S2 Ep 10. Navigating Tech as a Black Woman: Sharae Gibbs on Her Path to Design Leadership at Google and She Designs

In today's episode, Sharae Gibbs, founder of She Designs and Google Interaction Designer, shares her 12-year journey in UX and her mission to empower women of color in tech through mentorship and training.

• Former Graphic Designer who pivoted to UX design at major tech companies like IBM and Google
• Created She Designs as a mentorship platform for women of color in tech
• Describes Interaction Design as understanding user journeys and touch points to help people achieve goals
• Discusses the value of having representation and community as a Black woman in tech
• Explains how the She Designs UX course evolved to be more flexible and comprehensive
• Shares tools like Otter AI, Gemini, and ChatGPT that help maintain work-life balance
• Provides perspective on how AI is changing UX, but can't replace human empathy and cultural understanding

Teachers already have core UX skills - empathy, communication, problem-solving, and experience designing for different learners. Reframe your classroom experience in UX terminology: lesson planning is experience design, supporting diverse learners is accessibility work, and curriculum adjustments are usability testing and iteration.

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Bio: Sharae Gibbs is the Founder of She Designs, and an Interaction Designer with over 12 years of experience in User Experience (UX) Design. She’s worked at companies like IBM and Google, and her goal is to empower the next generation of women of color in tech. 

Contact Share at: sharae@shedesigns.org

Check out her courses at www.shedesigns.org

Use my discount code ZEEUXPREP for 15% off the course. 

Chapters

• 0:00 Introduction to Sharae Gibbs
• 2:50 Sharae's Career Journey and Mentors
• 5:00 Life as a Google Interaction Designer
• 9:00 She Designs UX Course Evolution
• 18:19 Navigating Tech as a Black Woman
• 23:00 Work-Life Balance and AI Tools
• 27:00 Teacher-to-UX Transition Advice

Transcript

Zee: 0:05

Hello teacher friends, welcome back to the UX Teacher Prep Podcast. I'm Zee, a former teacher turned Senior UX Researcher in EdTech. Today I'm chatting with Sharae Gibbs. She's the founder of She Designs and an interaction designer with over 12 years of experience. She's worked with big names like IBM and Google and is passionate about empowering women of color in tech. We dive into her work at Google leadership in UX, ai, accessibility, work-life balance and so much more. Stick around until the end, because she's going to give us insights on how to transition from teaching to UX and she's gonna talk about her amazing UX design course.

Narrator: 0:46

Welcome to the UX Teacher Prep Podcast, the ultimate destination for educators who aspire to break into the field of user experience and product design. Your host, Zee Arnold, a 15-year teacher turned ux researcher, is here to guide, coach and mentor you through every twist and turn as you make your career transition into tech. If you're ready for a more satisfying career and lifestyle and you want the balance to unleash your creativity, this podcast is for you. Now for the show.

Zee: 1:19

Hello Sharae. It's so great to have you on the show today. How are you?

Sharae Gibbs: 1:23

I'm doing really well. Thank you so much for having me. I'm really glad that we're doing this.

Zee: 1:28

Yes, I'm so grateful and excited to talk to you on the show today, because I really look up to you for your expertise and your professionalism. So let's get started by telling everyone a bit about who you are.

Sharae Gibbs: 1:40

Of course. So my name is Sharae and I've been working as a UX designer for over a decade now, primarily at large tech companies like Google and IBM, and most people in my community know me through She Designs, which is my mentorship and online training platform for women of color, building and running it for, I think, over eight years now, and it's something that I'm incredibly proud of. I'm also a mom to a one-year-old and I'm married, so you know, life is really full.

Zee: 2:12

How long did you say you've been working in UX?

Sharae Gibbs: 2:15

Oh wow, I've been in UX for over a decade. I want to say I'm up at like 12 or 13 years.

Zee: 2:22

Wow, nice, nice. So what is it that brought you into the UX field? What was your journey like? Getting into UX, or was that your first type of career?

Sharae Gibbs: 2:31

This was my first career, but my background was actually in graphic design, so it's a small little pivot from designing branded products to designing experiences. Starting on with print and then moving that to digital experiences is a little different, so, but my background was overall in design.

