Show Notes
Do you show up as an "A-student" constantly seeking the next gold star, only to feel personally attacked when your work is misunderstood? 🌟 In this episode, we tackle the "identity trap" in design and how to stay passionate without letting corporate exploitation drain your soul
In this episode, you'll learn: Why wrapping your personal value in professional output leads to burnout and frustration. How the constant need for "exceeds expectations" reviews can actually undermine your professional agency. Strategies to care deeply about your impact without letting it define your humanity. How to feel in control even when your leadership doesn't yet grasp the full value of what you bring to the table
Our guest: Sara Wachter-Boettcher Sara is a vocal leader in the design community and the founder of Active Voice, where she has coached dozens of professionals through these exact challenges. She joins Marc to explore how to lean into conversations about value without feeling like you’re constantly pleading for your seat at the table.
As you'll hear, Sara brings some "tough love" that helps you come out the other side more confident. It’s about learning to keep your side of the street clean, even when the organization around you feels messy. Enjoy and keep making a positive impact! Be well, ~ Marc
--- [ 1. GUIDE ] --- 00:00 Welcome to Episode 253 03:30 The collective headspace of design today 05:30 The impact of AI-related layoffs on design morale. 08:15 Era of cheap money 10:00 20-teens tech boom and its consequences 15:00 The ROI trap and identity 18:15 How shifting performance standards destabilize personal identity 22:00 Breaking the spell of work identity 24:45 Discomfort of realizing a job doesn't align with personal values 33:00 Navigating organizational change 38:45 Power mapping exercises 44:45 Empathy for colleagues 51:45 Concept of "humanizing" organizations to reduce isolation 55:15 Radical act of clocking out 57:00 Leadership without the ego 59:15 Strategic patience in a crisis 1:01:15 The value of the human behind the designer 01:14:15 Question to ponder
--- [ 2. LINKS ] --- https://www.linkedin.com/in/saraboettcher --- [ 3. CIRCLE ] --- Join our private community for in-house service design professionals. https://servicedesignshow.com/circle
[4. FIND THE SHOW ON] Youtube ~ https://go.servicedesignshow.com/253-youtube Spotify ~ https://go.servicedesignshow.com/253-spotify Apple ~ https://go.servicedesignshow.com/253-apple Snipd ~ https://go.servicedesignshow.com/253-snipd
More from Service Design Show
Listening is the ultimate communication cheat code, yet nobody ever trains for it. Join us as Karen Hentschel reveals her radical 15-minute listening practice and how to turn complex information into human connection.
Tired of polished case studies that ignore the messy reality of driving organizational change? In this episode, Cecilie Kobbelgaard shares the unfiltered truth about embedding journey management inside Grundfos over the last four years.
Empathy is treated like the ultimate superpower in service design, yet well-meaning teams still build services that fail people in the real world. In this episode, service design researcher and educator Lara Salinas reveals what actually comes after empathy and how to get meaningful work done inside slow-moving organizations.
Great service design ideas do not sell themselves. In this episode, Stefan Wörnle (Senior Manager Global Customer Experience at MediaMarktSaturn) reveals how to stop your best work from dying in a slide deck and actually get your ideas implemented.
What if the ultimate cheat code for service design is not a new framework, but learning how to deeply listen? Discover how to sharpen your most vital skill and apply everyday activism to your design practice with our guest, Mariana Salgado.