The Fountain Institute is an independent online school that teaches advanced UX & product skills.
The Halloween Meme Special π
The Halloween Meme Special πby Jeff Humble Dear Reader, This year, I went a little crazy with the Spirit of Halloween designer memes. I could only find three on Google, so I made nine new ones for you. π€ Now, you have no excuse for showing up to work without a costume. I'm sure you can steal anything you need to make these costumes from the office supplies closet. π«’ 1. UX DesignerMaking this one was too easy. How are there so many clichΓ©s in the UX world? 2. Service DesignerI made this meme for the most underappreciated role in design...the service designer. If you see someone wearing this costume, hug them immediately. 3. Strategic DesignerI made this meme, but it really made itself because Strategic Designers have so many clichΓ©s. If you're curious about the role, learn more about strategic design here. 4. Growth DesignerGrowth Designers get a lot of hate because they tend to be so marketing-driven, but we need designers who aren't afraid of numbers. If you're interested in growth design, check out my guide to testing and experiments for designers. 5. Staff DesignerJust say "no" to managing kids! Staff Designer positions are rising after the lockdown, so with this costume, you, too, can experience the joy and pain of being the team's "mature" designer. 6. UX ArchitectI've always wondered how you get these magical roles like UX architect, but now you know it's the label maker. Re-live the good 'ole UX days when people let you organize the product according to the users' needs rather than the feature factory Frankensteins we have today. 7. Design ManagerThis one leaves a trail of greasy fingerprints wherever they go. You've never worked for an agency if this image doesn't trigger you. 8. UX StrategistI designed this costume around the mystical notebook that (supposedly) guides the UX team, but nobody can understand it. This is probably the easiest costume, but the job is perhaps the hardest. My advice: read this article before considering the costume or the job. 9. Entry-Level Design JobThis costume takes six months to put on, and somehow, it always turns into a costume for an unpaid internship. β β β β βShare this meme on Linkedinβ β β
β β May your treat bags be filled with good feedback and not a single dark pattern this year!
|
The Fountain Institute
The Fountain Institute is an independent online school that teaches advanced UX & product skills.
When Speed Stops Being the Bottleneck by Jeff Humble Dear Reader, Quick question: What happens when the thing that used to take 12 weeks now takes 4 days? I've been watching this play out across the industry, and it's wild. Lots of companies aren't sharing their new speeds, but a few are: Code and Theory (an agency that works with Microsoft and Amazon) is building dashboards in 40 minutes that used to take a week. They report cutting time-to-prototype by 75%. Coinbase reports a 2-5x increase...
Missed a few newsletters last year? Start here. By Hannah Baker Dear Reader, Before we jump into new ideas for the year ahead, we wanted to pause for a moment. If your inbox was anything like ours last year, thereβs a good chance you missed a few newsletters. So instead of sending another new idea right away, we put together a curated catch-up, a handful of pieces from 2025 that capture the questions we kept returning to. If you only read a few things from us last year, these are a good place...
What Can't AI Do in Design in 2026 By Hannah Baker Dear Reader, If you work in design, your feeds are probably saying the same two things on repeat: Hereβs everything AI can do for you, and Hereβs why you should be terrified. Most of that conversation focuses on tools and job titles: βWill designers be replaced?β βWhich roles are safe?β It makes for good headlines, but itβs not how the work actually changes in real life. A few months ago, walking to my studio listening to a Planet Money...