Zee: 2:50

Got it, and did you have any mentors who inspired you to just continue this road into design and even start your own company?

Sharae Gibbs: 3:00

I want to say that my mother was my first role model, so she always encouraged me to follow creativity I'm like my first sketchbook that she gave me and in terms of just leadership, I would say her as well, because you know, she was actually a teacher, and so was my grandmother and my aunt, and they moved from being teachers to different you know different roles. So my mother actually founded a high school. She was the principal for a high school and she became many things from a dean. She was once a paralegal and then she started to teach history and English. But when she got her doctorate, that's what allowed her to teach at higher level of education. So I really looked up to her in terms of presentation skills, how do I communicate well? How, as a woman, do I show up in these spaces? And she even does a lot of work with She Designs today, helping us grant some different things. So my mom is my ultimate, you know superpower and superhero, yeah.

Zee: 4:07

Wow, that's great um teachers in the house. Your mom was a teacher like me, yeah, um yeah, and I know you have a lot of respect for educators, and so when I was in your program, the ux design course, I was wondering if I would find other teachers in the program. And I did find someone who was a former teacher that was in our little cohort, so that was cool too. Yeah, that was really awesome. So you work at Google, so I have to ask you what is it like being a Googler?

Sharae Gibbs: 4:34

Oh, that's a good question. I honestly feel very, very privileged in a lot of ways that I think as a Black woman, sometimes you don't get to feel privileged and so, honestly, being a Googler makes me feel like I get to be in the know of things and also that I have access to a lot of information. Internally, we have a lot of online training programs and things that I get to do for free, so I'm always able to kind of learn a course and take a program that I'm curious about, and then I can also learn from peers and they're doing some amazing things. So it helps me stay on top of my skills and continuously like refine and learn from others, whether it be oh well, I really like how this person presented this material, material or I want to kind of reach out to them to learn more about their background and to understand a different perspective. I think being a Googler is really cool, and then we also have, like, free food and just the basic things that make such a difference.

Narrator: 5:39

Yeah.

Sharae Gibbs: 5:39

I was thinking about that the other day. Like I never wake up in the morning and go oh, I don't want to go to work, I always feel like, wow, I get to go to work.

Zee: 5:47

Wow, that is amazing. I got to be honest with you. When I first was transitioning from teaching into the UX space, I thought about Google and I thought about some of those major companies, the way how it's portrayed, like, you know, online and stuff. It just seems like it's so competitive, so hard to get in, like the process. The company that I currently work for is also very competitive, but it's an ed tech company and I just thought, you know, the company is so huge, you know, being a Black woman going into that type of space, what would that look like? And when I started your course and I learned that you worked at Google for so long, I was like, wow, like she's really doing it, this is great. So it's just great to know that you're in there and you're doing it and you're representing, thank you.

Zee: 6:32

So I'm curious do you work closely with UX researchers? And, if you do, what does that look like? Because I know you're an interaction designer and, by the way, what does that actually mean?

Sharae Gibbs: 6:40

Definitely so. As an interaction designer, I'm thinking about the various touch points between a consumer and our product or even with a service, so I'm constantly coming up with what we call user flows and figuring out from someone's like goal standpoint, if they want to complete a goal, what are the different tasks that they would need to complete to achieve the goal in these products, and also, as they are in the consideration and awareness phase, how can we ensure that our products stand out, and so a lot of the work that I do at Google is about consent interactions, making sure that when we request user data, that we're doing it in a very compliant way. I would say an interaction designer is someone who can think about the human experience, about all the different touch points that make up that user journey, and considering how we can help them achieve their goals. During, your question was about user research and how do designers or interaction designers kind of work with those folks, and so what I can say about UX role is that it sometimes comprises all things, so I do user research as well in my role, not just one thing.

