Many of the skills Jeremy Girard honed while playing in a band have contributed to his success as a web designer — as much as, if not more than, his ability to write clean code or design an attractive web page. He learned skills critical to his success, such as the importance of tailoring your set list (or your presentation) to make an early connection with your audience, or the ability to speak clearly and confidently in public. In this article, Jeremy will describe how being in a band taught him to be a better web designer.
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During the initial design process for your product, answers will come from brainstorming on the product and from execution at the highest level, with all necessary stakeholders (along with their egos). In this article, Chris Bank explains why defining your product matters and how to prepare and conduct creative exercises for kickoff meetings during the initial phase of product development.
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In this article, Matt Reamer will introduce you to the human-centered design process. He’ll tell a personal story in which he built a challenged family member a device to help them communicate more efficient and effortlessly and he’ll share lessons he learned from the failures and successes along the way. He hopes that this will inspire or at least get you thinking about how you can push your skills to help the people around you, as well as shed some light on some basic principles of user experience design that are too often overlooked.
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Sometimes, despite your careful planning and best efforts, a project will fail. And preparing to deal with failure is as important as planning for success. The important thing to do when a project goes bad is learn from it. Once the dust has settled, sit down with your team and take an honest look at what went wrong. Own up to your own failings, and do what you can to make sure they do not arise again. Articles and tips on how to kick off a project right and build a long-term client relationship are helpful in this industry, but if you only focus on what to do when things go right, then you will be ill-prepared for when things get so off track that you are unable to complete a project.
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Nothing compares to a good conference: the atmosphere of being immersed in a crowd of people who share the same passion as you, the lessons you learn and advice you take in, and the friends you get to meet and the new ones you make. You leave a good conference bursting with fresh ideas. That’s what Zach Inglis wanted to create with HybridConf. Since starting it he has been fortunate enough to receive invaluable pieces of advice from other conference organizers, so Zach wanted to pay it forward with this article and help more of you succeed, too.
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Having to make choices with limited information is not unusual — especially in complex projects or with brand new products. But, at some point, though, these choices start to feel like pure guesses and the ground under your feet feels shaky. What can you do about it? Approaching potential users for research, such as interviews and usability tests will help your whole team build a solid foundation for product strategy and design. You’ll find that the skills you develop will give you confidence to pursue the answers you need, leading you to better experiences for yourself and others.
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Communicating effectively can be quite difficult, especially when a project involves many people with different responsibilities and levels of authority. The problem compounds when the people involved belong to different organizations with different working guidelines. Effective communication happens when a message is delivered whose content has the same meaning for the recipient as it does for the sender. In this article, Krzysztof Rakowski will show us the rules he follows for a better communication. He hopes you find these insights useful to your work.
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While many Web professionals work hard to make work-related relationships as strong as possible, they often neglect their non-professional relationships. Web professionals, and IT workers in general, often struggle to maintain a healthy work-life balance, and their relationships often suffer because of that struggle. In this article, Jeremy Girard will offer some of the ways that he has found helpful in his own life and career to foster healthy non-professional relationships and personal well-being.
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You’ll be able to produce stunning work more smartly and quickly than ever before if you work with people. By sharing assets, constructing files systematically and generating objects using core techniques, the team is freed to focus on crafting concepts and solving problems. In this article, Dan Nisbet will show you how to create a stronger foundation for collaboration, even before the design process begins. He’ll also explore some techniques that are unique to Adobe Fireworks and that have the potential to transform your collaboration.
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One of the ways we can continue learning in the Web industry, is by attending professional Web conferences. But how do you decide which is right for you? In this article, Jeremy Girard will answer this question by shareing the methods that he has found helpful in choosing high-quality conferences, as well as some tips to help you get the most out of the events you decide to attend!
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