Empathy begets better products and workplaces. Human-centered design is useful for creating user-friendly products and services, but empathy is especially important in the workplace.
While this is a design portfolio, I wanted to take this time to talk about my interest in management. As I’ve heard and experienced, a good boss can make or break an employee’s interest. How many great employees left because of bad bosses? How many bosses suck because they don’t understand or care about their employees?
I aim to make the lives of other people around me better simply by taking the time to think about what preferences they might have or difficulties they might be going through.
The first business book I ever read
This is the first book about business that I ever read. As someone who used to take criticism harshly (hopefully still not the case) I found this book quite helpful. I realized that sometimes people just mean well and it can come out differently. However, as Kim Scott notes, words are measured at the listener’s ear, not the speaker’s mouth. As such, even if I am well intentioned it’s always important to be cognizant of how people are going to take it.
Empathy Encapsulated
Press Start Academy is a startup and didn’t have a formal training process that bigger companies would. Instead, my boss organized a speaker series to help supplement our learning.
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Sales and LinkedIn
Daryl Tong from foodpanda taught us about sending cold emails and how to maximize our LinkedIn presence. I learned a lot about the common courtesies while communicating as well as how to craft a compelling sales email. His LinkedIn advice was great not only in teaching us about how to use it but also in giving me the confidence to start utilizing it how I should be. He inspired me to write my first LinkedIn post.
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Venture Capital
Akshay Bajaj from Susquehanna International Group came to talk about venture capital. Our boss brought him in to help give our growth strategy interns some ideas and advice, but he also wanted the rest of us to attend the talk as well. Why? Turns out venture capital is pretty interesting. Even though learning about the industry might draw us away from returning as full-time employees, my boss was more concerned with nurturing us as people.