New adventures in a digital age<strong>.</strong>

Hi, my name is Philippa and  I’m a user experience designer with a focus on concept design and research. After graduating as an industrial designer, I moved to New York to learn more about digital product design. During this time, I’ve learned more about how to create digital products that traverse end-user and business needs. I integrated research, design, and presentation into my work and oversaw the entire product lifecycle from conception to execution.

2020 was a year that will not soon be forgotten; working from home became the new norm, some gained some pounds and others (though I wonder who) lost some.

From insurance to Alaphilippe

The last couple of years, I was part of the design team at KBC. Most  product designers don’t get particularly excited about studying federal banking regulations or the complex bureaucracy that often go hand in hand with designing for financial platforms. However, the progressiveness of KBC ensured that as a UX designer, you were given the freedom to come up with creative solutions to what some of you might see as “less interesting” subject. I’ve always had a strong interest in user research and together with Pàu, I decided it was time for a new challenge to explore this further. As of September, I’m working as the user researcher for Sporza. To give you some context: I don’t follow any sports, and didn’t know the tiniest bit about it. So for me, a whole new world opened. Besides the fact that I’m now able to join conversations about Alaphilippe and Refaelov, I learned a lot about both qualitative and quantitative user research. VRT offers you a lot of freedom to conduct research and to experiment with different concepts. So I have to say, for me it’s a perfect match!

A lockdown of self-development

By nature, I’m a very curious person and I love to learn new things so Corona was a perfect opportunity to do some self-development. I took an online course “Strategic management and innovation” of Copenhagen Business School. This course was provided by Coursera, an online learning platform connected to 100+ universities. The specialization taught me about the changing world of business strategy, focusing on the increasingly important roles of design, user experience and innovation in forming competitive advantage. The course gave me a better understanding of how strategy is established and how it can be implemented.

For me this course was a great first introduction to the strategic side of design. It’s something that interests me a lot, so I’m glad I had the time to dive deeper into this matter. As you can see I was able to take some steps in 2020 thanks to Pàu’s “people first” mentality and support. Hopefully this is a trend that can be continued in 2020.