Sharae Gibbs: 7:59

It's very multifaceted, and I love that right, because I love human-centered design. I'm interested in understanding user painpoints and sentiments and thinking about how their frustrations kind of they kind of give me little insights into ways that I could potentially solve those problems. And so in my current role, I do research and I do participate in what we call our pine cone studies, where I'm talking to actual people people like you and anyone who has used a Google product before. We are coming up with different methods to understand their experience. And then my role is also to come up with solutions and design solutions for it, for those all Got it.

Zee: 8:46

So you kind of do a little bit of everything then Interesting. You also do UX research as well, so you really get the full breadth of the work I do. I love that. So let's talk a little bit about your course, the She Designs Women of Color UX Design course. It's been about three years since I took your course and that course had a huge impact on my transition from teaching to UX.

Zee: 9:10

Obviously, as you know, within two months of taking the course, I landed my UX research role, and what I really loved about the course was the first of all I didn't even realize it at the time. I realized it after, like looking back that the parts where we had to do user research within the course were the parts that I loved the most. I loved reaching out to people, like you know, finding people on Facebook and different places and trying to get them to do interviews with me and just doing the research part of UX design was the part that I loved the most, and then I ended up in UX research, so that was pretty cool. The next thing that I loved about the course was us having those live calls where we got to talk to our peers about the work we were doing, and so that collaboration piece I feel like it really helped prepare me for the kind of collaboration that I would be doing as a UX researcher across different cross-functional teams.

Zee: 9:56

Last thing I want to say about the course is that it just really felt good to be alongside women of color right. I felt really empowered and I don't think any other UX course would have afforded me that opportunity. I was looking at all different types of courses and they just didn't feel like I would fit. You know, they didn't feel like they were for me. But when I found your course and I started to do research on like what it was all about, who it was for and what it was for really designing for everyone and accessibility and inclusion, I really felt like that's a place where I could thrive and I really did so. I know that your course has evolved since then. So what are some of those changes that you've made to your course and what motivated those changes?

Sharae Gibbs: 10:37

Yeah, well, first and foremost, I want to thank you for sharing that. I think we put a lot of intention into developing the course, and the fact that you felt that as a student at the time that means a lot to hear. I think even just participating in those live calls was really therapeutic for me as well. Right, so I wanted to create community, and that was my goal when I first started. The course was to create a space where people could come and learn from others, whether that be peers or other professional experts in the field, and having that access to professionals was really important, because if I think about my time as a designer, starting as a contractor for IBM and doing some other you know really great things I realized that the women, especially the Black, latino women they really, really helped me to figure out how to find my voice and how I could take on a career such as this Just watching them give presentations, having them help me navigate to different projects that I wanted to be on, speaking up and finding my ways of almost emulating some of the things that I was experiencing from them that was so important, some of the things that I was experiencing from them that was so important, and so to create that sort of live call where students could come together, learn from each other and bring some you know, you know friends and coworkers in the field or even people that were just happy to contribute to the program. That was really meaningful for me, and so, you know, I just want to thank you for participating in the program, but also just for sharing that you found it very useful. Research, because you do have to understand the world of UX in order to be a contributor in the space and to help your colleagues, right, that may have an expertise or something in research. Right, you want to be able to talk the same language and understand how you can contribute, not just from a design perspective but, you know, from a human-centered design perspective. And then your questions were around, like what really motivated me to want to change the course, and I think that it was understanding and learning right and applying what we're learning and the feedback that we're getting through the course was really important.

Sharae Gibbs: 13:06

So before our program was a set time and we were pairing students up with startups and trying to get them to go from having little experience and knowledge of UX to producing a case study portfolio with a startup founder and I think what we found is that people really wanted to have a lot more flexibility.

Sharae Gibbs: 13:27

So that was something that's really important, especially for moms, for parents right that are trying to juggle working full time, having kids and trying to takeuggle working full-time having kids and trying to take a learning program. So we wanted to change it to be self-paced, and that's something that we did. We wanted to include more video tutorials, more ways for you to actually get insight on these various topics from professionals, and so we did rewrite a lot of the curriculum, a lot of the details of accessibility and inclusion they're still there and then we also wanted to focus on beginner level, friendly content that anyone can start with just to kind of dig their feet into UX. You feel more empowered to take on what we're calling our Design Mastery Program, where you really get to start working with the tools a lot more hands-on, there's a lot more tutorials, and that was really important for me to change about the program so that we could actually scale it a bit and make sure that we could reach more people.

