How to handle pushback or resistance on your work from product managers

[@tatipalooza]

Oooh, I can’t wait for this one! They always say in UX you’ll have pushback from your tech lead which yes, but you never hear about pushback or issues with the Product Manager. I had to overcome this with a PM I worked with, it was such a struggle.

[@losbones]

Book recommendation: articulating design decisions by tom greever. it helped me (as a product designer) to refine how I plan and pitch my proposed ideas to stakeholders.

[@femkedesign]

Love this book! Also attended one of Tom's workshops in London years ago and really enjoyed it!

[@cristinagirard9992]

Thanks for the recomendation, I’ll check that out :)

[@matimbahlebela7176]

The music is fire, just 54 seconds in and I'm hooked

[@nikitisza]

It’s getting more and more important to learn how to push back respectfully and based on facts as designers get more experienced. When I started in the design field, I felt everyone knew better 😂 It took a couple of years to push back in the right way. Great video, Femke

[@femkedesign]

It's definitely been a learning process for me also!

[@stephieirwin]

When they exclude you from meetings and inform you that features are already being built without your knowledge. ‘My cousin thinks this would be a good idea’ was also a good one lol

[@hannas1799]

😂😂😂😂😂😂

[@femkedesign]

oh no 🙈

[@00mpa1oomp4]

As a PM, I approve this!

[@Kapadona]

Such a relevant topic for me right now. 😅 "Clearly artciulate any design decision" So hard for non native speaker, but I keep fighting.

[@femkedesign]

So glad to hear it! Good luck :)

[@mstez]

This is super relevant and important for folks to understand, especially those new to UX or maybe who hasn't worked with a challenging stakeholder yet. I've certainly taken notes down for my next encounter 🙂 Thank you so much for making this vid, Femke 💪👌

[@femkedesign]

Thank you Mike! Hope it helps you :)

[@rathcreative]

Great video. These are some of the questions that I’ve been having myself. Interesting to find out your perspective on this.

[@femkedesign]

Thanks!

[@hannas1799]

Thanks so much for this video, really helpful to have someone talk about this issue

[@techtucky]

Love this video! very helpful! really cool you listed those QAs to those says they don't like it! gotta have them written down!

[@femkedesign]

Glad it was helpful!

[@penny2808]

Thank you! your video is full of practical advice as always!!

[@femkedesign]

yay thanks penny!

[@ggcoralez]

I smash the like button before watching 😄

[@femkedesign]

haha thank you!!!

[@jianizhu4655]

Thanks for sharing! Appreciated it all the time!

[@carina13077]

Great tips, Femke! Do you have any advice specifically for stakeholders/PMs who don’t always see the point in user testing, or, they assume if a feature or design has been tested once, then it never needs to be revisited and tested again? The consensus has been that they don’t want to “hassle” end-users (B2B service) too much, so therefore try to keep testing to an absolute minimum. Thanks! 👍

[@femkedesign]

I'd be interested to know the size of their end user base? If you're reaching out to different users each time, then there's no hassling too much if you're only reaching out once! You can reach out to a new pool of users for each test.

[@243016694]

I also work for B2B with an extremely small pool of users I can test with. I found it helpful to build a close relationship with one or two power users. I feel confortable to just reach out to them for quick meetings or chatting over Team. While they might not provide objective opinions, they are the subject matter expert who can help me to understand the complexity of their workflow and give me quick feedback on the design. T Once I feel confident enough about the design, I do the user testing with the bigger team.

[@silverpod]

@@243016694 Agreed! Sometimes you don't get the full time and user access desired, but power users and SMEs are excellent alternatives.

[@YohanaMaia]

I've watched this video before and now that I'm in another company with another challenging stakeholder I'm back to watch it again! 😅 I'm definitely gonna try on my next meeting. Do you have any suggestions on how to prove to your leaders (startup) that you need any type of research to do your work properly? I've been having a really hard time trying to make them understand that the UI is just a consequence.

[@femkedesign]

I'd probably highlight the cost of NOT doing research, to try to get them to see the value in investing in research early.

[@BugHerdWebsiteFeedbackTool]

Agree with all of this 👍

[@243016694]

How would you responde when after you show all the reserach and documentation to prove that this design is what the user want ...then the senior person in the room say something like "you can't always make everyone happy. If Apple just produce what people want, then iPhone would never existe"

[@karsi14_]

Excellent video!! The question now is how to handle the "quick wins"? 🥹

[@femkedesign]

As in what if you get pushed to work on a quick win you don't agree with?