Agoda Design Lead
While at Agoda I managed 10 designers spread over two teams. Those teams were responsible for meeting the design needs of 14 different product and scrum teams - each focused on different aspects of our product, and some requiring in-depth subject matter expertise.
This project page covers some of the programs and efforts made during my time at Agoda to make work better and more fulfilling.
Improving how UX operates at the company
I know that designers can contribute so much more than "making things look pretty". A solid design team is an asset to any company, but they need to learn how to use us best, and it's our job as leaders to educate.
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UX process worksop
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Product and Design feedback survey
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Implementing new design Jira
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New design teams
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Product + Design + Research Quarterly planning
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Evolved Jira process for UX
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Training POs on how to work with their UX designers
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I published blogs on the internal newletter to share design success stories or share updates
Helping designers grow their potential
I care deeply about about feeling fulfilled in my place of work, and as a manager and team lead I want everyone to feel like they're learning, growing, and that their voices are heard.
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How to work with Product Owners
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How to work with Research
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When to prototype
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How to give UX presentations
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Breaking silos: a space to learn what others are doing
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Curated performance reviews
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Clear leveling guides
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Regular constructive feedback
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Feeling like a team
The old way
When I joined the company the design org was mostly comprised of visual designers - at the leadership through the junior level. They were looking to expand their UX capabilities, and hired me.
What kind of work did we do?
Most of the work was small and disjointed. Change an icon here, add a button there. Out of the team of about 20 designers there were only a few doing larger-scale work
How did requests come to us?
Product owners came up with ideas, and would walk over to our area, up to their favorite designer, and make a request to have the work done in a day or two.
Why was this bad?
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Ideas are better with more minds
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Disjointed work equals a disjointed product, and you could see it on the frontend
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Designers were frustrated and felt under valued
Why was this bad?
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Designers had little autonomy and felt unable to do their best work
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Work was not distributed evenly
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It was impossible to plan, and there wasn't a really clear escalation path for problems
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Design vetting of the requests being made was ad-hoc at best, and it was often a surprise to open the website or app and see something new
UX process workshop
I hosted a designer-focused workshop to identify how project types differed at Agoda, the pain points in our existing process, and how the team imagined a better way.
Product owner feedback survey
Rather than host a workshop that many POs wouldn't attend, I instead opted for an anonymous survey that would have broader reach, and hopefully get more candid feedback.
Survey goals:
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Demonstrate that designers want to be more involved
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Solicit candid feedback regarding how they felt about us
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Build empathy by learning more about how POs feel about their work and priorities
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Encourage POs to think critically about how we could be more of an asset, and use that as a concrete starting point
The survey feedback gave me context to share with the design team, and a foundation for us to start pushing for more engagement
The workshop results were brought to the other design leads and we worked together to create a design Jira board, and roll out the new process to each of our respective POs and designers, and set the stage for reorganizing ourself into teams
The new way
With new processes in place, we reorg'd the team such that there were clear groups and responsibility. This mapped 1:1 with a PO reorg.
A Head PO had a small team of POs focused on a group of work. A Design Lead had a small team of designers focused on that same group of work
I managed two teams of designers working with 14 different product owners and scrum teams
Velocity
Responsible for fast, small experiments across the main booking work flow for web and app. Keepers of the main pages: Home, Search, Property
Agoda Homes
Team solely focused on Agoda Homes
Engagement
Areas of the app or web where users engaged with the company (outside of booking)
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Reviews
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Manage my Booking
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Customer support
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Reception
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Airport Transfer
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Flights
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Hermes
Segments
Specialized features and workflows for various segments of users
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China
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Middle East/ North Africa
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Family travelers
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MSE (Multi-search-engine)
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Phone number sign in
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Property content
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Non-property content
Marketing
Graphics & illustrations used on product and marketing materials
Enterprise tools
Where properties manage their account
This was a lot to manage, so I got to work on designing processes, establishing team norms, and finding tools to help me out
Quarterly planning
With the product owner, researcher, and designer to discuss KPIs, overarching story ideas, and any research needs based on those goals.
I also made sure to keep track of my own personal goals: team events, blog posts to publish, training sessions, etc.
