Team Beacons
Supporting the global mission while creating team standards to help guide team growth.
Why a beacon?
Technically, an aeronautical beacon is a type of visual navigation aid that illuminates sections of a runway to guide pilots toward a safe landing in bad weather or night scenarios —think of beacons as a lighthouse for the aerospace industry.
Using that metaphor, we relied on eight beacons to guide teams through challenging work while working in the field. It was a way to ground the team. And everyone contributed. The beacons eventually became part of the onboarding process for new UX hires, and each team member would proudly hang a copy at their desk.
Unsplash image by Jordi Moncasi
UX Beacons in print form for use as handouts for our annual UX Conference.
The 8 Beacons
1. Win as One
Collaborate with others and look for compromises that work for everyone. Be courteous and ensure to spare feelings. Work as a team to be successful together.
2. Know the Priority
Understand the hierarchy of competing tasks, and focus on what is most important. De-prioritize the tasks that detract from the work with the greatest value.
3. Cultivate Curiosity
Learn continuously—pair humility with an ambition to enhance your broad knowledge and build a culture of learning with others.
4. Keep it Clear
Simplicity and clarity often take more effort than verbosity. Seek to communicate clearly in designs as well as in conversations.
5. Craft with Pride
Create artifacts of the highest quality—design with an eye toward progress rather than perfection. Build products you can stand behind.
6. Trust the Process
Follow all agreed-upon processes. They are in place to ensure the success of our projects. The UX process works.
7. Advocate for Humans
Stand up for the people using the product. Act as the bridge between the business, the technology, and the user. Focus every on the concept of user need as the driver of value.
8. Make the Future
Consider emerging technologies and how they may be relevant or helpful to users. Design future-proof systems to help mitigate rework in the future.
Aligning beacons with our mission.
UX Team’s Mission
Create an amazing employee experience by transforming processes and products in Gulfstream through inclusive collaboration, design, and communication.
Advocating for Humans = Create an amazing employee experience…
Cultivate Curiosity = by transforming…
Trust the Process = processes…
Make the Future = and products…
Know the Priority = in Gulfstream through…
Win as One = inclusive collaboration…
Craft with Pride = design, and…
Keep it Clear = communication.
Growing
How I built the team and invested in people to grow the UX practice in Enterprise and Agency environments.
“If you’re not engaging with the UX team, you’re going to have rework.”
— Sheryl Bunton, Sr. VP & CIO Gulfstream Aerospace
During a business-wide meeting.