Kiki (K): Hello everyone, we are back again in Kartini Teknologi with Kiki and Galuh. We haven’t recorded for a long time, huh? The last time we recorded was like before fasting. So it’s been a long time. We’re very sorry. The reason is there really nothing specific. Perhaps because we have to adapt again because of the pandemic and everything else. Because even though I’m used to working remotely, this pandemic has changed everything. I had to learn a new rhythm again, that’s why we only got the chance to record a new episode now. And today we have a guest, her name is Aulia Rahmani. Maybe we should call you Auli, yeah?

Auli (A): Yes, you can call me Aul or Auli.

K: Aul or Auli, yes. Okay. How are you?

A: Alhamdulillah, I’m good, even though I’m bored.

K: Where are you now?

A: Now I’m in Malang.

K: Are you usually based in Malang, or are you there because of the pandemic?

A: It’s more like I stay in Malang. Though when it’s normal, I spend a few weeks in Jakarta every month. But yeah, the situation now… we haven’t been able to do much like for… how many months? 3 months?

K: I think it’s been almost 4-5 months since February?

A: [Laughs] I can’t even remember. Time flies, it’s July already.

K: Yesterday I thought November would be in 3 months. It turns out, it’s still in 5 months. So this pandemic really makes us forget our sense of time. But hopefully you’re all well.

A: Alhamdulillah, I rarely get ill when I’m home.

K: Really?

A: Yes, usually I get sick like once a month, flu or something else. But until now, thank God, I have never been sick. [Chuckle]

K: Yes, thank God, yes. [Chuckle]. Okay, Auli is a Lead UI / UX Designer at a company called Alterra, which we might be able to ask further about later. But, we want to start from your background. Right, your background is actually communication right, when you were in college. Only along the way, you also become a front-end developer as well, and I read on your LinkedIn that you also interned in Metro TV, and others. You also were a content writer, social media planner, so many roles that you have tried. Now you’re focusing on UX. What made you decide in UX?

A: When I was a fresh grad I enjoyed trying out various opportunities. So if I had an opportunity I would just try it although in the middle of it I would struggle. But from there, I had so many lessons. I decided to focus on UX when I became a front-end developer. Every time I was coding, I felt that the design could be tweaked and improved. At that time the term UI/UX was still new, so I had to find out about it on my own. However, the opportunity to become a UX designer didn’t yet exist. When I was working on social media, usually the client would also ask me to make the web or design, so I was like full-stack, from front-end to web design. I was a fresh graduate, I got bored quickly, so I wanted to try something new. When I applied, I was accepted to several companies working on UX. That’s how I started learning UX. Although I previously already studied web design, but it wasn’t very in depth. Back then I was mostly designing—psychology or research weren’t really applied there 100%.

K: I see so it started when you become a front-end developer. Hmm, what was your inspiration to eventually focus on UI/UX? Like, why you specifically decide to delve into the field? Did you have any role model that made you think “oh, I want to be like them”?

A: No specific figure actually. But the hook that made me think “ I really want to learn this and focus on this” was because in UX we like to talk to other people to find solutions. I also enjoy great products and want to make products like those. So no specific figure that inspired me… maybe it’s too cheesy to mention Steve Jobs, but at that time I also idolized him. Because every time he released the iPhone, we would get amazed, like it seems he can sell anything. Also when I was a front-end developer, there was this person… well actually it doesn’t have things to do with design, but his product is great. The co-founder of Basecamp.

K: Jason Fried, isn’t it?

A: Yeah. I read his book, Re-work. And we also used Basecamp. At that time I thought, this product is great, and I want to create a product like this, that solves people’s problems. And Jason Fried is really productive isn’t he? He has a new book coming up, a new product.

Galuh (G): Besides of Basecamp, were there any products that amazed you and made you think “wow I really want to create a product like this”?

A: I was more interested in management and productivity tools, so like Basecamp, Atlassian’s products, I really liked those. One product that I really liked from back then until now is Airbnb. Maybe because I read the book Airbnb story, and I read about how they struggled from selling cereals, pivoting a couple of times… that was thrilling. Also, for products, sometimes we don’t only assess the product itself but also the people behind it, the people who created the product. Sometimes it matters more.

K: For Indonesian products, is there any product with a UX that you really like?

A: I like Gojek because they’re always improving. And it seems they always listen to their users. I do know some of the people behind it, but from what I see they always try to listen to what users need, what users want.

K: Okay, let’s discuss your current role. You’re now working at Alterra as lead UI/UX Designer. Can you share a bit about Alterra?