Evolving Jira
Larger design work has different requirements, and our Jira process needed to accommodate that.
By encouraging each designer to set up their own cadence with their PO, grooming becomes more of a collaborative effort and designers feel empowered to submit their own ideas to the backlog.
Design Thinking training for product owners
Presented at the large PO breakfast event - the goal here is to explain the business value of design thinking, and expose them to different exercises to do with their designers.
I included a case study of a session I did with the Agoda People Team on how to make the new hire experience better.
Design beyond product
I believe that design is applicable to all aspects of life, and enjoy working with different departments to creatively problem solve. Some of the side endeavors I involved myself in:
People team workshop: how to make the new hire experience better
Women's leadership group: addressing gender and racial issues at Agoda
Introduction to Design training for company-wide new hires
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1.5 hr Design Thinking workshop for HR team
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Resulted in 20% increase satisfaction rate on new hire survey after changes implemented
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See more details in the Design Thinking for PO training presentation above (as a case study)
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A 20 person cross-disciplinary selection of women tasked with figuring out what the company could do to make it a better place to work
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I stepped up to guide the group through exercises to arrive at solutions
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The new hire training program didn't include anything about the design team (we were lumped in with product)
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I worked with the training team to put together a design course that shone light on what we bring to the company
Helping designers grow their potential
Training and knowledge share
We had an amazing team of designers with such a diverse set of backgrounds and skills. There was a lot we could learn from each other, and with better work processes and team structure we now had the time and space to do so.
Training program: How to work with product owners
This video-recorded session lives on our training portal and is specific to Agoda. It focuses on what designers bring to the table, and features 8 key areas to develop
Training program: How to work with product owners
Another training session centered around accessing data, when, and how to engage with research, and what you can expect to get out of the engagement
Training session: Prototyping: when to do it, what methods?
In 2017 we began hiring design prototypers, but we didn't have enough for every team. This session was all about when, why, and how to do it
Training: How to give compelling presentations
Breaking silos between pods
Communicating as a designer is key. This highly-requested session was about audience, goals, cadence, and building your confidence
Once in pods it was hard to keep track of what the rest of the team was doing (we grew to about 50 designers). Along with one of the other design leads, I hosted a group-wide Design All-hands every other month to catch up and learn from each other, and organized pod "mixer" events with other leads to socialize
As part of my quarterly planning sessions, my team would come up with new skills or topic areas they wanted to learn about
I would then find a guest speaker, put together a session myself, or task someone on the team to plan it if it was something they were interested in or related to their work
Managing when I care: What I believe in and lessons learned
I had mentored before, and have never been shy of finding my own way and methods within a company, but Agoda was my first time managing. Of course we have to perform, but I feel strongly that we perform our best when we feel supported and are given the space to succeed on our own.
I believe that as a manager my job is to make it such that each designer is empowered to own their relationships, own their designs, and own their successes. My role is to set the stage with the right engagement processes, tools, and support system to enable that.
Curated performance targets
I work with each designer to learn their career objectives, what they feel they excel at, and what they want to learn.
I can then identify or create opportunities as quarterly or yearly goals that we agree to and work towards.
Clear and fair leveling guides
There was a strong perception that Americans or other "loud" nationalities leveled up faster.
The design leads created a clear leveling document, and by being organized, consistent, and clear in expectations we worked to alleviate this concern.
Micromanaging kills motivation
I hate being micromanaged, and endeavor to never do that to my team. Confidence inspires greatness. Expectations are clear, and I'm there if they need me at my desk or regular checkins and critiques, but otherwise I try to be hands off when it comes to the actual designing.
But Americans really are loud
Especially compared to our Thai counterparts. I wanted to make sure that my opinions and beliefs weren't dominating the air, and I learned a lot about what conversation techniques and methodologies work for a diverse team, but it took me a while to figure that out.
Regular constructive feedback
I sought feedback from design peers and product owners to check my biases, and attempted to deliver feedback in a timely and constructive way.
Nothing should be a surprise at the end of the year.
Even in English, our communication doesn't always translate
Culturally we all have different norms for every facet of a working relationship. My baseline to be 'nice' had to be overridden by a desire to be clear and effective to earn respect and do what's best