Notes

Demand for digital transformation and the talent associated with it boomed during peak pandemic. Brilliant up-and-comer designers, engineers, and PMs who had cut their teeth at Siberia graduated to the ranks of Airbnb, Rivian, and a host of venture-backed startups. And they are all doing great work. 

For a while, we tried to compete, but the signals became clear, and we dove head-first into reversing our talent model. 80% of our project teams became contract essentially overnight. The trend had been building, but the push over the cliff meant initiating our own transformation, overhauling systems, processes, and ways of working to turn our new reality into an advantage. 

How do we do this while maintaining our Siberia-ness? How do we guide and govern project teams that have fewer reps together than we were used to? Do we need to work on our screening, hiring, and firing process? Of course. 

Our onboarding handbook is a key tool that has emerged, one and we continually iterate on, fine-tune, and bullshit detect. And because the internet is cool, we’re open-sourcing it foritthat bad boy for your reading enjoyment. If you’re a potential client curious about what it’s going to be like to work with us, or a beautiful talent looking for a new studio to collaborate with, give it a read and let us know what you think!

Smash the link to READ OUR HANDBOOK!

Contact: hello@siberia.io

We had a chance to do a little "speed mentoring" with Break Through Tech and our friends at Boss Beauties to the next generation of young women coders. It was inspiring to meet some emerging talent, and hear challenge and success stories from leaders from Serena Ventures, NASCAR and more. This is an essential mission to get behind.

Watch the recap from the floor of the New York Stock exchange, and listen for a hint about an exciting upcoming launch!

A new piece in FastCo is making the rounds and asking the question of questions — is the “Design” out of step with business? Or is this cohort of C-level design leadership entering their OK Boomer phase? 

Building off their November coverage of IDEO layoffs, which declared the end of the era of design thinking (killer headlines guys, but must we hyperbolize?), this sentiment represents a growing awareness of a recasting of the role of design within corporations ranging in sector, from IBM to J&J.

We’re debating. Is this indeed an identity crisis or a correction, or a needed shake up to revitalize our beloved field? 

One thing is irrefutable - generational change is afoot and design is a battle-tested instrument to navigate change. Regardless of titles, or where the headshots sit on an org chart. 

Here’s a little PMA to balance out the gloom.