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APRIL 12 2025 - 05:50 - SEASON 4 EPISODE 6 PART 1

Sunjung Park (Part 1) 🦊 GitLab


Episode Description

Sunjung is a Staff Product Designer at GitLab, focused on solving technically complex problems and enhancing the developer experience. She is currently pursuing an MBA, which fuels her passion for creating sustainable solutions to complex challenges that foster societal change.

Highlights, inspiration, & key learnings:

  • Avoid perfecting solutions before fully understanding the problem; embrace mistakes and iterate quickly based on evidence. (01:00, 01:40, 01:55)
  • Don't rely solely on quantitative data; balance it with qualitative insights to understand the full context of user behavior. (02:13, 02:51)
  • Qualitative research provides a broader understanding of user flows, while quantitative methods like A/B testing are better for evaluating specific elements. (03:15 - 04:07)
  • Prioritize clear and simple user flows over adding flashy features; refining existing workflows can significantly improve user experience. (04:14, 04:50)
  • Effective product design relies on strong collaboration between UX/Product Design and Product Management to combine user insights with business needs. (00:00, 04:59)

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Where to find Sunjung Park:

Where to find the show:

Where to find Lewis Kang'ethe Ngugi:

The Full Transcript

[00:00:00] Sunjung: UX can suggest if they find something as an opportunity and start to kick off the conversation with the product managers, it could also go like vice versa, but it's a matter of collaboration.

[00:00:15] Lewis: Welcome to the Seven Minute Product Master Series podcast. I'm Lewis Kang'ethe, and today I'm joined by Sunjung, Staff Product Designer at GitLab.

[00:00:22] Great to have you Sunjung.

[00:00:23] Sunjung: Hey Lewis. Thanks for having me.

[00:00:25] Lewis: Thank you. And to kick us off, give me a brief definition of product design.

[00:00:29] Sunjung: Product design is about creating solutions that address user needs while aligning with, of course, business objectives. It requires a deep understanding of users and of course with their behaviors.

[00:00:43] During this process, designers gather insights from users, and we could always iterate on the solutions to correct the best possible.

[00:00:53] Lewis: Thanks for sharing that insight. Moving on to the next question. What's the biggest product design mistake you've ever made, and what did you learn?

[00:01:00] Sunjung: Very good question. One of the biggest design mistake I think that I made in my very early career was probably focusing too much on finding perfect solutions, including pixels.

[00:01:13] So even before I fully understand the problem, I just. Became overly attached to just getting everything just right. I was just too nervous. But in the end, like throughout that project we were solving the wrong problems, so we had to pivot in the end. So that was my one of the first experience, and over time I learned the value of embracing mistake.

[00:01:40] As a designer, this is okay to make mistake as part of my design process. And I also learned the importance of iterating quickly as well. I have a feeling that like now my design decision is more confident because now I spend more time finding those evidence throughout user research, stakeholders interview.

[00:02:00] So cnce wise, it's. Getting better, but of course I still need to embrace my mistake.

[00:02:06] Lewis: Thanks for sharing that. And onto the next question, what's the one piece of common wisdom you disagree with and why?

[00:02:13] Sunjung: One piece of common wisdom that I disagree with is relying just on quantitative data in the design process, probably unpopular opinion while a method like.

[00:02:27] AB testing, I think they provide valuable insights, but they often fail to capture the full depth of like overview on the user behavior. After all, like we're not just purely rational beings, including myself, therefore, it's essential to balance both like quantitative insight. And also qualitative insight.

[00:02:51] I believe combining those number with qualitative users data, including real world observations, this type of activity like with [00:03:00] the balanced work, allow us to make better design decision that truly aligns with users' needs. Scope of AB testing and qualitative study is different. So normally qualitative study has larger scope compared to the AB testing because AB testing is focusing on a very specific elements and you want to compare the performance, let's say.

[00:03:23] So I don't think it's like replaceable. But as a designer and researcher, we may have understanding on certain user flow in the larger scope. So we know how the specific element would play a role in terms of when it comes to the user flow. That's how I try to make a balance between like qualitative insights and quantitative insights.

[00:03:46] So to me, like qualitative user research insights, gimme the overview on the idea how this user flow works in terms of the larger scope of. The design and then quantitative insight is sometimes, especially about AB testing, it's about very specific elements and it of course like show their outcomes very clearly. Yeah.

[00:04:07] Lewis: Wow. Thanks for sharing that. And to the next question, what's the best product design advice you've ever received and why?

[00:04:14] Sunjung: The. Best product design advice I've ever received is to prioritize clarity in user flow over just adding flashy new features. Because while new features, of course, it's great for us as a designer showcasing our work in our portfolio, and it's also very meaningful impact because it's.

[00:04:34] Brand new. However, I also think the actual impact could also coming from just refining existing workflow, simplifying those, or even just removing unnecessary elements by just focusing on the core user needs and reducing frictions from the overall user flow. I believe we can create better user experience, truly make a difference.

[00:04:59] I think UX can provide like very clear insight on the user flow and then how user actually feel throughout running a certain task. So it would be definitely a beauty of collaboration between product design and product management because product management generally has better insight on the business side.

[00:05:23] So UX can suggest if they find something as an opportunity and start to kick off the conversation with the product managers, it could also go like vice versa. But it's a matter of collaboration. Yeah.

[00:05:41] Lewis: Well, it's the end of part one. We'll hear the rest of Sunjung's insights in part two of this episode. Thank you so much for listening and see you next time.