts are continually reinforced with a sense of being right.

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How does the Paradox of Expertise work against us? 🤨

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In her talk, Ruth focuses on the three things that have the most impact on design and research experts. 

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1) Experts are bad at predicting the future

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Hundreds of studies support the claim that experts are bad at predicting the future. One study by Philip Tetlock tested 284 experts (across multiple fields) and 27,450 predictions. It was found that after 20 years, the experts did “little better than dart-throwing chimpanzees”.  

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As designers and researchers, one of the most difficult things we get asked is to predict the future. We get asked questions like; will people use this digital product? How will people use it? How much will they pay? 

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Since experts are so bad at predicting the future, how can we reduce the damage? 

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• Fix #1: Generalize: The Tetlock study found that people with a broader knowledge of a subject were much better predictors. Traits of good predictors included “knowing many small things”, “being skeptical of grand schemes”, and “sticking together diverse sources of information”. 
• Fix #2: Form interdisciplinary teams: This is fairly common practice now, so we can take it further. Researchers should consider asking wider teams for recommendations when responding to research results. Rather than independently making recommendations based on your own narrow lens, bring in the wider team.

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2) Experts make worse teachers 

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In general, experts are fairly average teachers. Despite knowing the principles, theory, and practice of our fields, experts aren’t usually very good teachers. This is because experts tend to think in abstraction and concepts that have been built up over thousands of hours of experience. This leads experts to skip the explanation of foundational steps i.e. explaining why the concepts themselves are important.

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• Fix #3: Be bad at something: There’s nothing like stepping into the shoes of a rookie to have empathy for their experience. By doing so, it helps us to take stock of the job or task that we’re doing. 
• Fix #4: It takes a team: Sometimes we need to realize that there are other people better suited to some tasks e.g. teaching! As an expert, the responsibility doesn’t have to fall to you to pass on knowledge – there are others who know enough to do it in place of you, and that’s okay. In fact, it may be better to have the entire village teach a junior, rather than one elder.

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3) Experts are less innovative and open-minded

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Ruth highlights the fact that experts find it hard to process new information, especially new information that challenges closely held beliefs or experiences. It is difficult to throw away existing arguments (or schemas) in place of new, seemingly untested arguments. 

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• Fix #5: Stay curious: It’s easier said than done, but stay open to new arguments, information, and schemas. Remember to let your ego step down – don’t dig your heels in. 

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Why it matters 🤷

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Understanding the Paradox of Expertise can help designers and researchers become more effective in their roles and avoid common pitfalls that hinder their work.

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Ruth's insights into the inner workings of experts' brains shed light on the cognitive processes that can work against us. The development of schemas and the efficiency of information processing, while beneficial, can also lead to cognitive biases and resistance to new information. This insight reminds UX professionals to remain open-minded and adaptable when tackling design and research challenges.

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The three key points Ruth emphasizes - the inability of experts to predict the future accurately, their challenges as teachers, and their resistance to innovation - have direct implications for the UX field. UX designers often face the daunting task of predicting user behavior and needs, and recognizing the limitations of expertise in this regard is crucial. Furthermore, the importance of embracing interdisciplinary teams and seeking diverse perspectives is underscored as a means to mitigate the shortcomings of expertise. Collaboration and humility in acknowledging that others may be better suited to certain tasks can lead to more well-rounded and innovative solutions.

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Finally, Ruth's call to stay curious and open-minded is particularly relevant to UX professionals. In a rapidly evolving field, the ability to adapt to new information and perspectives is critical. By recognizing that expertise is not a fixed state but an ongoing practice, designers and researchers can continuously improve their work and deliver better user experiences.

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What is UX New Zealand?

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UX New Zealand is a leading UX and IA conference hosted by Optimal Workshop, that brings together industry professionals for three days of thought leadership, meaningful networking and immersive workshops. 

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At UX New Zealand 2023, we featured some of the best and brightest in the fields of user experience, research and design. A raft of local and international speakers touched on the most important aspects of UX in today’s climate for service designers, marketers, UX writers and user researchers.

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These speakers are some of the pioneers leading the way and pushing the standard for user experience today. Their experience and perspectives are invaluable for those working at the coalface of UX, and together, there’s a tonne of valuable insight on offer. 

Every month we have fun and informative “bite sized” presentations to add some inspiration to your lunch break.  These virtual events allow us to partner with amazing speakers, community groups and organizations to share their insights and hot takes on a variety of topics impacting our industry. 

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Join us at the end of every month for Lunch n' Learn.

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Elle Geraghty

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We all know that testing your IA is essential to create a functioning user experience.

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But prior to testing, what is the best way to decide between multiple possible IA approaches?

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For Elle Geraghty, the answer is a thorough understanding of potential categorisation options that can be matched to your business and user needs.

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Speaker Bio

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Elle Geraghty is a consultant content strategist from Sydney, Australia who specialises in large website redesign. 

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Over the past 15 years, she has worked with Qantas, Atlassian, the Australian Museum, Virgin Mobile Australia and all levels of the Australian government.

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Elle also teaches and coaches content strategy and information architecture.... and through all this work she has developed a great IA categorisation system which she will share with you today.

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Connect with Elle on:

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Linkedin

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Instagram

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Twitter

Pressure on budgets, deadlines, and constantly shifting goalposts can mean that our projects sometimes become familiar, impersonal, and “blah”. How can we evolve from our obsession with status quo content engagement and instead, using our raised awareness, help to usher culture and society’s changing demands into our digital products?

