1. Unthinkable with Jay Acunzo
Jay Acunzo hosts a cool podcast called "Unthinkable." He chats about listening to your inner voice to make awesome, sometimes different, choices. Jay's worked at big places like Google and HubSpot and loves to share tales of people doing their own thing, which inspires us to think differently and be creative.
What's super cool about it?
There's this special set of episodes called Signature Stories. These are the stories that the people who made them are really proud of and that the listeners love the most.
“You don’t find great stories, you build them!”
- Jay Acunzo
Some episodes you shouldn't miss
Jay Baer, who wrote The Time To Win and six other business books. He talks about the importance of gathering stories from everyday life and how to shape these stories to share a cool lesson or idea.
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And you don’t want to miss this one!
Simone Stolzoff is the author of The Good Enough Job: Reclaiming Life from Work. He started with poetry in school and has lots of thoughts on how to live a life that's not all about work. He gives tips on finding amazing stories, something that's super useful no matter what you like to do.
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They also talk about how to find inspiration in the world around you to create new stories or projects. It's all about noticing the little things and turning them into something great.
How Stories Happen - Launching Brand New Show (finding the inspiration to the world you actually experience)
“Great stories happen to those who can tell them”
- Ira Glass
2. Design Matters with Debbie Millman
Debbie is super good at asking questions that make you think, and she knows a lot about art and design. It's been around for 19 years, making it one of the oldest shows talking about creative stuff. Debbie chats with artists and designers to find out what makes them tick and shares it with us.
Why It Stands Out: Listening to Debbie has been an incredible journey of learning and inspiration for me. Her unique interviewing style, and conversations with guests have provided me with invaluable insights into the creative process and the realities of working in design and other creative fields.
Key Episodes & Topics:
Debbie’s conversation with Milton Glaser, the legendary graphic designer behind the "I ♥ NY" logo, from 2009 was a masterclass in understanding the power of design in shaping cultural conversations. I found this gem on the show website, and it's a must-listen that's not available on Apple Podcasts.
Massimo’s philosophy of 'timeless design' reshaped my understanding of simplicity and functionality in creativity. Insights on the significance of discipline and the power of design systems have profoundly influenced my approach to design practice.
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“And remember, we can talk about making a difference, we can make a difference, or we can do both.”
- Debbie Millman
I've been listening to the Invisible Machines podcast lately, because Robb and Josh break down complex concepts like conversational AI and hyper automation into easily digestible insights. It has definitely made me more curious about the potential of these technologies!
Why It Stands Out: Rob and Josh offer a panoramic view of tech integrated into our lives. I appreciate how they tie technologies back to real business problems and UX. e.g. Hyper Automation tools can automate onboarding new employees workflows. Collecting, managing data seamlessly, also triggering welcome emails, system access setup, and the most important scheduling orientations.
Key Episodes & Topics:
UX and AI, Context is Everything with Sarah Gibbons and Kate Moran of Nielsen Norman Group
Interesting point discussed was the potential over-reliance on conversational UI. Sarah and Kate emphasized the importance of exploring the ways to interact with the text, for example, in the responses.
They also touched on the concept of “Articulation Barrier.” This barrier points to the opportunity for UX designers to create systems that can understand and interpret a wide range of human inputs.
Imagine you have a magic box that can do lots of different things - like a phone, camera, and game console all in one. Instead of switching between different boxes for different needs, you're using just one for everything. This makes you have to think about what you're doing with it more carefully because it's like playing different games using just one toy. This is context switching in simple words. Researchers are really interested in how you figure out which game you want to play with your magic box and how they can make it easier for you to switch between games without getting confused.
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Don Norman, Author and Researcher
Shifting towards humanity centered design from Human Centered Design. Key aspects of Humanity Centered Design Societal Impact, Sustainability, Ethical Considerations And Long-Term Thinking.
After listening to the podcast, I believe the key arguments that Don emphasizes: intelligence is diverse, not necessarily a single quantifiable number. AI is good with pattern recognition, not so much with understanding. Education system should shift towards cooperation and teamwork through projects - that’s how things get done in real life. Most importantly, evolving tech is bringing systemic change, that creates an opportunity for panoramic design possibilities.
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“The notion of productivity, trying to maximize productivity is actually minimizing it because what you try to do is get the most work out of each person permitted.”
- Don Norman