A: Okay, so Alterra is actually a payment aggregator. Back then, before I joined, the name was sepulsa.com. So they were only selling phone credits, digital products. But, along the way, the business focus turned out to me all the things behind those digital products—the things that people don’t see. So they were focusing on B2B. They provided PPOB (Payment Point Online Bank), sold phone credits and digital products for several e-commerce. They also provided billers, to build the billing ecosystem, as well as payment technologies for other products. If I explain further it will become too technical, so the focus is in billing payment.

K: I see, and the focus is in B2B right?

A: Yeah, more to B2B.

K: You’re a lead UI/UX designer. Can you tell us more about your responsibilities as a lead UI/UX designer?

A: So in Alterra we do have several UI/UX leads, not just me. There are 3 of us. Each of us focuses on a product line. I focus more on managing the UX team and grooming the team members. There are also other things that I help to craft aside of managing. Actually, I’m responsible for 12 products. There is only one focus, but in the inside there are 12 branches, and my time only consists of 4 people. We’re also hiring. So if you’re listening to this episode, check out Alterra’s LinkedIn. It’s okay if I promote a bit, right? [Laughs] The pace is currently very fast, but the number of members is not proportional to the pace. So we’re currently hiring specifically for UI/UX designers.

G: You mentioned thatt here are 3 leads, and they are responsible for three products. Is it true?

A: Yes.

G: How is the coordination among the three leads to ensure that although the products are different, they have to follow a similar style? How do you keep the consistency?

A: Actually each product has different users and vision as well as mission. So it’s like we’re responsible fr different companies. For each product we have a guideline, and as we go, we keep on improving the style guide too. So far we maintain it by always referring to the guidelines. And we always do a weekly sync to find what are the other team leads currently doing, what blockers do they have, is there anything else we can help with, or what can we give to them as feedback. Sometimes when we craft something, there are many blind spots that we cannot see, but others can see. And other team leads can also show their work and ask for feedback from other leads or team members. It’s more about over-communicating, especially during the pandemic.

G: That’s so true.

A: So yeah, we have to be transparent, stay true to the core. We want to be customer-focused, we want to give the best for our business team. So focus on the core, and also over-communicate.

G: I see. So although the products are different but you must stay true to the core.

A: Yes. Stay true to the core, communicate with each other, and be transparent whether there are any issues or not.

K: What roles make up your team? Maybe there are researchers, UI/UX designers…?

A: Researchers are not yet in my team, they are in a separate team. If we need them, we will take them. We’re also looking for researchers, so there are many people that we’re looking for. In my team, we have UI designers that focus on the UI, we have generalists UI/UX, and UX writers. But I also still help to craft some other things like research, UI. It’s not yet ideal, but it is what it is.

K: Since you also need more people, maybe that’s also what pushed you to write the Twitter thread about UX writers?

A: Yeah, maybe.

K: So can we say that it comes from personal concerns, isn’t it? Because there are not many people who have the skills yet.

A: So, I was taking a one-week leave after the Ied. During that leave in which I didn’t do anything at home, I was thinking, where am I going to take this team to? Because one UX writer, but there are many things that they have to do, from maintaining the styleguide, supervising their friends, it’s kind of difficult. And looking for UX writers is not as easy as looking for UI designers, UX designers, there are many of those. So it’s more difficult. Actually it didn’t have anything to do with work, it was just for fun. I wanted to try tweeting something that I thought wouldn’t be very useful. And then it went viral. A lot of people, it turned out, are not aware of the role. Like, in every product there are people who craft the copy or the content. In some companies, maybe they already have this role, however there’s lack of awareness about the role. UX writers do not only create the content. only write, they also make the designs and interactions in an application or website to have contexts. So people can understand what they need to do.

K: From your threads or writings that I have read, you were more focused on the topic of pivoting from other roles to UX. Is it because of your personal experience in which you also did pivot, or is it because there is no discipline that is specific to the field?

A: From what I see—there are a lot of people who can write, but not many are aware that this role exists. That’s why I want to raise the awareness, that the role of UX writer exists and can be learned. If you have the basic writing skills, you can be a UX writer.

K: But what is the role of a UX writer exactly—are they also involved in the creation of the design flow?

A: Sometimes we as users aren’t aware that what we read in an app/web is just as important as how it looks or works. The task of a UX writer is to craft copies in a product so that users feel they are guided, without them realizing it. But I think nowadays we start to often hear about how important UX writing is in a product. Because if there’s no copy, or if the writing isn’t good, it’s not usable.

