Bia Castro

The rise of the “Super IC” is THE most exciting career trend I’ve seen in a long time. “Many companies now recognize and value experienced ICs who can drive substantial impact. If you find joy and effectiveness in your current role, leverage this to continue excelling and creating value.” - Lenny Rachitsky (reflecting on an interview with Tal Raviv) A Super IC is defined as a senior+ level (“Staff”, “Lead”, “Principal”, “Distinguished”, “Director”) Individual Contributor (IC) who has no interest in transitioning to a manager role and has the ability to progress in their career as an IC. Historically this was not a viable career path. Traditionally, after reaching Senior Product Designer, if a designer wanted to continue to grow in title and compensation they would have to transition to a manager role. I’ve been fortunate enough to work at companies that understand the importance and business impact of enabling Super IC’s. But I think the broader industry is coming around and will nurture and reward these roles. Let me know if you’ve also noticed this shift and what your thoughts are. #SuperIC #ProductDesign #UX

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Just watched 👋 Ricardo Vázquez's talk on bridging the gap between design quality and performance. Key takeaway: beautiful UX means nothing if the app is slow. At Dropbox, Ricardo showed how shared language, simple metrics, and cross-team alignment turn craft into measurable impact. Design isn’t done at the pixel—it’s tested at load time. #config2025 #figma

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Drive design impact by comparing UX metrics. UX metrics turn raw user data into useful signals. Benchmarketing is what turns these signals into actionable design decisions. Once you know what you're measuring and how you're collecting data, a benchmark helps you measure the differences in user behaviors. Benchmarking helps you answer two questions. • What does this data mean? • What should we do next? Using benchmarks, like a goal, past result, or industry standard, you can see if your design works and what to change. We use Helio with iterative design to create these signals before development begins. Example: 80% of users completed the task after a design iteration—up from 60%. Shifting the call to action and rewriting the copy had an impact. That 20% jump shows that the design change worked. Benchmarking made it clear. Measuring your work is good. Comparing the performance makes it great. #productdesign #productdiscovery #userresearch #uxresearch

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This week my buddy Corey Lee shared this post about designer levels, and it resonated SO HARD with me. ❤️‍🔥 Junior level designers are the level of doing the work, being fed the strategy, executing on the orders. This is where we all start, and where your focus should be just about getting good at "doing the thing" - wireframing, visual design, prototyping, generating ideas, using typography, all of it. Your goals should be to acquire skills, and get good fast. Mid / Lead - this is a time in which you're leading the work. You're getting put at bat, and getting given an opportunity to start leading and taking much more responsibility. Your goal shifts here from just "doing the thing" to facilitating the thing. Your goal should be to align, solicit, and communicate decisions. You should be towing the line, and getting the project across the finish line, and not letting anyone stop you. Senior and higher, your goal should be to "absorb problems" and define how you would approach the work. This means the strategy, the the research plan, the artifacts, the timeline. You should be operating as a subject matter expert, giving recommendations, not asking for permission. If you're not doing that, the harsh truth might be that you're overtitled, and you don't realize it. The sad truth is I think many designers are operating under the Senior title without the trust and respect or credibility from having defined and led the strategic work. It's one of the big things I talk about, the trust / respect gap. It's why designers never - "get invited into the room" - "don't have a seat at teh table" - "get told what do to do." - "don't get trusted with what to prioritize, or the impact they drive." This is the reason why I created Dark UX Academy, to help designers overcome this exact hurdle. I was there too, so I get it. Design is power, you can change peoples lives with it. However, without influence, business acumen, trust and respect, you won't realize the full potential of that power. What's been the most challenging part of being a designer for you?

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I'm lucky that I to work with a lot of in-house design teams, but I can pretty much tell from the get-go which of these programs are going to go well or not. There's one clear signal that determines whether or not the team will feel empowered and be better off after our time together. It's not the topic. It's not the structure. It's not the format. It's when the executive leader shows up like everyone else. When the leader joins each session, does the activities, asks questions, shares insights, and has new ideas, those are the teams who leap forward. It's the rare opportunity for those teams to see their boss as a human and gain valuable insight from their experience. This simple act demonstrates how genuinely interested that leader is in their personal development, not just how it helps the customers, company, and the leader. And the teams that don't? It's when the leader doesn't show up. Those teams feel like they've been "assigned" more work. When the leader pops in for the first 5 minutes, doesn't show up, or worse, sits in the background doing other things, I know those teams won't really improve. Those teams see they're separate from the leader. Those teams go through the motions, but don't really do anything different on Monday. And, I can sense that they know they won't really improve either. That suuuuuuucks. So now, when a team is interested in some kind of training, workshop, or boutique program, I let them know that the best chance they have to improve is when the leader shows up. I tell them that curiosity is contagious. When a leader ops-in to learning and growing, the team opts-in too. So, if you're a leader and thinking about bringing in anyone to help your team grow, my advice is to show up with your team. That's the biggest bang for your buck.

