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Episode #99 with Ryan Whitmore: Senior Product Designer at Ready Tech

16 Oct 2023 | 58 mins, 10 secs

On this episode of the Digitally Diverse series we chat with Ryan Whitmore, Senior Product Designer at Ready Tech. We chat about Ryan’s career to date, his role at Ready Tech, resources he recommends and the problems the team at Ready Tech are solving. Hope you enjoy the interview!

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Show Notes

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In This Episode, You Will Learn:

  • (00:00)

    Intro

  • (01:20)

    Career overview

  • (02:30)

    Problems Ready Tech are facing at the moment

  • (04:20)

    What does Ready Tech do?

  • (10:00)

    Research & testing

  • (27:00)

    Delivering value in a new team

  • (30:00)

    Higher education

00:01:00:00 – 00:01:20:05
Ellen Bennett
Thank you for joining us for another episode of Digitally Diverse, where we do a deep dive into the journeys and career of some influential people in the design and tech industry. So today we are joined by Ryan Whitmore, who is a Senior Product Designer at Ready Tech. Thank you so much for joining us.

00:01:20:10 – 00:01:21:22
Ryan Whitmore
Thank you for having me.

00:01:21:24 – 00:01:35:17
Ellen Bennett
Thank you. Well, I guess I would love to start off with just a brief overview of who you are, what you’re up to at the moment, and how you’ve come to to where you are at Ready Tech?

00:01:35:18 – 00:02:09:08
Ryan Whitmore
Well, currently based in Sydney, originally a Canberra guy over the last, I think five or six years I’ve been working in the design industry coming up through UX pathways. Prior to that I was doing stuff in the games industry and I was also a teacher and dance teacher back down in Canberra. So bit of an eclectic background. And yeah, last brought me up to Sydney with my partner for a job at my place, being as my first official product designer Title.

00:02:09:10 – 00:02:32:18
Ryan Whitmore
The product designer? Yeah. Have been up here for about two and a half years and joined it ready only about two months ago. So pretty new into that into my current role. Super came in different like adrenaline activities I quite enjoy Boulder quite enjoy a good mountain bike sesh. Sad to say goodbye to this snowboarding of convenience down in Canberra.

00:02:32:18 – 00:02:36:04
Ryan Whitmore
But yeah, loving it, loving it up in Sydney at the moment.

00:02:36:08 – 00:02:52:13
Ellen Bennett
I love that and I’d love to do a deep dive. But perhaps later into your dancing and dancing teaching credentials, that’s like, but what are you coming on board to already tech to do? Is there any particular problems that you’re facing at the moment?

00:02:52:15 – 00:03:27:16
Ryan Whitmore
Yeah, for sure. So the main remit for me joining Ready Tech is to sort of coach and supports the growth and maturity and development of our product and design team as well as other teams that work in conjunction with us. So historically, ready Tech has been very development first it’s been clients will come to purchase products, ask for particular functionality and features to look for those requirements, and then the team would go forth and develop those.

00:03:27:18 – 00:04:10:06
Ryan Whitmore
In terms of the vision for how the product comes together and it makes sense down the line, all that sort of jazz. This is kind of a new way of working, a new way of thinking for the company and for the product team. And so it’s been being built up over the last maybe year or two. And then I was brought in as someone to really help the product designers in our team, which focuses in the education space on how to get us working within like product trios, doing human centered design spacing, uses a lot more regularly running continuous discovery habits, going through discover, define design and deliver cycle, I guess going on Marty Cagan

00:04:10:06 – 00:04:25:08
Ryan Whitmore
stuff, all those sorts of things. And yeah, just really trying to help set that up, have a design process established, which is I guess my call it the first three months and then beyond. Then it’s design system as well as continuing to mature those processes and those practices.

00:04:25:14 – 00:04:41:15
Ellen Bennett
Yeah. And so really like taking, taking the reins on the HD side of things and figuring out what that looks like for you guys. I’m curious, were you able to share just a bit of a overview of what Ready Tech does? Like what kind of what kind of work?

00:04:41:17 – 00:05:13:05
Ryan Whitmore
Yeah, for sure. So Ready Tech is our company has been around for quite a while, actually started back in the nineties and was publicly listed not too long ago and diversifies its portfolio across education, work pathways and workforce Solutions and as you call it, software in there and like council software and that sort of stuff as well. And the main focus of the company is to provide mission critical software that enables businesses and services to run.

00:05:13:05 – 00:05:42:08
Ryan Whitmore
In terms of where I work, it’s in the Education and Work Pathways Team, which creates learning pathways or learning management systems, student management systems, so on so forth. And I work on the student management system Coach plus, Yeah, it really ties in with government regulations and different education goals. It’s used for that courses, apprenticeships, higher education as well, types, etc. etc..

00:05:42:08 – 00:05:57:21
Ryan Whitmore
So then the main I guess at training organizations that we support, but at the end of the day, the end user that we’re really trying to elevate and serve here is, you know, the students or the people that that are accessing that education and the quality of education that comes out of that.

00:05:58:01 – 00:06:07:15
Ellen Bennett
Yeah, nice. That’s great. Thank you. So, Ryan, what kind of projects and challenges are you guys facing at Ready Tech at the moment?

00:06:07:15 – 00:06:47:24
Ryan Whitmore
Yes. So Ready Tech is currently working on a number of different things spread across like client requests. So we’re doing things in terms of the product team specifically, I guess, is supporting the onboarding or the implementation of the software, the number of different providers of all different sizes so that some small like MA and PA set ups that are implementing plus then there are some much bigger organizations as well, larger institutes types, higher education that are taking particular sections or parts of the products outside of that and more in the product space.

