Don’t settle for designing in between meetings

Designers, don't settle for constantly designing in between meetings and endless Slack bombardment. You deserve better than this.

✣ Close Slack for a few hours and ask teammates to text you if urgent.

✣ Set recurring blocks of 3-4 hours in your cal for focus time. This week and next are probably slammed for you. Look 2+ weeks out and you'll find openings.

✣ Flag this with your manager as a major blocker to more thoughtful, higher quality design. Hold them accountable to being your ally in resolving this with cross-functional peers. (Try this.)

✣ Do you really need to be at X, Y, and Z meetings? Or is it just your own FOMO or FOMP (fear of missing a promotion)? Does X meeting even need to be a meeting? Don't shy away from asking these questions of yourself and others.

✣ When you deliver stronger work as a result, give focus time the credit! Don't let it be a hidden hero.

✣ If none of the above works, find another team or company that values this. Seriously, 30 minutes of design sandwiched between 3 hours of meetings an unhappy career maketh.

You deserve better.