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If you’re in design, you’re probably being asked to use AI tools to make you faster. Don’t fall into the trap of using AI only to support what you already do. The real winners in the AI era will be the people who use AI to *expand* their role.

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This is a must read from Carly Ayres; a first-hand look at why junior designers are struggling to find mentors. Mentorship is completely broken because people tried to commototize it and now the constructs of how we practice our craft is changing every waking moment. Sabina Cabrera, the designer interviewed in the piece, shares an interesting observation...the people who used to mentor are trying to survive: “We’re entering an era where a lot of people just haven’t been mentored, so they’re like, ‘Why would I do that for someone else?’ She’s not wrong. Senior designers today are more likely to be navigating layoffs than onboarding interns. Even those inclined to give back are operating in survival mode. 'If you’re a designer today, you’re not chilling,' she says. 'You’re like, ‘What’s all this AI stuff? I don’t have time to educate tomorrow’s designers while trying to learn new tools and also make sure I don’t get laid off.’” In times like this I reflect on the words of St. Mother Teresa of Calcutta, "Never worry about numbers. Help one person at a time and always start with the person nearest you." Take time to mentor one person. If all collectively do that, this is how mentorship scales. https://lnkd.in/gjgvMW-m

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What does "Investing in Design" look like for companies? Large companies are Investing in design. Earlier stage companies are saying "Design matters to us". Where does that actually show up? There's a lot of layers this can permeate through. Some broad ways in no particular order; - Design in Leadership roles, working together to steer strategy and impact - Investment in Design resource, what's the head count? - Investment in Design Headcount in specialty areas, Motion, illustration, Brand, Writing, Dedicated Design Systems - Market salaries (don't have to over pay, but definitely don't be under-paying!) - % of Designers work time freed up for play and exploration - Offsites, work trips...bringing Designers together to inspire them and fuel their creative cups - Retention incentives, learning and development stipends, equipment etc etc. - Access to tooling resources (Want them to bolster their ai skills...get them access to ai tools!) What else you can add, I'm barely scratching the surface right? If a company is doing these things - great. Those are quality signals. If they're not, but they say they're "invested in design"... dig deeper and think twice.

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wtf is a prototype now?? we've made incremental progress for a decade+ and then everything changed overnight 😳 So I chatted with Nikolas Klein and Holly Li to unpack what it all means for designers (including some tactics I'd never considered) We go deep into: ✧ Rethinking what "high fidelity" means ✧ How Figma Make fits into your workflow ✧ The use cases they're most fascinated by + a LOT more... It's high energy, insightful, and should spark a ton of ideas 👇 https://lnkd.in/gvqWQUjq

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I teamed up with Adobe’s Creative Career Resources to create a no-fluff, straight-talking course on something every creative needs to master: how to present your work like a pro. Whether you’re heading into your first design interview or gearing up for a big pitch, this 6-part course is packed with tips to help you talk about your work with confidence, clarity, and authenticity. I cover everything from telling your personal story to guiding clients through your portfolio, and even building your own creative buzz so opportunities start coming your way. Would love for you to check it out and share with any up-and-coming creatives who could use a boost: 👉 https://lnkd.in/gzBHBCjJ

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Design Advisors - do you need one? 🤔 If you're a Founder and have never hired a Product Designer or set up a design function before, I'd strongly suggest you bring on a design advisor to help with the process. Setting up your design function for success and laying those foundations will be key and it'll avoid having to take steps back in the long run.

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1 in 5 users face cognitive barriers every day. But most design teams aren’t even mapping them. We obsess over screen readers and keyboard nav— yet ignore how real users process decisions when overloaded. That’s not an edge case. That’s the default for modern cognition. If your product only works when people are rested, focused, and uninterrupted on the most golden of all paths, well then— …it’s not built for reality. Here’s what we’re missing: → $18T global disability market (WEF) → 100:1 ROI on accessibility investments (Accenture) → 71% of users abandon tasks when friction hits But the shift isn’t just ethical. It’s strategic. Reducing cognitive load, supporting memory, and designing for error recovery helps to expose weaknesses in the product’s core architecture. The top teams are using #cognitiveaccessibility to build better systems—and unlock real business value. Full breakdown below 👇 [Comment “COGNITION” if you want the PDF.] What’s one cognitive barrier your team hasn’t mapped yet? #uxdesign #accessibility #inclusivedesign ⸻ 👋🏼 Hi, I’m Dane—your source for UX and career tips. ❤️ Was this helpful? A 👍🏼 would be thuper kewl. 🔄 Share to help others (or for easy access later). ➕ Follow for more like this in your feed every day.

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