00:06:48:01 – 00:07:10:00
Ryan Whitmore
We’re working on a couple of key areas that have been identified as like strong growth sections as it’s really looking at the the whole experience around how do we get students on board, how do we support the employers as well as Stack. It’s often it’s like an apprenticeship. So how do we support the employers with that whole process?

00:07:10:05 – 00:07:40:23
Ryan Whitmore
How do we enable the best support through that process? So that’s communication of information, that’s training plans, that’s, you know, getting people enrolled and admitted into courses and so looking at the whole end to end experience as well and trying to genuinely understand, well, you know, there’s three different, I guess, user needs in this space, right? You have the training provider, you then have the employee and then you have the student, which is often a staff member as well.

00:07:41:00 – 00:08:01:13
Ryan Whitmore
And so they’re all sort of driving for different reasons, right? They’re all trying to train the student at the end. But in terms of things that are prevalent for them, like the employees also trying to manage their day to day business. So how do they cover the cost of onsite as well as how do they cover the time of the student coming in and doing their apprenticeship?

00:08:01:13 – 00:08:37:10
Ryan Whitmore
How do they play around? Like how do they manage that? So that’s something that we’re spending quite a bit of time building empathy and understanding for so that we’re able to solve those problems, specifically some of these more granular specific problems. But the bigger ones in terms of, you know, really connected learning goals across the student’s journey, also like smooth delivery of courses as well, because this software not only manages the student’s progress, but it also is involved in like attendance marking and all those sorts of things as well.

00:08:37:10 – 00:09:13:16
Ryan Whitmore
So if you have apprentices that are coming in at all hours of the day because of their their work schedule, how can we make it as least impactful to the students, to the trainers, as I guess classes and ultimately the students learning experiences to have those attendance records marked, and then to also take those students to their specific areas because apprenticeships is usually learning how to use dangerous equipment or learning how to do, you know, a pretty complicated hands on activity.

00:09:13:16 – 00:09:30:24
Ryan Whitmore
Right. It’s it’s a bit different to I myself that is sort of learning how to use design tools and those sort of things. There’s not as much risk there. Right. So there’s work, health and safety and all those sort of things need to be managed. And quite interestingly, the software that we built has a tangible impact on their ability to do that.

00:09:30:24 – 00:09:48:24
Ryan Whitmore
So it’s really looking at those whole like end to end experiences and understanding how we can have like almost invisible software that really sense its purpose whilst ensuring that we’re able to meet government compliance and regulation needs and setting students up for success.

00:09:49:04 – 00:10:09:18
Ellen Bennett
Yeah, I know that sounds like a quite the typical really, because your you’re having to kind of make the process and the experience seamless for people who have got really different reasons for using the product. So how are you going about that? What kind of research and testing are you doing for that?

00:10:09:20 – 00:10:43:20
Ryan Whitmore
Yeah, like great question, because not only do we have the difference between industries, right, but then you also have the difference between roles within industries and different providers focus on different things and they use different aspects of the product also in different ways. So the current model that Ready Tech has in terms of approaching serving as clients needs is to really understand what it is that they want in the requests for the product and then figure out how we can implemented it in a way that repurposes particular bits of functionality.

00:10:44:01 – 00:11:06:03
Ryan Whitmore
However, that sort of creates a new problem for us as a product, which is you start getting a little bit of a patchwork quilt, right, and you get you things that are bills that might only be for that particular client specific use case, which is very difficult for it to be one coherent product many use in the future, but two also relevant for different clients.

00:11:06:05 – 00:11:30:19
Ryan Whitmore
So we’re introducing continuous discovery habits, which is a book written by Tracy Torrance, which ties in quite nicely with Mandy Kagan’s books and something that I had set up or sort of took a lot of inspiration from in my previous role as well, and really trying to ensure that we’re speaking to users every single week and giving teams a period of time to go and do a bit of a discovery piece.

00:11:30:19 – 00:11:56:21
Ryan Whitmore
If that’s relevant. There’s a brilliant little matrix that’s dovetail head up on one of their articles for those listeners that dovetail. It’s a research repository to read metal, so and it has like a matrix of what’s the problem, clarity and what’s the risk level. And if it’s a really high risk or really low problem clarity, then it’s something that’s probably a good candidate for doing that for research pieces.

00:11:56:23 – 00:12:15:19
Ryan Whitmore
So we’re spending a lot of time on our product teams to help them think critically about how well do we actually know this problem space, how much do we empathize and understand the different uses, realities, and also looking at it from a viability lens as well and being like, How complicated do we think this is going to be to solve or built?

00:12:15:21 – 00:12:37:15
Ryan Whitmore
And from there we make a decision as to how do we dive into research. Currently, because it’s quite new in the business, we’re running a lot of user interviews. They’re anywhere from 45 minutes to probably about an hour and typically cover their lived experience with completing that, that thing, that job. Right. And yeah, the jobs to be done framework.

00:12:37:19 – 00:13:00:15
Ryan Whitmore
Another buzzword I guess is something that we’re also using quite a bit. So it’s just fine, you know, like it’s business to business software, right? So it’s helping us frame what it is they’re trying to complete and how we can structure that employee’s jobs, that an employee’s work experience in a really easy to tackle way. Yeah. And iterative development right.

00:13:00:17 – 00:13:26:21
Ryan Whitmore
So take the concepts, you take the learnings and you try and pull out the key insights, the key learnings you challenge your thinking, your biases, your assumptions, you define some nice, clear problems and then from that you surface and concepts and some ideas and quickly iterate and test on those fits prototypes. So that’s honestly pretty high level. And so most designers typically will say that kind of process.

