Don’t Edit Your Voice And Imagination.
This year has been a ride, and it’s only fitting we share our most powerful takeaways. I want to share a story of growing into a designer as an engineering student.
Before I was a designer, I was an engineering student. Before I was a mentor, I was a mentee (still am).
Growing up, we all have vivid imaginations. We stay up late waiting for the tooth fairy, dream of going to space, and have ideas that were defied physics. And as we grow older, we start editing our imagination.
This year, I spoke to designers globally on ADPList and noticed one similarity — everyone was told what they can/should do as designers. It was as though we all stopped imagining things as we step into the industry. …
5 Principles long-lived teams use to collaborate and succeed
Keynote by Felix Lee at XFN Conference and OBJ-She Design Week 2020
Almost every significant contribution requires a team. That is increasingly true whether you’re a designer, creative, or entrepreneur, author of Being Mortal, notes that every profession has moved beyond the individual craftsman to delivery in teams.
Hitting’em OKRs is teamwork
A Google study of effective teams showed that team norms especially psychological safety were key to performance. The lead researcher found that giving people this data caused them to pay attention to team norms but added, ‘‘Don’t underestimate the power of giving people a common platform and operating language.’’
It’s true, the highest performing teams I’ve worked with and led — knows how to foster a strong culture of creative collaboration. …
To bend reality, you got to know reality. And it’s not all design.
A few days ago, I read this tweet (and hundreds of LinkedIn posts) and found myself wondering about whether most designers understand the value of design. And as Steve Jobs once said, “Design isn’t the way something looks, it’s the way it works.” If by any chance, you understand this you’d know what’s coming next.
For most designers, when something isn’t working, it’s tempting to jump into a usability study or doing massive user testing to find out usability flaws. But sometimes, it’s easy to forget that design isn’t always about how usable it should be. It first needs to solve a problem, provide value. …
Thinking and Designing centered around sustainability.
— This article was written-first by me at Shaper Impact Capital. —
For the past decades, companies have been thinking and creating products & services that solve largely a part of social problems. Today, we have companies like Uber that help us get a ride in minutes, Facebook connects us closer to our friends and Stripe helps facilitate payments globally. These are just popular companies but we all know where this is going. As a civilization, we’ve done remarkably well and thrive at each industrial revolution.
22 Months In Military Service, What Truly Mattered.
Bertrand Russell once said, “Do not fear to be eccentric in opinion, for every opinion now accepted was once eccentric.”
On Oct 4 2018, I enlisted into Singapore’s Military conscripted service. At that time, I flew back from SF Bay Area & Indonesia after a year exploring in the world of technology and design — I’ve always believed in constantly reinventing the way we experience the world, a purpose that still guides me today.
Military Service was a reality I wasn’t ready to face. To serve the nation, I had to put the work I had then, to a pause. …
The greatest lesson my father taught me without words
I’m writing this on the eve of Father’s day at midnight 2:00AM — awaiting for my father to be home. This is a normal day for him. In fact, for the past 20+ years. Waking up as early as 5am and coming home as late as 2am from work. He had returned home late after everyone else had gone to bed, from a day at work (in his bakery) and getting a few hours of sleep. That same moment for years, capture my father — his passions, his values, and what he stood for in life.
Yet, none of this was taught verbally neither to me nor my siblings. He showed it through his work ethic and his love for the people around him. His support for the people around him was never measured or quantified. You see, we don’t come from a ‘well-to-do’ family but in my father’s eyes, there was never a day where he wasn’t optimistic about the future. …
Our journey to design a radically better experience for planning trip itineraries — Series 2 of 2
This is the final part of a two-part series documenting the design of Packdat’s trip-planning platform. Wondering how we got here? 🤔
Here’s the story so far: Packdat was designed to solve the woes of trip-planning. We launched for the third time and in 12 months👇
Everything worked out well, not…
12 months after relaunch, we saw higher drop-offs. That wasn’t what we had expected so we began digging deeper to find where the frictions were in the flow. We sift through the finer details and closely analysed the smaller tasks —
- By introducing ‘Add by URL,’ we were able to increase the number of contents on our platform — First win…
Our journey to design a radically better experience for planning trip itineraries — Series 1 of 2.
In late 2016, Zeth and I were scrambling to plan our trip itinerary. While doing so, it felt like a major school project 😭. Soon, we realised we weren’t the only ones; our friends were facing the exact sentiments. We grew curious and asked:
Why does planning an overseas trip, feel like a school project?
We believe that travel should be a magical and easy experience for anyone.
Planning an itinerary seems to be broken, and we were inspired to fix it.
Beyond travel is your story
Packdat is a platform to share travel ideas and co-create itineraries with your friends.
Founded in 2017, Packdat has seen 30,000+ successful itineraries created in Southeast Asia and was eventually acquired by Passpod in 2018. …
Giving the power of flexibility and efficiency back to travelers.
Introduction 👋🏻
Like most people, I love travelling. The feeling of being foreign, all new again, is irreplaceable.
Last month, I decided to push myself creatively as a designer and write about my Passpod app redesign.
Giving more flexibility and efficiency to travellers for booking.
Passpod is a Digital Tourist Pass that provides seamless connectivity and offers on local attractions anywhere in the world. Released in 2017 available in Indonesia.
Redesigning the travel app
At Passpod, I found opportunities to redesign alongside with software developers and designers, and of course, write this article.
My Role: Head of Product & Design
Task: Research, design and collaborate on improving the existing app
Timeline: July 2018–Aug…
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