Office hours: the powerful design tool you aren’t using (yet)

Make your team available so you improve your work, build connections and extend your influence.

One of the practices that our Design team has put in place (and was recently expanded to include Product Managers!) is holding regular “Office Hours”, where we proactively make ourselves available to the rest of the company. We go to the heart of the office — the lunchroom, so we’re in a central spot and no one feels like they’re bugging us. We make ourselves known so everyone can see that we’re open to answer questions, hear feedback or talk through ideas. The laptops are there to show work in progress or walk through a problematic area.

Quick aside: this works just as well for the “team of one”, so there’s nothing keeping you from doing this if you’re the only Designer in your office.

Why we hold “office hours”

Once you get beyond a handful of people, it’s impossible for everyone in a company to be aware of, and contribute to making an awesome product. It’s understandable — people are busy and likely aren’t even aware of what the Designers, Developers or Product Managers are working on. Conversely, it isn’t easy for us to stay on top of recent Customer Support trends, feedback to Account…