00:13:26:23 – 00:13:55:00
Ryan Whitmore
But in terms of the way that the teams are operating, when I first joined Ready Tech, it was mostly business requirements driven, writing out tickets and having some prototypes, but not everything was prototypes. And then often the developers would support with the designing of the experience as well, which is great. We absolutely want tech involvement, but it did also mean that there was often misinterpretations sometimes between the words, right?

00:13:55:00 – 00:14:20:18
Ryan Whitmore
So it’s really just trying to get the design process nice and visual because the thinking and the logic and all the understanding that underpins all of the work that’s been done up to date is really solid. It’s just communicating in an official way that allows us to keep the product continuity there and most importantly, keep that user experience consistent across the product and to a vision that’s going to be good too.

00:14:20:20 – 00:14:34:15
Ellen Bennett
Sounds pretty meaty. Like there’s obviously so many different aspects to what you guys are trying to achieve now. Do you have a dedicated research team or is it all the designers are pretty much like working into end with this?

00:14:34:17 – 00:14:36:19
Ryan Whitmore
Yeah, so it’s definitely the latter.

00:14:36:24 – 00:14:38:22
Ellen Bennett
Difficult set of Yeah, yeah.

00:14:39:01 – 00:15:01:24
Ryan Whitmore
Yeah. And like ready Tech is definitely not a startup anymore, but in terms of, you know, like you spoke about, what are some of the problems and the challenges facing. I think it’s it’s a pretty common one across most businesses but inflation and the way that the economy is doing at the moment is having a very tangible impact on how much investment can be put into sort of, I guess, gross icebreaker stance.

00:15:01:24 – 00:15:29:21
Ryan Whitmore
And quite often product is growth focused. So when we’re looking at the skill sets we bring on board, having like a dedicated research team is something that is probably a bridge too far in terms of where we need to put our money, I guess, and what humans, what skill sets we need. So it’s definitely much more of a jack of all trades sort of product designer, someone who definitely stretches across that spectrum as opposed to discrete functions.

00:15:29:23 – 00:15:50:22
Ryan Whitmore
But I also think it’s very personally, I have a bit of a mantra that, you know, a product designer, it’s kind of like a it’s that they’re the equivalent of a full stack dev, right? And that means being able to go from deep discovery all the way through to high fidelity delivery of designs, right. And working in lockstep with engineers to to bring whatever the solution is to life.

00:15:50:22 – 00:16:24:13
Ryan Whitmore
Right. And make sure the problem stays true in terms of solving the problem, it stays true. So I think that designers should absolutely be doing their own research. You know, obviously to to a certain extent out in terms of innovative just going off and doing completely generative, open ended research. That’s probably not necessary for product designers. But when you’re coming in to work on an outcome, solve a problem space or, you know, find it like it, I can really valid our solution for an opportunity.

00:16:24:13 – 00:16:59:08
Ryan Whitmore
Space product designers should be speaking to users at all points through this. So it’s really just mostly about understanding the outcome box that we’re in at the moment, conducting the necessary discovery research that’s mostly contextual inquiries and understanding their context, their experience, and then quickly transitioning into doing more prototype driven usability testing, that sort of stuff. But the goal would be to get to doing some deeper, more open ended research that can surface some unknown unknowns, right?

00:16:59:14 – 00:17:17:23
Ellen Bennett
Yeah. I mean, I guess it’s always, always the goal, but whether or not it’s it’s practical for where you all are at at the moment it’s Yeah, that’s another question. So yeah Yeah it’s, it’s interesting to, to hear that that’s kind of like where your priority is at the moment, having someone who’s abreast of every aspect of the process.

00:17:17:23 – 00:17:43:19
Ellen Bennett
So and you write like I tend to find here in here in Australia anyway, that’s more common to have someone who’s a jack of all trades where they are often someone who’s, you know, really able to speak to every part of the design process and know what they’re talking about overseas. It does tend to be a little bit more specialized, but that also comes with other cons as well.

00:17:43:24 – 00:18:13:06
Ryan Whitmore
Yeah, yeah. There’s definite. I’ve definitely seen before like silos that have arisen from having dedicated research teams and stuff. So I think starting where we’re at today is very like logical or pragmatic approach because it develops knowledge and experience over that whole product design lifecycle. I guess for us, like it’s a very different dynamic. Like this organization is a very different dynamic.

00:18:13:06 – 00:18:42:08
Ryan Whitmore
Said my previous role was business to customer, my previous role, whether it’s business to business. And so client relationships and sort of that that sales role is much more prevalent, whereas in the customer focused is more marketing and you know, what’s, what’s the societal interpretation of the product and how can that be, how can that be interpreted and understood through out digital experiences in our contents and so on.

00:18:42:10 – 00:19:09:10
Ryan Whitmore
And so that just has a very different impact on the types of people you interact with within the company and the different things people need to get involved in. And like the checks and balances, they do some things as well to make sure that, you know, you don’t accidentally kick over a glass or something like that when you’re trying to do user research or something and cause an accidental issue or problem because it’s a different dynamic.

00:19:09:12 – 00:19:32:16
Ellen Bennett
Yeah, I guess with your with your experience, like you’ve obviously now at a beta B company were working at Mad Pause, which is B to C, and then prior to that you were in consulting, right? Know how, how have you found the transitioning from each of those workplaces? Because they’re all you’re right, they all are quite different.

00:19:32:18 – 00:19:57:20
Ryan Whitmore
Noticeable. Yeah, that’s probably a good way to put it. So my, my first job in industry was at DSA technology. The transition from day say to P.W see was probably the closest that both obviously consulting firms, but just slightly different points of focus. And that transition was unique just due to the size of P.W see and the specificity of my role.

