My “user manual”

Hey there, I’m Loretta Widen and I’m a Principal product designer at Turo in the San Francisco, Bay Area. You’ve stumbled across my user manual.

What is a user manual?

A user manual is a series of facts put together about yourself and how you like to work. This helps the people you work with understand you better and with that better understanding, you can work better together.

The basics:

• I have over 13 years experience as a professional designer, working across multiple industries and with companies ranging from small 7-person startups to large corporations.
• I’m a morning person
• I’m introverted
• I’m a big picture person
• I’m a self-starter, and very self-aware
• My superpower is being the supportive connective tissue of the design team.

Conditions I like to work in:

I am (nearly) always available

• I don’t mind being contacted at any time, but I may only respond during the hours of 10 am — 5 pm
• My calendar is available for anyone to see and I don’t block off focus time because I want people to feel like they can access me if they need me.
• BUT, My lunch hour is sacred. It is time for me to bond with my co-workers and relax for an hour from the computer screen. I will not sacrifice my lunch for meetings.

I prefer flexible work from home and work hours schedule:

• I value companies with flexible work from home policies. Working from home cuts two hours of commuting out of my day, which reduces stress, and allows me to spend those two hours on my mental and physical health. Working from home also allows me to spend quality time at lunch with my husband and dogs. All of these things are of high importance to me and I want to work with companies that understand that a more balanced life, means I show up focused and refreshed every day.

My ideal seating arrangements foster communication and collaboration with my peers but is placed away from other distractions.

• I don’t usually wear headphones unless I have to. I work best when my seat is not near loud, communal spaces like the kitchen or a bathroom.
• I love when I can get opinions from my desk mates often so my hope is to sit near designers and managers I work with frequently.

Communication

I’m bad at multitasking a lot of conversations at once. Face to face is best.

• For important company memos, I prefer emails over slack messages that often get lost in the shuffle.
• I often struggle to keep track of the million conversations happening in slack, so if it’s important, please DM me directly or better yet, tap me on the shoulder. I’m always free for a quick discussion to unblock you.

Receiving personal feedback

• I welcome personal feedback at any time because I want to continue to learn and grow.
• I’d rather have difficult conversations than letting things go unspoken, so I value honesty and straightforward feedback in private.
• I will probably obsess about whatever constructive things you have to say so, a little will go a long way. Please be gentle.
• I like having specific examples of things I'm doing well and not well.
• I need actionable, concrete examples of what improving looks like.

My work style

I’m an introverted thinker, but an extroverted collaborator

• I prefer to spend a lot of time upfront diving into data, qualitative feedback, and competitive analysis before committing to how I will solve a specific problem.
• I’m a slow decision-maker that likes to “talk it out” and do some whiteboarding sessions of all the possibilities.
• I need plenty of context before a brainstorm. If you invite me to a meeting and prompt a brainstorming discussion cold-turkey, I’ll likely be silent most of the time because I can’t keep up with the conversation and think deeply in my head at the same time.
• I like to share my work and ideas frequently with both my peers and my manager. I can work autonomously but I find that I am most efficient when I have people around to bounce my ideas off of.

My work love language is infodumping

What motivates me

I’m motivated to build features that actually benefit users.

• I find the most satisfaction when I can simplify a flow, give users features they ask for, or provide more information at key moments that will help users be more successful.
• I’m motivated by companies and teams that value innovation and put in the extra effort and time to make their product great.

Public praise for great work done

• I value public praise, especially after I’ve worked really hard and accomplished my growth goals. It makes me feel good knowing that all my hard work is noticed and valued.

My weaknesses

Boundaries and balance

• I want to please everyone and be supportive, which means I have a hard time saying no.
• I will be the last person to admit I’m burnt out because I fear it will mean I wasn’t good enough to tackle everything thrown at me.

I am averse to new things I think I’ll be bad at

• I dislike social settings and team building activities that I might be bad at such as go-kart racing or rock climbing.

My Superpowers

I am highly empathetic to users and passionate about doing good for them

• My internal values heavily align with users
• When a company I work for adopts policies that are harmful to its users, I take it very personally.

I thrive as the “connective tissue” design leader

• I am a 1000 ft view type of person, because I like understanding how my work affects other parts of the product and I like connecting the dots for myself and other designers.

I’m a doer

• I go above and beyond for the people I work with and the teams I support.
• I don’t wait for permission to make improvements in areas that are known problem points.

Things I love

Mentorship, both giving and receiving

• I haven’t gotten where I am today without the close mentorship of a few great managers who turned into truly amazing mentors and friends. I have thrived in places where my manager intimately knows my work and is invested in my personal growth.
• At the same time, I do love offering up mentorship to less experienced designers on topics around building better relationships with their teammates, learning how to influence, develop

Connecting with my co-workers on a personal level

• I love getting to know my co-workers in and outside of work.