[Podcast] Microsoft Designer: Cinthya Urasaki

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Cinthya UrasakiThere are about 500 designers working at Microsoft. People in the UX community are often very surprised to hear about it. I think part of it is we haven't given our designers enough opportunities to talk about what they do and what's it like to work as designers at Microsoft. Therefore, I used my spared time during my visit to Redmond last time to chat with Cinthya Urasaki, who is a UX Design Lead at the Unlimited Potential User Experience Team.

I think one of the biggest advantages of working at Microsoft as UX designers is there are so many different groups with their unique design challenges you can work on. I first met Cinthya at the MIX conference this year, she talked about her group designing for emerging markets such as China and Africa. As designers in the team, they really need to understand the culture difference. Many things we may already take for granted in the way we interact with computers could be completely different. For example, you'll need to rethink the PC experience because computers are often shared by a community of people in those markets. One of my favourite blogs talking about culture and design is Future Perfect by Jan Chipchase.

In my 20 minutes conversation with Cinthya below, I asked her about:

  • what's her role at the Unlimited Potential design team?
  • what are some design projects the team is working on?
  • what are the challenges when designing for emerging markets?
  • What are Cinthya's daily activities?
  • What are some necessary skills to be a great UX Designer?

You can view the interview below or download it here. Enjoy!

Cinthya Urasaki is a User Experience Design Lead at Microsoft’s Unlimited Potential Group. By partnering closely with user research, Cinthya works on shaping incubation projects that addresses the needs of the other 90% of users in the world. Her current focus is on mobile solutions for Emerging markets. Prior to UPG, she led the social networking UX team at Windows Live. She was involved in creating current and next generation of social communication products like Windows Live Messenger, Spaces, Events and Groups. Before joining MS in 2004, Cinthya went to the Institute of Design, IIT in Chicago to do her Masters in Human-centered communication design, where she learned how to apply user-centered methods in innovation and design processes. Cinthya comes from Peru, where she spent 4 years doing design consultancy in Lima, Peru creating corporate identities for small and big enterprises including print, packaging, web and advertising solutions.

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