00:19:57:22 – 00:20:20:20
Ryan Whitmore
So in DSA, I was more of a UX designer and I was working on digital transformation, which, you know, buzzwords galore, but that is effectively just the team coming in and working, consulting, coming in and working with an organization to be like, You guys want to use more technology or you want to try and change the way to process or to work.

00:20:20:22 – 00:20:50:04
Ryan Whitmore
Let us help you figure that out. And so that was kind of end to end like a product design. But when I joined P.W. say, it was much more I can’t say that I was strategic designer, so that very much had me in the let’s sort of discover the problem and let’s talk about recommendations in the solutions. We talked a lot of research, do some BI style work, but also through a lot of user facing work and try to bring that together to give you a path or a roadmap to doing something new, right?

00:20:50:06 – 00:21:20:03
Ryan Whitmore
Then the transition to map was actually my my first 3 to 4 months at my points was for their products called durable AI, which is like a dog food subscription product. So yeah, so it’s brand spanking new. It’s kind of what really helps matters get through the start of Target because and COVID hits the quant business and that was was people getting pet sitters to look after their animal when they were on holidays of going away.

00:21:20:05 – 00:21:45:13
Ryan Whitmore
So obviously when we’re all locked down, that’s not happening. So pretty much everything from animals grant ground to air and for really, really quick hauls and everybody just wrapped around this concept of tenable you know don’t feed subscription cooked all the necessary nutritional values, human grade delivered to your door, made specifically for your dog’s energy levels and their size, etc., etc..

00:21:45:19 – 00:22:05:13
Ryan Whitmore
And so that really helps the business like the company sorry, stay afloat and keep the lights on, so to speak. And then as things start to back up, we’re having to do more things. But that was the team that I started with and that was much more like ecommerce almost, and that was very different to what I’d been doing, right.

00:22:05:13 – 00:22:27:19
Ryan Whitmore
So I started my career in sort of let’s go through the double time and process and let’s try and discover all the problems to all this things performing really well in socials. We’ve got really good metrics on this particular thing. Let’s update the website so it has it looking like this, so has it looking like that. And so that was a very different pace to what I was used to working at.

00:22:27:21 – 00:22:49:00
Ryan Whitmore
It was also a very different motivator or instigator of work too, and took me a little bit in my head around like how an sample to work in a product way within that framework, I guess, and I did struggle with that. But ultimately I learned a lot of good things in terms of conversion and retention for those that are listening.

00:22:49:00 – 00:23:13:19
Ryan Whitmore
Who I knew, I didn’t know what these numbers meant. A conversion is how many people you can get to buy. Retention is how many people you can keep buying is an easy way to think about it and sort of how those metrics drive a lot of business, right? And that started to get me to think about like the outcomes and key results framework and how we can start to think about those business metrics and turn them into product metrics.

00:23:13:21 – 00:23:36:20
Ryan Whitmore
Unfortunately, you got to do some things where we were redesigning the whole homepage, which saw a 30% uplifting conversion, which is huge, right? So it was that instilled a bit of confidence in me into the product process. And then a few months after that, I ended up moving on to the core product, which was Marketplace. And that was once again entirely different.

00:23:36:20 – 00:23:57:08
Ryan Whitmore
It was much bigger. I was trying to figure that out. And then my transition to to ready tech in terms of, I guess, role similarity is old fundamentals, probably a better way to put it. It’s not it hasn’t really been different at all. Right. Which is kind of nice. The bigger challenge for me personally is just the level of responsibility being an industry now.

00:23:57:10 – 00:24:19:12
Ryan Whitmore
So five or so years, five, six years, how long it’s been and priced out of have many years teaching, as we sort of alluded to before. So there’s different sort of skill sets that have been built up in previous careers. I’m now in that position where I’m coaching and mentoring and helping do almost the change transformation stuff that I was doing at the beginning of my career.

00:24:19:12 – 00:24:23:11
Ryan Whitmore
But sort of I’m the change agent, so to speak, and it’s just different.

00:24:23:13 – 00:24:24:21
Ellen Bennett
I come full circle.

00:24:24:23 – 00:24:49:18
Ryan Whitmore
It has a little bit and so it’s quite interesting because it gives me respect for the just the pure complexity of driving change in any organization, no matter the size of it. Right. And something I’ve been saying to my colleagues, my managers is learning to become comfortable being uncomfortable because I am not there yet is the simple answer to the fact.

00:24:49:20 – 00:25:10:23
Ryan Whitmore
And it’s it’s about going, okay, well, I I’m very confident in the way of working. That is my foundation. And the approach that I’m at has worked and it’s worked really well in previous roles and some really confident with what we’re bringing in to Ready Tech. But it also means that sometimes there are tough conversations, right? And you’ve got to find compromises too.

00:25:11:00 – 00:25:34:09
Ryan Whitmore
You can’t just go purist the whole time because let’s face it, no company is purist. No, no workplaces is purist in that sense. So it’s like, okay, well, this is what we want to do, but we’re not going to get that straight away. So just being fair, being reasonable, being practicing what you preach, right? Like you spent we spent so much time speaking to users and empathizing with their needs before doing change internally.

00:25:34:09 – 00:25:51:20
Ryan Whitmore
It should be exactly the same. Speaking with our colleagues, speaking with our teams, empathizing with their understanding and flexing that so that we’re able to grow together and grow meaningfully as opposed to people possibly getting a no. We don’t change at all something because you force change at a rate that’s not appropriate.

