“Hello World” — Product Design
How I landed as a Product Designer. Why I chose it. What I do
The way I explored myself on my skills, experiences, and interests in the past two years looked so stupid. I came across several different industries and finally landed myself in product design.
Changing Back and Forth
I came to Cornell as pursuing a less popular major called Urban Planning, but influenced by friends around me — I suddenly wanted to switch to the consulting industry. Persuading myself with numerous reasons and strengths, I could do this. Many cases, a couple of coffee chats and interviews did not end me up in this field — I realized that I didn’t love it.
I continued to explore. But I got lost — it sounded stressed when you saw people posting their internship offers and summer plans on social media, while you were not confident on your own. Having taken a few courses in data science and information systems, I participated in a transportation design project in one of Cornell’s project teams. After showing my eagerness to learn and collaborate with team members, my team lead was willing to sit down with me for an in-depth talk.
Being candid. I told him that I didn’t feel happy in many efforts I had made, nor I ended up in an industry that attracted me. He then presented me again with the team’s final presentation slides from the previous semester and asked for my insights.
Technologies. People. Creativity.
Suddenly they empowered me to discuss more. Throughout this nearly two-hour conversation, he concluded:
“I found your passion for meeting new people. You also showed us many creative ideas and inspirations. All past efforts mean everything. There will be a way to put them together and build yourself talented.”
Thoughtful for a while, I made two decisions: I enrolled in Cornell’s Concurrent Degree program so that I can study human interactions with cities and technologies exhaustively. I also landed my space at User Experience, becoming a Product Designer since then. From urban studies, consulting, data science to UX, I had no regret but more appreciated with those past experiences and lessons learned.
Why Product Design
People asked me frequently: why do you choose product design? Here are my main insights:
My passion about learning on human-computer interaction, human’s communication and emotions
My enthusiasm in creativity, sustainability, and design for future smart cities (IoTs)
What I Do
Like software engineers, product designers exist everywhere. Being a Product Designer is always about learning and living on the margin to meet more challenges. This summer, I’m working as a product design intern at EquityMultiple, a real estate investment firm at New York City. Here are a few key facts of what I’m doing and will do as a Product Designer:
Meet new people and acquire knowledge from different industries.
Solve real-world problems and help people achieve their goals.
Create and design functions all the time.
More and more…
What’s Next…
I will be writing more blogs about my experiences, as well as takeaways from life. I’m exploring the world while keeping a simple, aesthetic, and functional design mindset.
Design Your Life.