Zee: 14:30

So there's it sounds like there's a foundations course now and then there's a design mastery course. Is that right? That's correct. Okay, I got it. And I forgot to mention that part about being paired with the startups. Being able to work with an actual company on a real project was amazing, because obviously, teachers and others who are transitioning into the space or just starting into UX they want real projects that they can actually work on with real clients. So that was top tier.

Sharae Gibbs: 14:57

Awesome, yeah, and we're still going to have that as part of the design mastery program.

Sharae Gibbs: 15:01

So I think a lot of what we did was trying to make sure, at our core, we can reach everyone, help everyone get comfortable with Figma and certain design tools before we start to go really deep. And I'm also really proud of the work that we've done in partnering with startup companies. We've partnered with OriginWay, which is an amazing product that helps women with their pelvic floor and provides training about that. We've partnered with Lunai, which is an app that tracks periods and utilizes science-based sounds to alleviate menstrual pain. We've also partnered with Skinnery app and Kintsugi. So these are some of the programs and startups that we've worked with Navigate Maternity, a lot of the companies are leveraging a lot of student work and that's something that we showcase in some of our case studies of the impact that we've made at She Designs. And again, like to your point, it does help them say I do have this case study and I have this work experience because I've worked and met with stakeholders before and I sort of know how to handle myself.

Zee: 16:08

Yeah definitely and, for those who are listening, if you are interested in the course the foundations course you can use my discount code ZUXPREP for 15% off the course. If you go to the website uxteacherprepcom and click on courses, you can find that information and you can check out the course. I think it's a great course and, based on what you've been saying and the improvements that you've made and just enhancing the course to the next level, I mean I wish I could take it again. I think I'm thinking like, should I take it again? Learn more. You know I'm always like into learning more and just getting as much information as I can. It sounds like I really want to take a look at it and see the new things that are there. Yeah, definitely. What's one of the main things you hope that your students will take away from the course? Anyone who takes my course. I want them to walk away with this. Or is it just like every little thing that's in the course? I want them to grasp it all. That's a really good question.

Sharae Gibbs: 17:03

I think one of the key takeaways is the distinction between empathy and sympathy, your ability to understand people and help solve the right problems. I think it's really, really important to take away from it. I would say, showing your process, being able to improve one, your UX terminology, your vocabulary and how you communicate things. Some of what I've seen is, especially when people are reaching out to take the program and they may even have a UX role already, that's the thing they could be transitioning into UX or in a UX role. But wanting to feel more confident in their knowledge is that they want to take the course to use the right terms and speak the lingo, and so that's really important, right, like how do I effectively create a design portfolio? How do I like communicate my ideas and put them together so anyone can see the work and understand my approach to design? Because I feel like your approach to design you could take wherever you go and be effective Makes sense.

Zee: 18:10

So let's talk about being a Black designer and leader in the UX space. How have you navigated any challenges that may come up? I know, basically you're in a predominantly white or male-dominated industry and so, like, how does Sharae show up as a Black designer and a leader in the UX space?

Sharae Gibbs: 18:30

Oh, that's such a good question, because the truth is like working in tech, especially as a Black woman it means that you're constantly evolving and you're constantly being asked to prove your value. So, for me, maintaining balance is really, really important. I try to stay connected to why I'm doing the work in the first place, not just what I'm producing, but like who am I doing it for, you know, and how does it impact people? So I, as I had shared before, I take a lot of courses, right, I read, I try new tools, not because I'm trying to case trend, but I want to be ready for when things happen, for when the world shifts and you know it always does. I want to make a space for reflection and ask myself like am I still growing, am I being stressed in ways that feel healthy and meaningful? And then, personally, you know, becoming a mother, everything has shifted for me, so my time is a lot more sacred now, and so I, you know, I try to stay grounded in community, whether it's through She Designs or my own support system, and that really does help me, right?