00:25:51:22 – 00:26:24:13
Ellen Bennett
That’s definitely something that comes up a lot when I speak with, especially over the last few years, design teams and what they look like. Companies in general have changed a lot and how we work has changed a lot as well, that the people who are the happiest with their experience have always been the people who have been consulting it and had that collaboration pace with their managers and their mentors and have really been asked, you know, what works best for you and how do you want to see this change be put into place?

00:26:24:13 – 00:26:39:04
Ellen Bennett
And and you’re right, there’s no there’s no point in putting a square peg into a into a triangle whole like you’ve got to figure out what what is going to work best with each workplace. So yeah, I could ask you for actually asking the questions. So I think that’s great.

00:26:39:06 – 00:27:10:00
Ryan Whitmore
Well, there’s always room for improvement. Like, you know, I often reflect on stuff that I’ve been doing over the last couple of months, right? And there’s absolutely no way that I could approach things in different levels. Right. But I think that’s also a part of the new role that I’m in, too. And that transition challenge that we were talking to before, like being able to reflect on and be like, I ask this question, I took this approach, but I don’t know if that landed exactly how I wanted it to.

00:27:10:00 – 00:27:21:15
Ryan Whitmore
So, you know, being selfless and self-effacing as well to a certain extent, and, you know, just being like, I this is my intention. It fell flat. I’m sorry. Let’s try that again, which I’ve had a couple of those moments.

00:27:21:19 – 00:27:44:00
Ellen Bennett
Yeah. And we all do like and it makes it makes sense that you’d want to, especially when you’re quite new. You’re only been there for a few months. Like it’s going to, it’s going to feel weird for a while. And I was actually speaking to her because my sister, she, she and I asked her like, how long does it usually take you to fit into a new role and feel like, you know what, where you were at and how you were doing?

00:27:44:02 – 00:27:59:14
Ellen Bennett
And probably about a year, I think is the consensus. Like, it seems to me that that’s kind of when everyone seems to hit their stride and they feel a bit comfortable and they know all of the stakeholders. So yeah, I think it just takes a bit of time.

00:27:59:16 – 00:28:27:23
Ryan Whitmore
Yeah, and it’s also just really complicated for anybody in new roles generally, because business typically wants you to start making moves or delivering value much sooner than 12 months. Right? So yeah, I know. K.R. Personal. Okay. Are there design process in three months? Right? So it’s like, like, okay, right. I’ll jump into doing that. But that also means that, you know, you’ve got to start making some decisions to move in that direction before you possibly know every ounce context.

00:28:28:00 – 00:28:51:22
Ryan Whitmore
So it’s a constant juggling act. And you know, to bring it back to your original question in terms of transition, that’s definitely been and continues to be the most challenging part because I’ve gone from being a product designer that lives within a product trade to listeners that don’t know what I’m referring to there. That is a product manager, a product designer and a tech lead that work together to make sure we’re trying to solve the right problems.

00:28:51:22 – 00:29:13:18
Ryan Whitmore
And then we have a team that wraps around us that that we support, that helps build that solution, that whatever it is. And so I’ve gone from being in a row where I was a product designer in that leading the research functions at my post, but still delivering things to being across multiple teams and not actually delivering anything directly.

00:29:13:18 – 00:29:46:21
Ryan Whitmore
I’m supporting teams and stepping in and stepping out as needed, which is just a very different context as well. So yeah, it can be really challenging to balance stepping up into sort of whether it be from uni to Job Junior to mid, mid to senior, whatever, whatever, whatever, stepping up into those different roles. But it can also be difficult to manage your own interpretations of what the expectations are of your performance in a period of time with sort of how long like you and your sister said it takes to really feel fully connected to the company.

00:29:46:23 – 00:30:06:18
Ryan Whitmore
And it’s not just the company, right? Because you try and understand the product and then most importantly, you’re trying to connect with all the people as well, right? And find your place in a culture and have purpose and not be annoying, but also be likable and fun and, you know, be yourself and all those sorts of things.

00:30:06:21 – 00:30:31:18
Ellen Bennett
That old chestnut and it’s it’s a it’s a juggling act for sure. And so, yeah, Ryan, I think you mentioned before like, you know, transitioning from uni into the junior role into the mid and how you’ve been finding that transition now into somewhat leading a team. I guess I’m curious to hear what compelled you to, to come into design and to tech in the first place.

00:30:31:18 – 00:30:36:10
Ellen Bennett
So did did you have a unique experience with design and what did that look like?

00:30:36:11 – 00:31:06:14
Ryan Whitmore
So yes, I had a form of higher education experience with design, but I didn’t go to a university, so to speak. So I was studying primary school teaching. Then I moved to high school teaching and I was working as a facilitator of dance class in a school at the same time as I was studying full time. So I was teaching and studying as well as doing some planning support assistants in classrooms in that role and that timeline there.

00:31:06:16 – 00:31:46:08
Ryan Whitmore
Because I’ve been teaching and I’d been running classes and I’d been, you know, doing a lot of that work, I tried to get my university to give me some form of recognition for doing effectively placements for however long it was, but for understandable reasons, the system wasn’t going to allow that and I just got really frustrated. So I was like, and it also aligned with some life things at the time in terms of having to sort of pause my degree and I decided to then study something for a couple of years online that I could do at a more part time.

00:31:46:10 – 00:32:12:06
Ryan Whitmore
Right? And that was when I stumbled across design as a space. So for whatever reason, actually funny story, if you entertain a bit of a digression or a tangent, I think I was playing an online computer game and I kept getting into public body with this other guy. Anyway, we started chatting and I jumped on a video voice call with him at one point and we started talking more.

00:32:12:08 – 00:32:29:18
Ryan Whitmore
He happened to live in Canberra as well and I was like, what do you do that isn’t online? Is that I’m studying how to become a games developer. I was like, that’s really cool. So then I went in and I started having a bit of a look around at this particular training organization called the Academy of Interactive Entertainment.

