It’s a Chimed Life: Meet Sam Berg, our Head of Design
“I picked up a corkscrew in the gift shop at the MOMA — one of those that was shaped like a woman flapping her arms — and loved that it was beautiful and functional at the same time,” Samantha Berg explains. “I was seven years old, and that’s when I decided I wanted to be a designer.”
And that’s exactly what Sam did — after studying architecture, engineering, human-computer interaction, and design in high school and college, her career has spanned designing mobile operating systems, consulting, and leading design and creative teams for tech companies.
But growing up in New York, where finance is king — and notoriously an ultra-competitive and predatory industry — Sam was hesitant to move into the world of fintech.
“While I had been told there was a difference between finance and fintech, I didn’t believe it until I came to Chime. When I realized they didn’t prey on their members, and even better, that they put them at the center of all their decision making, I knew this was a company I wanted to be a part of.”
Sam joined our team in 2019 as Head of Design.
Her approach to design at Chime
At Chime, design and creative operate as one team, which allows Chimers to make experiences that are holistic and feel like they’re all part of the same family. The design and creative teams work cross-functionally with product and marketing teams, as well as the talent and workplace experience teams. ”Design is truly infused across the entire company,” Sam says.
For example, Design recently created a metal version of our Credit Builder Card to encourage members to spend on Credit Builder (as opposed to their debit card). The card screams Emerald City — it’s a premium product that members love to use and show off to their friends. The project involved a close partnership with card operations, as well as the product and lifecycle marketing teams. They designed the card, the mailer it ships in, and onboarding emails that celebrate members’ financial milestones. “The campaign was really fun — it turned something that could have been focused on managing money — like, ‘Go make 20 transactions during this month’ — into something that resonated with our members, had personality, and was focused on their lifestyle,” says Sam.
And of course, Design works closely with the Product team on product design and development. “Our members love our SpotMe feature, so design partnered with product on some quick tests to see how we could improve and expand upon SpotMe,” Sam explains. “The feature allows members to send a boost — a few extra dollars that become available to a friend through SpotMe.” It was designed and developed quickly and Sam loves that her teams are able to run such member-driven experiments. “SpotMe Boost is an example of our team launching something that is simple and really valuable for members, but was done quickly.”
Finally, Design also partners with internal teams, like our Workplace Experience team, to delight Chimers. For our summer event, known as SummerChime, designers helped bring together swag, a website, and tons of fun touches to make the entire virtual experience feel cohesive, fun, and, most importantly, to help Chimers feel connected to each other while attending virtually.
Getting design at the table early and often — ok, always 💁♀️ 💁🏽♂️
One thing Sam has learned throughout her career — and brought with her to lead our design team — is that design can bring critical thinking to inform better strategy, whether for external or internal-facing design needs.
For example, when the Product Team decided to launch the Unemployment Assistant to help members navigate the confusing world of applying for unemployment benefits, it was meant to be a quick experiment. But while the product team originally envisioned an email series or wizard, when design got involved, they pushed the envelope further.
“The design team understood that a lightweight, yet highly interactive approach would be powerful for both member understanding and ensuring this experience could fit into our members’ busy lives. While the end product looks simple, and even as if there wasn’t much design that went into it, complex unemployment laws can only become digestible with intentional design choices.”
“Many people have the mentality that design is about making things look good,” Sam says. “But really, design is about making things that are functional, aligned with our brand, and will best achieve our goals. That starts with understanding our members’ needs and how to provide them with the most value.” Design at Chime strives to make sure that every member’s experience with the product facilitates their financial wellbeing and doesn’t get in their way. “Banking* is, after all, a means to an end for people — we want to get them excited about that end result (like buying a couch), not bogged down in the details of how to move money into their account or pay for it,” Sam explains. So rather than design getting involved after a concept is developed, Sam is constantly encouraging her team — and all Chimers — to involve design in the process early and often.
To do that, she promotes cross-functional collaboration and helps design get involved in projects as early as possible. “We’re currently planning for 2021 and design is part of those conversations,” she says. “It’s about making that involvement happen naturally so that design becomes a built-in part of the process rather than an afterthought.”
She’s also working with her team on a design hackathon, where the entire design and creative organization will ideate on top priorities for the coming year. They’ll vision out features and products, as well as ideas the company is noodling on, to get everyone excited about what Chime can achieve in 2021.
“By being proactive and staying ahead of the vision for the upcoming year, we’re flexing our creative muscles and inspiring the company to consider what’s possible — and encouraging them to always involve us in their processes early.”
Designing from shelter in place
As a designer and creative herself, Sam has felt the effects of sheltering in place on her own process and her teams. But they’ve stayed creative and found new ways to ignite their creativity together, while apart.
What they’ve learned is that spontaneous interaction and feedback are key to keeping the team’s creative juices flowing but are also a little harder to come by when folks are working from home. “In the office, we were always casually looking over each others’ shoulders and giving feedback, and I think we underestimated how much that empowers a high quality in our work and our team’s overall creativity.”
So in addition to a weekly design workshop — a structured feedback session — Sam and the team implemented a standup on Thursdays for the whole team to just hang out and say hi. “It’s really just so we can see each others’ faces because we realized how much we missed being around each other in the office.”
They also put together a virtual ‘wall’ where designers can post ideas or mock-ups and give and receive feedback organically. “We’re finding ways to spontaneously connect and foster the collaborative creativity that we’re all craving, but it’s definitely hard sometimes,” Sam says.
Though difficult at times, getting creative with their collaboration methods has led to an unexpected — and wonderful — development in the team’s weekly schedule.
Sam was always the one to set the agenda for the team’s weekly design workshop, but when everyone started working from home, a team member offered to ‘host’ the workshop one week. What seemed like a kind offer to take something off Sam’s plate turned into a weekly tradition, where designers and creatives trade-off organizing the weekly workshop.
“Beyond saving time for me, hosting the weekly design workshop is a creative opportunity to step up and take ownership of something,” Sam explains.
What’s more, the team has taken a creative approach to the workshops (no surprise there). “It’s a long meeting — it can go for two hours sometimes,” says Sam. “So we introduced a break in the middle.” What started out as an opportunity to get water or go to the bathroom quickly became a more interactive and fun component of the meeting.
“Now, every week, a Chimer shares something during our workshop ‘breaks,’ whether they teach us how to shuck oysters, lead us in a meditation, or debate which minor league baseball teams have the best-designed logos. The team is getting to know each other in a way that may have never happened if we had been in the office, and it’s making our process, collaboration, and team culture even stronger though we’re apart.”
If you’re interested in joining Sam and her growing team of designers, head over to our careers page.
*Chime is a financial technology company, not a bank. Banking services provided by, and debit card issued by, The Bancorp Bank or Stride Bank, N.A.; Members FDIC.