K: That’s how it is from my own experience too. I’m now working on revamping Mozilla’s onboarding, and we only have designers and copywriters. So actually we make the copies ourselves but we consult with the copywriters too. Actually we have no idea about it, we’re just imagining is this the correct way to write a copy? So it’s very important to have UX writers in the company. Do you have UX writers in Gojek?

G: I think so but since our work doesn’t intersect I don’t really know the details.

K: In my company I think we don’t have it, or maybe because our company is too big and I don’t understand it but I think we don’t have them in my company. But it would be really helpful if we do have them.

A: UX writers do not only craft micro copy, they can also be involved from the beginning, from synthesizing, giving the storyline to the designer, what they should make. The UX writers would brainstorm with designers—when you see a product, the visuals, interactions, and copy have to be in unity. So they (UX writers) are already involved from the start.

G: I see, so it’s not like UX writers follow the existing flow, but they can also influence the flow that will be created, right?

A: Yeah, that’s why it’s called UX writer, because they do not only create copy but also create experiences.

G: Say that a head of product or manager says that “we will create a new feature”, how does that get to the UX writer, how is the flow like?

A: In my company product managers are not based on business. Project managers have to calculate the cost of delay first. From A, B, C, D, E we calculate the cost of delay and see which one has the largest cost of delay. If A matters most and its cost of delay is the largest, we will work on that first. The handover to the UX team - we usually see whether we need to do research for this product or can we use an existing research. If it exists, we can use that, otherwise we can add more research, collect more data, or start from scratch. There, UX writer is already involved - they actually already have the style guide, know our persona, the vision and mission of the product, so they have to be involved and be in line with the designer. If they need to test it first, they should test it first, but if they can go straight to wireframe prototyping, then so be it.

G: You mentioned style guides - I’ve seen style guides for UI which contains things like how the buttons should look like. What does a style guide for UX writing look like?

A: I think Gojek has one. A few products already have their own UX writing style guide. The contents include the tone and voice of the product, the vision and mission of the product to make it easier for designers to… well when we design, we probably don’t want to have everything be in lorem ipsum right, we need to give context as well like what Kiki mentioned earlier about making their own copy. To make things easier, UX writers have to give examples in the style guide. For example, what is the voice and tone for a snack bar like, in empty states what does the tone of the illustration has to look like. They can also provide recommendations, what the illustrations should be like, what the microcopy should be like. They can also include rules, like do’s and don’ts. Like for example don’t use words that are too casual, it depends on the product.

G: Ah, so copy has to align with the illustrations too, and that’s why UX writers also need to work together with the illustrators.

A: Yeah, because they’re all in one development team, they can’t work on their own. As a user, when we see a product, we are in the same place. For example from Home, to Product Detail, why is the tone different? Why are the words like these, why are the illustrations different from the ones in Home?

K: Sometimes there are apps with different app and mobile web experiences.

A: Yeah those apps exist. Usually they’re being worked on by different people who don’t communicate with each other, or maybe they don’t have guidelines. I’ve been in that position, working with a different team, it was rushed, stakeholders were okay with it, so we continued to develop it. We were in a difficult position, it was hard to push things. There must be one dev team who works together and already have a style guide.

K: In the process, who else do you talk to usually?

A: In my team we usually talk to the product manager and developers themselves. We must have chemistry, and usually after research or finishing a style guide, we share these to our developers, so they have the same awareness as we do. Sometimes I personally feel that sometimes developers are too behind-the-scene and sometimes they don’t understand what user wants, because other teams don’t really communicate it. I don’t want to be like that, because if we communicate it clearly - what users want, what users like and don’t like - developers or tech team will be more excited to work on it because they know the value of the product they’re building.

G: I can relate because usually I’m more excited to work on something when I know its value, rather than just being told to build this feature without knowing why it’s important.

K: Regarding portfolio for our friends who want to be UX writers, yet they have never worked as one before - what do they need to prepare?

A: I’ve already written about it on my Medium, because many have asked me: how? And I thought to myself, hmm… how? Actually, the most important thing is to have writing skills. Regardless what the jargons are—design, UX, etc. they have to have writing skills themselves. They have to understand, who they’re writing for, who are the users, why craft a microcopy… they need to know the why. Also, storytelling. How to make it flow from one page to another. For other things like writing a case study, research, you can learn as you go. The most important thing is in writing itself.

K: So the most important thing is you can write.

A: And also know who you’re writing for.

K: The third part of your series in Medium talks about A/B testing. Can you share a bit about it for our friends who have never heard of A/B testing before?