00:32:29:20 – 00:32:48:11
Ryan Whitmore
I really liked the description of game design, and so I decided to sign up off the back of that and ended up meeting him in person. I’m still with him all the way up to today. And we sort of they all sort of small sidekicks together and helped each other out here and there. And that’s ultimately what maybe fall in love with design, right?

00:32:48:11 – 00:33:24:14
Ryan Whitmore
So I studied I studied teaching at the University of Canberra, which ultimately was, for my financial perspective, a waste of a degree, unfortunately. So still paying off a portion of that. And then I had my debt, I guess for the course. So a bit of a unexpected path. I didn’t really know exactly what it was that I wanted to be doing, but when I started doing game design, what really drew me to it was thinking about how do I build a fun experience that feels connected and feels somewhat believable.

00:33:24:16 – 00:33:44:02
Ryan Whitmore
So there are a few things in game design. I’d like some just cool concepts, like the way you design a mechanics I like. How do you say in Skyrim? Use your magic ability, How does that do its thing? But then there are also economies that sit around that. So like when you use a magic ability, your matter goes down.

00:33:44:04 – 00:34:13:13
Ryan Whitmore
How much does it go down? And like what happens with your health and all those sorts of different things and that creates gameplay loops and experiences as you do something that’s an inverse action and you interact with the world through those things. And so I really enjoyed that sort of system design and that thinking about how that experience comes together and then being creative, getting to build a fun experience and like I had always been somebody that was a little bit like, university degrees are a bit silly and annoying.

00:34:13:13 – 00:34:33:24
Ryan Whitmore
Like you have to get this piece of paper to then be employed. And as soon as I got my piece of paper, I kid you not dare say it and hit me up and asked if I was interested in applying for a UX designer role. I didn’t even know what UX design was at the time, so I had my game design background, got my piece of paper, and then within a week or so I started going through the process for that.

00:34:33:24 – 00:35:03:19
Ryan Whitmore
So I was very, very privileged, very, very fortunate to sort of have the cards fall in that data. That’s sort of ultimately what got me into UX design coming from a games background, but it felt like a really almost poetic combination of interests and skill sets because I really loved from my dance backgrounds putting together pieces and stories and narratives right through through dance, through movement, and then with games.

00:35:03:21 – 00:35:31:12
Ryan Whitmore
I really liked making an experience connected and easy to use and enjoyable and engaging. And then UX design is kind of those things all smashed together a little bit. Obviously not 1 to 1, but like more so than I expected. And then, yeah, it just empathizing with people and understanding their needs and then interpreting. Coming up with a solution just really got me so space in the industry and yeah, for a little while there I tried to get back into games.

00:35:31:14 – 00:35:49:21
Ryan Whitmore
It’s a bit of a fickle industry in and of itself. You sort of need to be in it, to be in it, and if you don’t sort of start at the bottom, it’s hard to move sideways into the industry. And so over the last few years I’ve really just had to sort of make an intentional decision that product and this industry is sort of my focus area, right?

00:35:49:21 – 00:36:24:06
Ryan Whitmore
So I have those skill sets in games, which is absolutely translatable. I lean on it all the time, but I haven’t gone through like a formal visual design or graphics design course or something like that. I also had never a General Assembly or any of those styles of courses in terms of what is your design. When I was at the I did get to do a audio service design course, which was actually really helpful, but that was something that was supported through my role and helped extend my, my, my skills at that point in time.

00:36:24:06 – 00:36:48:23
Ellen Bennett
So yeah, it’s really interesting to hear from people that don’t have the, you know, traditional bachelors degree and you’re at the it’s quite trendy right now to go through General Assembly and it’s, I think, really cool that you’ve come in from a different industry it happens quite a lot. I hear all the time with people coming in from like a marketing background or like a traditional design or.

00:36:48:24 – 00:36:51:08
Ryan Whitmore
Customer support or something like that.

00:36:51:10 – 00:37:14:22
Ellen Bennett
Yeah, because you’re right, they are, they are translatable skills. So yeah, it’s interesting to, to hear what you love so much about like gaming and you know, that cause and effect and how all that ties in with like UX because UX is so much about like, you know, the experience and making sure that you’re getting that, that impact with the user, it’s very, very translatable.

00:37:14:22 – 00:37:43:16
Ryan Whitmore
You’re right Yeah and I didn’t didn’t even really can click in my mind for years like for years and years. But like I’ve been doing design for quite a while and I reckon play only in the last two years. It’s around a little bit. Is it that that relationship between it has properly clicked? I think stepping into a product design role where you’re thinking about I guess the business metrics that move and the human metrics and all those sort of things.

00:37:43:18 – 00:38:08:18
Ryan Whitmore
There’s that connection as well and it makes it feel a little bit more tangible in the sense that building these experiences, because in these regions and we’re trying to solve these problems, but they’re valuable problems to be solved because they’re moving these numbers which result in better outcomes. Right? And those outcomes are product outcomes that are focused on the human that you’re trying to help, not necessarily business outcomes.

00:38:08:18 – 00:38:34:00
Ryan Whitmore
It’s often focused on money or some sort of growth metric for the organization because for me personally, that doesn’t really resonate. I don’t really care too much about all this thing I did generated $200,000 or whatever, like, okay, cool, can I help this person get their, get their whatever right? Like, did I allow this pet to have a good life for a couple of weeks?

