Why would anyone want to create a love-love-love scenario? Let’s firstly define what this even is.

A love-love-love scenario can be thought of as a win-win-win scenario with a slight twist.

In a love-love-love scenario, the three parties are, the team that builds the product, the people who use the product and the environment.

Love within the team that builds the product.

When allowing love within our team environments, there is no one size fits all approach. Typically, (not all skilled designers are like this) designers who are very skilled and empathetic tend to be very quiet and sensitive. Within business, it’s a common occurrence that the loudest voice in the room is the one that people will listen to. This may not be the right one to follow. Learn what’s the best working style for your teammates and honor that. Maybe a teammate prefers to use slack while another prefers to use zoom. Do this by communicating your intentions of wanting to establish a healthy working relationship, and ask questions and share personal information that can help you achieve this goal. Questions around communication style, interests outside of work and even passions are all great topics to build this rapport.

Love is understanding. We need to learn how to love our teammates for who they are, not what we may expect them to be or to do. Many times when first meeting a teammate, people will ask for introductions. Essentially they are asking you to tell them what have you done that warrants them showing you their respect. This is not love. Love is not judging you of your past, good or bad. Love wants to understand who you are, right now. It wants to understand what you care about and what inspires you to do the work that you do.

When speaking with teammates, be yourself without imposing onto others how they should also be. You never know what others are going through. I have two personal examples of this.

One time a teammate expressed having some personal issues and not being able to make it to a sync. I expressed my understanding and didn’t ask for details of what was going on but expressed my support for them to take care of their personal matter, showing up to work in their best state and prioritizing moving dates around with other teammates so that they could handle their business without worrying about work. They were able to and expressed a lot of gratitude for the way I helped them in that moment. One afternoon I found myself having a very nasty headache. In hindsight, I should have canceled the rest of my meetings and took care of myself, but I thought that the headache would pass and that I could focus on the last few meetings of that day. The headache didn’t pass and while on zoom i was visibly uncomfortable. A teammate who recently became a dad made a dad joke that most of the team laughed at but I was unable to have any reaction to because of the pain that I was in (it was a good joke). He noticed and said “I guess Shawn didn’t find that funny”. I responded by saying “I’m sorry but I’m having a really terrible headache at the moment.” and he apologized for making the comment. There are times to joke, there are times to work intensely and there are times to take a break. Be present with your teammates and learn to empathize with what they may be experiencing. This can happen via asking questions and actively listening to what others say.

Love for the people who use the product

In order to build products that people love, that love must be infused within our build processes. Infusing it within the team environment as stated above is the foundational step. To truly infuse it into a product however, one must honestly participate in the design process and its many methodologies with the right intentions at heart. Product design is this beautiful opportunity to increase one’s quality of living. To help one solve a problem, discover inspiration, learn something new, and even provide for their family. How and why a product is being used must always be top of mind. A designer can truly understand this through user research and testing. Involve the people you are designing for within your design process and listen to what they express and watch what they do. Respect these insights and use them as design principles to guide you throughout your design process.

Hold yourself accountable for having the opportunity to bring a new idea into this world. Are you repeating mistakes of the past? Are you perpetuating systematic issues? Honestly ask yourself these questions. This is where truly great product design happens. When the ordinary is challenged and the extraordinary is created.

Love for the environment.

The earth has been around much longer than humans have been on it. It naturally finds its equilibrium. Ecosystems showcase this every day via food pyramids. Even the act of a wildfire is beneficial for sequoia trees. It’s paving the way for a new creation. These trees have cones that release new sequoia tree seeds when there is a fire present. The fire burns away previous debris on a forest floor and creates ideal conditions for new trees to grow.

Our intense consumption and production habits interrupt these natural processes however. If we have no environment to use our products in, will the products be of any use? We are living in a time where sustainable technological options are accessible and are of high quality and functionality. If you are looking for a real problem to solve for your product, moving to zero waste should be the one. Good product design is more than just aesthetics. It’s also more than how well a product functions. It’s how well a product aids in our existence of today and tomorrow.