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Ebony Kenney, UX Analyst at Ripefruit Creative, Ripefruit Foundation, and a Federal Government Agency, recently spoke at UX New Zealand, the leading UX and IA conference in New Zealand hosted by Optimal Workshop, on how social justice can permeate our work as Usability professionals.

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In her talk, Ebony takes us on a journey beyond the status quo to deliver digital products that are equitable and champion social justice.

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Background on Ebony Kenney

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Ebony L. Kenney is a Graphic Design, Market Research, and Usability veteran, excelling at the art of inquiry. She is said to be a "clear wifi signal” with her finger on the pulse, and insights to elevate any conversation. She draws from a scientific approach which yields itself to facilitating discussions that inspire thought and action. She holds a BA in English and MA in Design. She has most recently served as a User Experience Product Lead for applications, and Data Analyst for workforce morale efforts at a federal agency. 

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She is also the founder of Ripefruit Foundation, a non-profit effort dedicated to identifying and strengthening peripheral skills as they appear along the spectrum of neurodiversity, and Ripefruit Creative, a design agency dedicated to the realm of education and equity.

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Contact Details:

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Email address: ekenney11@gmail.com

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LinkedIn URL: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ebonylkenney/

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“Ain’t None of Y’all Safe!”: Achieving Social Justice in digital spaces 🌱

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Ebony’s talk explores how Usability professionals often focus too much on the details, for example, the elements of a page, or a specific user path. As a result, it’s easy to forget the bigger picture - the potential for the project to make a difference, to be welcoming, and to be an accessible experience for a diverse set of users. Additionally, constraints on timelines, uninformed or unwilling product owners, and the endless loop of shifting requirements distract us from even a hint of a higher purpose. Throughout our projects, things that are important, like designing a nurturing, protective, and supportive environment that encourages engagement start to get deprioritized.

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Ebony challenges us to work in ways that ensure we don’t leave behind equity and social justice in our digital products.

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Introducing a Safe Third Space ⚠️

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Her talk introduces the concept of "third space," which is a hybrid space that combines different realities. Combining the concepts of “safe space” and “third space”, she arrives at the “safe third space”, which has embedded social justice and is the pinnacle of product design.

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• Third Space: A hybrid space with concentric, adjacent, and overlapping realities. Third spaces can be geographical (e.g. a coffee shop with a bank attached), cultural (e.g. finding a connection between immigrants and first generations), and virtual (e.g. online experiences and social media).
• Safe Space: A space where a person can be honest and there are no consequences or perks.
• Safe Third Space: A space or environment online where people feel safe and can be themselves. Going beyond tolerance to actually making people feel like they belong.

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What is Social Justice? ⚖️

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Ebony asks us to think about social justice as rungs on a ladder, starting with “reality” and finishing on “justice” as we climb the ladder.

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• Reality: Some get less than what’s needed, while others get more. Waste and disparity are created. 
• Empathy: Once you’re in touch with pain points, compassion is sparked for another human’s condition.
• Equality: The assumption is that everyone benefits from the same support. This is considered to be “equal treatment”.
• Equity: Everyone gets the support they need, which produces equity. 
• Justice: The cause(s) of the inequity was addressed. The barriers have been removed or work has begun. 

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When discussing equity, Ebony highlights the difference between need-based and strength-based equity. Need-based equity identifies everyone's needs, while strength-based equity goes further by identifying the different strengths of the people involved. 

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Essentially, everyone has a unique lens through which they view and experience the world. Teams and organizations should value their employee's unique lenses and should encourage employees to feel comfortable speaking their minds. Additionally, teams and organizations should nurture safe spaces so that these views can be shared and therefore add value to a project or product achieving equity and social justice.

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Why it matters 💥

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When we think about our users, we should climb the social justice ladder and think about people on the “fringes” of our user base. In other words, don’t just cater to the most valuable user, or the most engaged user, as often happens when we start delivering projects. We should challenge status quo processes and assumptions in an attempt to better reflect society in our digital products.

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Bringing social justice into the UX design process can be done by marrying the basic UX design process with the social justice ladder.

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What does implementing Social Justice look like in practice? 👀

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Ebony suggests a few ways that UX professionals can adopt social justice practices in our day-to-day work. These practices help to foster diverse thinking within project teams, which in turn helps us to get closer to achieving equity and social justice when designing digital products.

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Social Justice on an Agile Team

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• Call your own meetings with just the people necessary – don’t be afraid to coordinate meetings outside of the scrum master’s schedule.
• Recommend don’t suggest – It’s a subtle difference, but “I recommend…” statements emphasize your own unique viewpoint.
• Find data to back up recommendations - if not, find or generate the data
• Set the UX/CX commitment before the ceremonies begin.
• Choose your battles – don’t fight your product owner on every single thing.

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Social Justice on the Screen

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• Run completely through each user path (From Google, not URL). This helps us to catch blind spots.
• Make personas that make sense - ensure they can be implemented.  
• Capture risk and look for trends in decision-making that could have business implications e.g. if you’re trying to convince your product owner to change something, it’s important to align it to the business goals or project vision.
• Look for bias in language and placement - share from your unique viewpoint.
• Watch an internet novice navigate your screen.

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Be yourself, but develop yourself

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• What is your strong point as a UX person?
• Are you codeswitching for safety reasons or expediency?
• Are you allowing “different”?
• Work on your question muscle – try to ask questions that build a foundation of understanding before making wild guesses or assumptions.
• Avoid burnout

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In these ways, organizations and teams can keep social justice front and center when designing a digital product, rather than letting it slip by the wayside. If you can create safe spaces for your team to thrive and share unique points of view (or at least look for them), you are much more likely to design products that nurture engagement, create a welcoming environment, and ultimately meet the needs of diverse user groups.

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