All the books I’ve read in 2021 — Maybe it was the pandemic but I seem to have read more books than usual this year. Some I listened to but most of them I read with my favorite method: ink-on-paper-inside-hard-covers. There were some excellent books, both fiction and non-fiction, in the mix. There were also quite a few…

Your software reflects your organization. — As a business person, you may consider your software to be an operational tool, part of the sales or operations of your organization. But to your customers, it is a pipeline to your corporate soul. …

The mythical design tool. — The concept of “requirements” in interaction design is a mythical dragon that refuses to die. Designers seem to constantly bow to requirements and to imagine that they are cold, hard facts whose demands are non-negotiable. …

Interaction design is a different kind of design — The brilliant author and observer, Scott Berkun (@berkun), asked (on Twitter) the provocative question: What is the greatest design lesson you’ve ever learned? There were many varied replies, and I finally weighed in with my answer: The design of the behavior of digital systems is not at all the same…

If you love a design tool, set it free — Yesterday, on a video conference call, I gave a presentation to more than a thousand people around the world. I was billed prominently as “The inventor of Design Personas.” Afterwards, several people pointed out that I never once talked about personas. I didn’t even say the word. …

These are the books I read in the past year — As usual, I read lots of books this year. Some of them were fun and frivolous while others were as serious as a heart attack. Welcome to 2020, the year of breakdown. It pleases me to find plenty of women authors on my list, and several of the best books…

A new story and an old story — Mark and Patricia McCloskey, the couple who pointed a pistol and an assault weapon at peaceful protesters in St. Louis last June, have filed suit against a news photographer who snapped their rumpled likenesses. The picture went viral and they instantly became an internet meme. I can only hope that…

Why your company’s actions seem counterproductive — I have this recurring vision of tech practitioners as skilled origami experts, trying to fold paper into clever and graceful swans while their house is fully engulfed in flames. As quickly as they create the little paper animals they burst into flame. …

Even weapons. Especially weapons. — On 5 December 2001, an American Army Special Forces team entrenched Taliban soldiers outside Kandahar, Afghanistan, ordered an air strike against their foes. A waiting B-52 bomber responded quickly, dropping a single 2,000-pound precision-guided bomb. The huge bomb fell with digital precision directly on top of the American Special Forces…