Software as Material—A Redux
Summary
Key Insights
-
•
The shift from feature-driven to outcome-focused product development improves alignment and impact in enterprise software.
-
•
AI and generative tools are accelerating design and engineering work, enabling faster prototyping and solution discovery.
-
•
Cross-disciplinary boundaries between design, engineering, and product management are blurring, requiring new collaboration models.
-
•
Domain knowledge is essential for understanding complex enterprise problems but can also create cognitive biases.
-
•
Building strong relationships with cross-functional partners is vital for driving change and shared success.
-
•
Design systems and cloud-native architectures enable velocity and scalability in building modern software.
-
•
Societal issues like climate change and political polarization shape the context and responsibilities of designers.
-
•
The prediction frameworks designers used historically are less effective due to rapid technological and cultural changes.
-
•
Low-code and no-code tools will empower designers to prototype and configure solutions more directly, improving agility.
-
•
Designers must become cultural change agents advocating for growth mindsets and inclusive product cultures to maintain relevance.
Notable Quotes
"People are starting to catch on with the fact that design matters and that it’s maturely important to solving the problems we face."
"The best experiences are the ones that start to be relevant around who we are, recognizing where we are and what we’re trying to accomplish."
"There’s a new tech stack for software creation, all about cloud services and subscription-based business models."
"Prediction frameworks worked until the world changed; now our prior experiences aren’t always helpful for what comes next."
"The code starts to follow the outcomes and might even start to write itself at some level."
"We’re moving toward a contextual enterprise, where everything is relevant and adaptive to the user’s situation."
"We have to be advocates for growth mindset and process improvement because people fall back on old ways even in times of change."
"Take your cross-functional partners out to lunch. Build relationships because people don’t resist change; they resist what they don’t know."
"AI assistance in user research doesn’t supplant humans; it augments and assists by helping us sift through large volumes of data."
"If we deeply understand outcomes and advocate for impact, we’ll be the ones making real change happen in the enterprise."
Or choose a question:
More Videos
"AI can accelerate prioritization tasks, but the final judgment must come from humans who understand context."
Mark Interrante Harry MaxAI for Prioritization (3rd of 3 seminars)
July 11, 2024
"Ethics is fantastic, but for the business, the right thing sometimes is revenue."
Patrizia BertiniThe (r)evolution of designOps: It’s Time to Think (really) BIG
September 11, 2025
"Sometimes you have to insist on the correct terms that are widely recognized and consistently used."
Shan ShenTranslating UX Terms into Business Contexts
November 29, 2023
"Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the mouth, said Mike Tyson."
Adam ThomasSurvival Metrics – Making Change in a Fast, Data-Informed, and Politically Safe Way
December 6, 2022
"Experiential significance is that moment in research when something just hits you as really important and impossible to ignore."
Robin BeersResearch as a Catalyst for Organizational Transformation
March 12, 2021
"Keeping something cloud-based accessible is the most complicated because of hundreds of releases per day in continuous integration."
Sheri Byrne-HaberAccessibility at Scale
June 9, 2021
"Designers are uniquely entitled to critique—it’s a privilege to rigorously improve craft while others might envy that process."
Joseph MeersmanSweating the Pixel: Scaling Quality through Critique
June 10, 2021
"Go meet someone new at this conference and set up a coffee chat next week."
Deanna Washington Bria Alexander Jon Fukuda Saara Kamppari-Miller Farid SabitovConnecting the Ops: Plenary Panel and Closing Circle
September 9, 2022
"Government isn’t always trusted, so we worked with local partners to connect with underserved communities."
Aaron Stienstra Lashanda HodgeLeveraging Civic Design to Advance Equity and Rebuild Trust in the US Federal Government
December 8, 2021