Sharae Gibbs: 19:39

Because I would say that, as a Black woman, I'm constantly experiencing, you know, different things, whether it's blatant racism, subtle microaggressions, even in meetings, right, you might get over talk sometimes, or people might say condescending things to you in a condescending tone, like does that make sense, you know, and so. And then I, just as a black person living in america, we experience things that are more overt, like neighbors calling the priest for no reason. There was this one time on a plane and someone was like good riddance when I decided to switch seats, you know. So, you know these moments, they really stick with you and I think, when you show up at a job, there's just so many different moments, right, that I could pull up and say, like these there are, you know, some challenges, but I think, as it relates to women especially, I feel like being a black woman, you, you go through these different experiences and it does show up and it does sort of impact your trajectory.

Sharae Gibbs: 20:39

I would say so in terms of many industries.

Sharae Gibbs: 20:43

I mean, I just went to an event recently and a woman was talking about how she had been wearing multiple hats at her job and she had been at the job for years and when it was time for promotions she was really getting overlooked and I remember feeling, you know, connected to her in some way like we're all having similar experiences as Black people, as women of color, and it's something where they're basically saying like we don't see you right Because they're saying it's not the time or you know, there's always some reason, you know, and I feel like in order for us to kind of break out of that, it's important for us to continue to find ways to grow in our careers and honestly, I always say, like plan your exit strategy.

Sharae Gibbs: 21:28

I would just think that you're in a space where you're being overlooked and that's why, you know, I thought doing a course was really important and then, adding on to my course outside of UX, in the future I want to do so many other types of courses because we have to create that understanding that we understand our own value right, and sometimes an external offer somewhere helps us realize that there's going to be better coming and that I'm worth more than my current job and how they are valuing me.

Zee: 21:58

That's so powerful. The way you were just explaining the planning, your exit strategy. I was thinking, yeah, you need to make some more courses. You need to make some more courses because a lot of women need to hear this. And what you mentioned about just staying connected to your why that's something that I try to ground myself in as well Just staying connected to the reason why I'm staying in education, the reason why I want to be in this design space, and also connecting to what you said about constantly being asked to prove your value, and I have very strong beliefs.

Zee: 22:30

I'm a very spiritual person, I would say, and so I'm just so glad that I know the value that I bring and that my creator has given me already permission and access and all those things that I need to be able to show up in a space and be confident. You know what I'm saying and so definitely I keep learning and I'm always I'm everyone knows I'm a very curious person. I'm always trying to learn something new and, just like you said, stay on top of what's happening and being being ready. So I would love to see a course like that, especially from you, you know. I think that would be amazing, awesome. So you mentioned balance and how you. You know you have a one-year-old daughter now and you have to kind of balance a lot of different things. So do you have any specific tools that you leverage at work to kind of stay organized? Do you have like a favorite tool?

Sharae Gibbs: 23:31

is one called Otter AI. It's basically integrated with your meetings. I do it from She Designs meetings because at Google we have other tools, but I do use it and it sort of wraps everything up. I think it's incredibly helpful for recording things, for sharing out big takeaways and the summaries, insights is really cool. So I use that one a lot and I definitely use Gemini.

Sharae Gibbs: 23:49

I use chat, gbt, and I think a lot of us are starting to use it, even for like mundane things. Right, like I need to quickly get back to this person's email, how can I just kind of let them know I acknowledge what they said and I can move more efficiently throughout my day. And then there are also some really like cool tools that I'm seeing for images and pictures and some like cool editing software ones. So I think I'm using AI more and more every day. It's kind of it's a little scary, yeah. So I would say there's Figma AI plugins, there's Adobe Sensi for refining images and optimizing UX, just yeah. Gbt for any sort of design briefs, or I think I really love how they help you identify certain patterns and things that are happening, so it also can help you with your research work.

Zee: 24:41

Yeah, definitely Just for efficiency sake. I think it's really great to be able to implement some of those tools just to get you started, because you have so many different things you have to get done and you just need something to just get you started on your way so that you can get to it. So, speaking of AI, you know AI is advancing very rapidly and I wonder how you think it's impacting UX design and what do you see as potential? I know you talked about a lot of the benefits, but what are some potential challenges of integrating AI into our design process?