A: In summary, A/B testing is used to compare two versions or more. So it can actually be A, B or A B C D. But since we’re talking about UX writing, the ones that we’re comparing are variants of microcopy. For example, microcopy A. How effective is it? How is microcopy B compared to microcopy A? I think this is the type of testing that is easiest to do compared to user research or other tests, since they are quite complicated and can take time. If we’re new and just getting started in UX writing, we better use testing like A/B testing. Not only that it is fast but we can also apply the results right away. However, it depends on the product ecosystem though, sometimes it’s not possible to do A/B testing, like maybe the developer cannot perform A/B testing for certain segments. So, it also depends on whether the product is ready or not.

G: Ah so sometimes there are limitations in the engineering or the tech itself, yeah?

K: Do you perform A/B testing in production?

A: I think it’s better to do it in production, but if you want to do A/B testing outside, like perform usability testing with some participants, it’s okay. But we need to know whether the sample size that we use already represent the population or not. You don’t want to have all of these efforts to test, gather people, only to find out that your sample size is not representative enough. So if you’re doing it on-site be careful in the sampling part.

G: Right, especially during this pandemic right.

A: Actually there are a couple of third-party apps that you can use for A/B testing, if your company allows it.

K; What are the tools that you can use?

A: I don’t remember, in my company we have Mixpanel so we can use Mixpanel. Other tools… I forget the name, so it’s like they would gather the participants, we just give them what we want to test, and the participants will try them and we can see which one they are more engaged to. Meanwhile Mixpanel already includes everything so it’s easier.

K: Do you have any book, blog, or website that you like to read as references about UI/UX?

A: I don’t read a lot of UX books nowadays, I’m more into articles now. Back then I really liked reading UX books. There are two books that I like. First is Don’t Make Me Think from Steve Krug because it’s more about psychology, and Emotional Design from the famous Don Norman. It’s also more about psychology, so that I can learn about the foundational concepts of UX. Nowadays I read self-growth and project development books. There is this book about UX writing that I like, it’s not very complete but it’s very applicable. It’s called Microcopy by Kinneret Yifrah. She also often writes in Medium.

K: There are a lot of psychology books there. When you studied communications in college, did you learn those too?

A: Yes, that’s why those things I learned in college are very helpful, because the core of psychology and humans is communication, right, internal and external communication. That’s the core, so those were very helpful actually. But I’m not really someone who memorizes theories, so I have to be able to relate to the events that happened, or when through the books I’m reading, I have to relate them to other people’s experiences, so I’m not a very theoretical person.

K: Last part, about work from home. You’ve now also become a mother. From what I see, when you’re a mother and you also have a job, there must be a lot of things to do. How many hours do you usually sleep at night?

A: It depends on how packed my schedule is. Usually Mondays to Wednesdays are more packed, so it’s easy to get exhausted, and because of that I’d sleep early. Now that four years have passed since I became a mother, I can no longer be a night owl—if my child sleeps at night, then I would too. I go to bed at 10 PM, but when I’m watching Netflix or playing PUBG I can sleep late at night. Last night I stayed up playing PUBG for 2 hours. And if I’m inspired to work on something, such as writing an article or drawing, playing games… it depends. But on average I go to bed quite early, like 10 or 11 PM.

K: You still have time to play PUBG, that’s cool. Do you have other hobbies other than playing games or watching Netflix?

A: I’m into cooking currently because I have to stay at home. I’m afraid of ordering foods, so I cook instead.

K: Did you draw the illustrations in the articles yourself?

A: Yes, but it is what it is, sometimes I’d write for just two hours, and then I’d draw, publish it… I didn’t want to think too much about it. I enjoy writing, but I don’t publish many of my writings. That’s what I want to change, I don’t want to think too much about whether it’s good or bad, I just want to publish it. If I have any feedback I’ll just revise it. So now, I usually write, focus on it until I finish it, proofread a bit, read it again, and publish it.

G: I can relate. I like writing too, but mostly they end up in my drafts because I’m so afraid of hitting publish. Lately I’ve been thinking too, once it’s published, I can still edit it—as long as we proofread it first—but if we miss something small, we can just edit it. I can totally relate.

A: True, true. When I look at my WordPress drafts, there are so many posts I didn’t publish. And they do have good themes in it but I don’t remember what I wanted to write. That’s why if I remember something, I’d write them down in my notes, so that if I want to write something, I already have the outline, and whatever, I’ll just work on it.

K: Where do you usually keep your ideas?

A: I’m not very organized, so usually if I have a book right in front of me, I’d write it down there, otherwise I’d write it on my notes in my phone. Most important thing is, I have to make it happen, so that it’s more efficient time-wise too.

K: Now that you’re working, taking care of your home and your child as well. How do you divide your time?