00:38:34:06 – 00:38:55:06
Ryan Whitmore
Their family was away. Like. Like what was that? What was the righteous thing? I guess that’s where enabling through through the products, right? So having those outcomes that do relate to the business metrics, which whether we like it or not, are important if we don’t have the money being generated for this stuff. So we’re not going to have the work in the first place.

00:38:55:06 – 00:39:10:17
Ryan Whitmore
So you do have to draw those connections. But if we’re able to see the meaningful change to the humans that the product is here to serve and in positive case the animals, that’s a much more motivating factor for me personally.

00:39:10:21 – 00:39:31:17
Ellen Bennett
Yeah, and it seems to be more, more and more important for designers these days too, to have that positive impact on the users or the customers or whoever you’re trying to serve. Is that one of the main reasons why you wanted to go to Ready Tech? Because you feel like you’d have a bit more of a wider range of users that you’d be able to help.

00:39:31:19 – 00:40:01:04
Ryan Whitmore
I think for me with the move to ready Tech is really about the next step in my career, You know, being ambitious and wanting the opportunity to sort of shape the way a design team is able to operate. That was probably the core focus, I guess, in terms of that. But the second and very close to equal was the fact it was in the education in terms of my role and having that background in education, like I obviously nearly did that as a job, right.

00:40:01:04 – 00:40:27:05
Ryan Whitmore
So I do care about that and. I do get a lot of satisfaction out of seeing people thrive and the process of finding what Thrive looks like for those people. So be that an extension of the level of role I have ready to tech or be that an extension of the product. And what that enables in terms of students studying and thriving in their own careers.

00:40:27:07 – 00:40:33:23
Ryan Whitmore
It’s sort of one in the same those two things. What would the biggest draw for me in terms of moving to Ready Tech?

00:40:34:04 – 00:40:37:16
Ellen Bennett
Yeah, I love that full circle moment yet again.

00:40:37:18 – 00:40:39:00
Ryan Whitmore
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:40:39:06 – 00:40:59:06
Ellen Bennett
So Ryan, obviously you’ve had a few chops and changes like your direction and like what you’ve studied and where you want it to see yourself going. Has that kind of affected like some speed bumps that you’ve had in your career? Like what has there been any moments where you’ve had to take stock and really figure out where you want to be heading?

00:40:59:08 – 00:41:25:06
Ryan Whitmore
The most pertinent one that comes to mind the for and I guess choosing to study game design was I was feeling really stuck in the whole teaching situation. I mentioned before when I was talking about my education pathways that I tried to get the university to recognize the work I’d been doing in the school and that really got me down, like, really got me down.

00:41:25:06 – 00:41:43:17
Ryan Whitmore
I was, you know, there were times where I was like, fortunately, I was very lucky. I had my little office in the school for some reason. I don’t know why, but I did. And so, like there were a couple of points in time where I was just really overwhelmed. And so I just close the door and I had a cry like I was pretty upset, didn’t know what I wanted to do or why I go down a particular path.

00:41:43:19 – 00:42:05:05
Ryan Whitmore
And I was also, you know, really quite scared of the games path. Like, I just, you know, you only ever hear that it’s a challenging industry to get into and that it’s very competitive and that Australia is really bad with its games industry. So I was just scared that I was making a really bad choice in terms of career pathway to go from something.

00:42:05:05 – 00:42:26:21
Ryan Whitmore
So I guess necessary is education to I’m going to become somebody that makes computer games. It was just like it was a really scary concept and I had no idea that it was going to lead on this path. I had no idea that it was going to connect to something like us. And so that was that was a big speedbump that intimidated to pursue this out of me.

00:42:26:23 – 00:42:49:09
Ryan Whitmore
But my mom just encouraged me to to jump into it, and which I did. And I’m very, very grateful and glad that I’ve done that. But then I guess speed bumps throughout my career, you know, I guess I a caveat that, you know, I think I have a huge amount of privilege. It’s definitely a massive amount of luck and societal sort of privilege.

00:42:49:09 – 00:43:11:24
Ryan Whitmore
I think that has come by way as a result of, you know, like getting my degree and very quickly being approached for a job my age, being a little bit older as an entry level and that sort of stuff being what, pink male, being tall, all those sort of things. I think it had a very unconscious impact on maybe being unconsciously staying a little bit more.

00:43:12:01 – 00:43:34:02
Ryan Whitmore
So I try to be very self-aware of that. I’m very supportive of everybody else and always try to caveat, I guess, my path as well, because I know some people just don’t have don’t have that right. And and unfortunately, that’s something that we’re trying to change as a broader society, but it’s really hard for those individuals. So I’m grateful for that.

00:43:34:02 – 00:44:00:08
Ryan Whitmore
But it has had a big impact, I think. So besides for the stuff in terms of choosing my degrees, I was at PWI, say, and I very quickly realized that that as an organization wasn’t a culture fit for me. And that was a pretty big speedbump that took a really big hit on my mental health previous to that role as well.

00:44:00:08 – 00:44:30:03
Ryan Whitmore
I had always put a lot of self-worth on my professional aptitude and my professional efforts, I guess. And then I got to p.w see and like, you know, just different organization, different hierarchy. It works really well for some people, but it just didn’t work well for me. I felt like I wasn’t listened to and I wasn’t given the runway to sort of stretch, flex, fail, succeed, etc., etc..

00:44:30:05 – 00:44:57:22
Ryan Whitmore
Also, COVID had happened at that point in time as well. So there was a lot of being at home and just the stress of that whole timeframe so that had a pretty big impact on my mental health. But what ultimately resulted from that was a complete reframing of what I valued as lash out. You think? And if I’m to be a glass half full kind of guy, like I think it I think it pretty much made me value my now fiancé.