Sharae Gibbs: 25:14

Yeah, I would say like AI is really shifting everything, but very powerful, it's very fast. It helps us to design, create and solve problems really, really quickly. I know it can feel sort of overwhelming quickly. I know it can feel sort of overwhelming and I look on YouTube, I look at different content creators and there's a little bit of fear, I'm suspecting, about how quickly things are evolving, and I would just encourage designers to stay curious and adapt. It's helpful to use those tools right and the ones that the people that are thriving are, you know, figuring things out and quickly starting to adapt and to use those tools. So maybe it can help you to automate your tasks, write user flow, analyze behavioral patterns, as I just mentioned.

Sharae Gibbs: 26:05

I feel like these tools are helpful, but I also don't believe that AI can replace you, you know, because it can't really replicate lived experience. It doesn't have cultural understanding or emotional intelligence, and so I would say that we are still pretty complex as people and so I don't think that for every single job that it's going to be able to take over. And yeah, I think I don't know. In our course, we're going to talk about integrating AI into your UX process and a lot of cool information. I don't think UX is going anywhere, but I do think that it's evolving and it's important to understand how to blend your creativity with strategy and kind of think about how UX and AI of time. I really am loving this interview.

Zee: 27:00

Last thing I want to ask you is what advice would you have for educators who are trying to transition into UX space? I know it's crazy right now, but any kind of advice you can give them if they're considering a career in UX, design and skills that might be an asset for them, or any other advice that you might give them in this time, right now, transitioning to UX?

Sharae Gibbs: 27:29

Yeah, definitely. If you're an educator thinking about transitioning into UX, first of all, know that you already have so many of the core skills that you need, because teaching is rooted in empathy, communication, problem solving, and you've already experienced designing experiences for different types of learners, right? So it all beautifully translates already into UX. What you'll need to do is reframe your experience, and so a lot of the work is identifying the overlap and what you already do. So, for example, if you have on your resume today that you know how to plan a lesson, example, if you have on your resume today that you know how to plan a lesson, well, that's really experience design. If you are able to support diverse learners, maybe you work with people with disabilities. Maybe you have a focus or background in inclusive design and accessibility right, because you understand the different types of user needs and you kind of interact with people firsthand.

Sharae Gibbs: 28:30

If you're able to adjust your curriculum, well, that's some sort of usability testing and iteration, and so I think there's just a way of building fluency with UX tools and language and then learn how to talk about your skills in the context of product design. Like, how do you speak about user research? Why are frames prototyping, like is there anything that you built in your classroom that could be seen as a prototype? And then, if you just want some help with figuring out how to reframe that experience, I always recommend a course, a bootcamp. A mentor, a career coach anyone who can support that career change and offer mentorship or guidance is something that I definitely recommend. And yeah, overall, just don't underestimate your value. You've led classrooms, you've adapted to people, you've adapted to change and you've already supported so many people with different needs every single day, so I think you've already done the hard work. It's just about figuring out how to again, like reframe your experience into a UX focused one.

Zee: 29:35

Yes, reframing the experience. I keep telling teachers you can do this, you have what it takes. You might not see it, but I can see it. Yeah, so that's great. It was so great to have you on the show today, Sharae, and learn about your journey and your course. I am so excited that I got a chance to talk to you. How can people reach out to you if they want to connect with you.

Sharae Gibbs: 29:56

That's amazing. Yeah, you can always go to our website, wwwshedesignsorg. There's a way for you to actually set up a call with me through the booking tab at the top, and I can always be reached out via email as well. Shiree at she designsorg, and you know I'm happy to help anyone who's interested in transitioning or just wants to understand more about what I do on a day to day basis.

Zee: 30:21

Okay, so I'll definitely drop that in the show notes and in the description box. And thanks again for coming on, Sharae. We'll talk soon. All right, talk soon. Thanks so much for having me

Sharae Gibbs: 30:28

We'll talk soon. Alright, talk soon. Thanks so much for having me thanks so much for tuning in.

Narrator: 30:35

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