A: I actually haven’t found the right formula. There were some days, like for two weeks, where I felt very stressed, especially that my child has started to go to school again and the school is fully online. At 8 AM he has to go on a video call with his teacher, and sometimes he doesn’t want to, he would run away. I haven’t found the right formula, but I’m just trying my best. In the morning I would tell my team, we usually start at 9 with a team check-in, and if I can’t do it because I have to teach my son, I’d switch to 10 AM. So it’s more about communication and transparency with my team, and rearrange our work hours if possible. Because I’m already in a stressful situation, I’m not the kind of person who would make to-do lists because they would burden my mind, so I’d focus on daily targets. What do I have to achieve every day? Psychology wise, I feel more relieved, because there are results. If it’s to-do list, sometimes when we’re just writing down A B C D E we suddenly remember, oh we haven’t done this… the list is neverending and it adds to the stress. So it’s more like, okay, today I’ll teach my son one chapter, I’ll cook this, and all tasks in JIRA have to be completed, I’ll also have to do design review… straight to the target. And I work from the easiest one, because if I already have one achievement, it would be easier to move to the others, so I don’t feel stuck. It’s easier to move to other targets, once I have achieved something.

G: Interesting. So we focus on the result… if it’s to-do list, yes, it’s adding more burden. Yeah I also start from the easiest task, even I put showering on my list so that it feels like an achievement, like there’s progress.

A: Yeah, I’m more excited when I do it this way. Also, besides of transparency with the team, transparency with my husband is also important. We both work together, so we do it in shifts. If I have a meeting, he will take care of our son. Sometimes naps as well. At night, I take care of my son full-time, he can work. Or early in the morning.

K: So support from family and company is also important, right, it would be difficult if the company isn’t flexible.

A: Yeah, thankfully my company is pretty flexible, I mean there are other mothers as well, and fathers also feel the same thing if their wives work. So the company has to empathize.

K: As a working mom, what’s your concern? Is there fear of being too becoming too busy? Or are there any other concerns?

A: Once concern that I find hard to deal with, is that it’s been 4 years and sometimes I still feel kind of guilty. Guilty for leaving my son, especially that working in a tech company, the pace is very fast, sometimes there is a day where 80% of it consists of meetings, and I can’t take care of my son or talk to him. But if I look back, actually after my son was born, I resigned. After three months of maternity leave—don’t do this, folks—maternity leave, then I come to the office again, and after 2 weeks I was already stressed of leaving my son, especially I still had to nurse him. I felt guilty. So I had some kind of baby blues at the time. I ended up resigning. I was a stay-at-home mom for almost a year, spent most of the time home, didn’t go anywhere, I was just taking care of my son. And I felt that I didn’t have enough quality time with him, it was just routine stuff—feeding him, nursing him, and I grew to resent it, why is my life like this? It seems there’s no quality in it. My husband supported me to go back to work, and I got the opportunity to work in Alterra. Returning to work, I still feel guilty, but because of that I have to think very hard about having a quality time with my son, so every time I’m with my son I really have to focus. I’m more engaged to my son now compared to after I resigned, so that’s what I like. Maybe a problem like this is not just my problem—I also talked to my friends who are full-time stay-at-home moms. They also feel that although they’re at home all the time, they don’t have quality time with their children. Maybe every mother has to have their own me time before going back to their children so that they have more quality time together. Otherwise, we take it for granted.

K: Maybe because of the limited time, it feels more precious to you, isn’t it? Do you have any other message to Kartini Teknologi’s listeners?

A: As a woman, sometimes we’re the minorities, at work, in the team, especially in a tech company. I think although we’re minorities, don’t let it be a blocker for you to perform, speak up, get the opportunities you want. And also, about becoming a mother, becoming a mother isn’t a blocker for you to create. Once we’re outside of our house to work, we’re already sactificing our time with our children, and when we’re outside, there are results—we’re not just playing around, or not just about the money, we have to earn something for ourselves as well. We have sacrificed so much, so there should be an impact for us too. That’s how I think about it. Whatever I’m working on out there, I have to learn something, that can be useful in the long-term.

K: Whoa there are a lot of things that we learn from Auli, from UX to being a working mom. Thank you so much for spending your time with us this weekend.

A: Thank you so much!

K: Before we end the episode, we want to say thanks to Odiolab who will be helping us edit this podcast. All this time Kartini Teknologi is like an MVP, usually I would edit it, Galuh will write the transcript. But we don’t even have professional microphones. Now we want to try to get our friend’s help to create a more proper audio, let’s see how it looks like. So thank you to Asep from Odiolab. That’s all, I guess. Thank you so much for listening, and see you on the next episode!