006 - Product Triad, Being Your Authentic Self, and Biggest Design Failure with Aimee Franco of OpenTable

Today, I’m talking to Aimee Franco.-Aimee is currently a Product Design Manager at OpenTable, an online restaurant reservation service company. If you’ve ever tried to reserve a restaurant, you’ve probably heard of this company before.-She started out her career as an industrial designer, later transitioned into UX, and worked at companies such as Caremerge, CDW, and now at OpenTable. In our conversation, what really stood out to me was the vulnerability that Aimee expressed in the end when she talked about her past struggles of bringing her authentic self to work. And for early-career designers, this is so important to remind ourselves: to be an authentic human being and designer.-We talked about working with engineers and PMs, the design culture at OpenTable, her biggest design failures, and so much more. So without further ado, here’s my conversation with Aimee Franco.===Highlights⭐ Transition to UX with an industrial design background⭐ Working with engineers & PMs⭐ Day-to-day as a Product Design Manager at OpenTable⭐ Design culture at OpenTable⭐ Her biggest design failure & learnings===Not Just Pixels is a student-led UX Design podcast that strives to help you grow as a designer and get that next design internship or job. This is the podcast I wished I had as a design student, and I hope you’ll get something valuable from this show 🙏===Have a great day! :)