Five to inspire with Tengwan Quek
Senior Product Designer @ Zendesk
Who are you?
I’m Teng Wan Quek. Currently a Senior Product Designer at Zendesk, Singapore. I am the lead designer for Zendesk Message and also work on the core Chat product. Previously, I branded and designed Zopim, one of the world’s leading live chat product that was later acquired by Zendesk in 2014. My affinity with chat is celebrating its 9th year anniversary.
My love for art began when I was a 3 year old kid. From then, I spent a huge part of my life drawing and painting. Later, I formally studied in Industrial Design and Visual Communication in school. I quickly fell in love with all types of designs that require me to solve problems with simple solutions.
During my free time, I enjoy hanging out with stray cats, illustrating, reading, solving puzzle games and watching good movies/TV shows.
What’s a typical day on Tengwan life like?
I start my day with a cup of tea and a book. I then commute to work with music and more reading. Zendesk has flexible working hours and I usually get in around 10.30–11am depending on my meeting schedule. I clear my inbox, catch up on Slack messages and recap what I was working on the day before. I try to complete any intense design work at the start of the day.
In the afternoon, I catch up with my scrum teams or fellow designers to talk through ongoing projects. We set aside time to discuss things like product strategies, design decisions, patterns and product implementations. Zendesk has designers all over the world, from San Francisco to Copenhagen, so I’m regularly on calls with them, too. Every two weeks, the design team looks forward to ‘Creative Friday’, something I initiated when I first joined the company. We take a couple of hours to do fun, and sometimes silly, activities together, such as cooking ramen burgers, playing Lego Pictionary or learning calligraphy. It allows us to take a step back from work, relax and grow closer as a team (https://www.instagram.com/zendesk.design.sg/).
After work, depending on my energy level, I spend my time practising the piano, draw or just simply chill.
How would you define good design?
To me, good design is invisible. It does not take the center-stage. Every decision made in a good design is non-obvious but deliberate. One would only realise its importance once it is removed or designed badly. This is what I strive for every detail I design.
Share something you’d really like to do — but haven’t done yet. What’s keeping you from doing it?
I’d love to venture into cartography and architecture drawings. I am always very intrigued by how cities were planned and how/why humans live the way they do. There are so many interesting stories behind each brick. But the subject is pretty niche and requires a large amount of time to research before creating any work. I definitely have too many hobbies at the moment.
How do you imagine your life as a designer 10 years from now will be?
I imagine I have the freedom to design larger, end-to-end experiences right down to the finest details. I am not sure what they are but they can cross between physical to digital experiences.
People and/or designers that inspire you? (personally and professionally)
Naoto Fukasawa and Dieter Rams — They inspired me and proved it is possible to strive for simple yet functional and timeless designs.