00:44:57:22 – 00:45:19:24
Ryan Whitmore
But at the time it was an early relationship between the two of us and it really made me value and appreciate her a lot more. And what we gave each other and supported each other and, you know, even things like my personal hobbies very much into mountain biking, I did a lot more of that. And so there was health and wellbeing that came as a result of that.

00:45:19:24 – 00:45:40:22
Ryan Whitmore
But the work satisfaction was much, much lower. I also experienced a little bit of bullying in that particular role as well, which is a bit of a tough thing to talk about, but that’s something I did experience a bit of. And so that process in terms of going through as well as just experiencing in general, was not nice.

00:45:40:24 – 00:46:04:21
Ryan Whitmore
That knocked my confidence around quite a lot. And it also meant that when I joined bad posts it was a really, really, really long sort of runway to rebuilding and reestablishing my my professional identity because I’d also gone from this point of view where I was no longer valuing myself personally on my aptitude and my effort in the work context.

00:46:04:23 – 00:46:28:01
Ryan Whitmore
And I’d lost a lot of self esteem because of that whole experience. And then I stepped into this other company where it was very, very different. Culture was more aligned to my personality. The science was like literally the inverse. I think I joined Mad Force when I was like 35 people or something, so much, much smaller than the hundreds and hundreds of thousands of people to participate, you see.

00:46:28:01 – 00:47:09:23
Ryan Whitmore
So like all of that was quite a big change, I think. And so there was months of, I guess, just rebuilding and trusting myself and trying a few things and pushing the boundaries, being vulnerable with my new colleagues at the time and allowing myself to, I guess, feel a bit crappy at times as well, and to be really as open as I felt comfortable with my managers and the people around me about what was going on at that point in time as well, and letting them know that I’d had those experiences in my previous role and how thought it was manifesting for me in my current role.

00:47:10:00 – 00:47:35:08
Ryan Whitmore
So yeah, that would probably be the biggest speed bump. And you know, the reason I told the story in terms of my my privilege is because I kind of feel like that’s a big speed bump for me personally, but that’s just a singular statement of pride. There’s lots of other speed bumps that I know, colleagues that I’ve crossed paths with, people I’ve worked with in consulting and all sorts of things, different professions, backgrounds, pathways, everything have had all speed bumps.

00:47:35:08 – 00:48:06:13
Ryan Whitmore
The meh in regards to that. So I always try to keep myself grounded. I guess when it comes to those things. I learned a lot from that experience, which is very much shaped how I want to be as a human and a professional forever from here on out, like really consolidated that part of me, I guess. And fortunately for me, the manager I had for the longest period of time at Malpas was somebody who really embodied as well.

00:48:06:13 – 00:48:24:16
Ryan Whitmore
And so that really helps, really helped me gravitate towards it and do it more. And also, you know, he’s somebody that I stay in contact with a lot now. He’s just a fantastic guy. And, you know, he supports me, mentors me a little bit with different stages of where I’m at with my career, too. So.

00:48:24:18 – 00:49:00:10
Ellen Bennett
Yeah, yeah. From first of all, thanks for being like super vulnerable with, with your experience and being aware with what kind of privileges come from, you know, where we live and who we are. But then also acknowledging and reflecting on the fact that no one gets easy, breezy, super cruisy journey through their career and everyone does have speed bumps and reflecting on that and you then knowing how you want to show up, then as a leader and as a colleague is, you know, obviously it’s a crappy situation when you’re in the in the midst of it.

00:49:00:10 – 00:49:10:16
Ellen Bennett
But coming out the other end and realizing like, okay, this is how I want this to, to shape with where I go next is really powerful. So yeah.

00:49:10:18 – 00:49:32:13
Ryan Whitmore
Yeah, exactly. And like I said, something I try to do as well as I can turn one to villainize the other people that were in that situation as well in terms of I guess, the perpetrator, if you want to use that kind of language, like their intent, I don’t believe was ever to do that. It’s just that’s how it came across and that’s how it impacted me.

00:49:32:13 – 00:50:03:11
Ryan Whitmore
So, you know, I try to be optimistic about those situations. And that whether it’s true or not, is, you know, potentially a different story. But in my mind, that’s what is a healthier way of framing it. Call it naive, call it whatever. I’m not sure. But I think, you know, giving people the benefit of the doubt and, you know, giving people the opportunity to to grow or to to change or whatever it is, it’s just a good personality trait generally speaking.

00:50:03:13 – 00:50:12:17
Ryan Whitmore
So I tried to make sure that my mindset doesn’t go down dark path or anything like that when it comes to reflecting on those things.

00:50:12:19 – 00:50:36:20
Ellen Bennett
And I think as well, it’s it’s really good to talk about this stuff because the experience of bullying, it doesn’t stop at school now, which I think a lot of people, when they hear that word, that’s immediately what comes to mind. So thanks for being super vulnerable and like sharing your experience because I feel like a lot of people can probably empathize with that and also that self-doubt as well.

00:50:36:20 – 00:50:49:01
Ellen Bennett
When it comes to that situation, it does matter how it lands like it does, whether or not the intent was there. So yeah, I think that’s a really important conversation to have.

00:50:49:03 – 00:51:13:23
Ryan Whitmore
Yeah, What one other thing I just popped into my as you were talking and something that helped me move on, which is why I wanted to jump in and add it. Is that something I’ve learned? Is that sometimes a place is just not your place, right? Like the value that you bring might actually objectively not be good in that place.

00:51:13:23 – 00:51:37:09
Ryan Whitmore
And that’s a hard reality to to personally accept. But sometimes that’s not because of you as an individual. It’s because of that place not being your place. Right. And going to find a shared group of people. Right? Like you can’t be friends with everybody in the world. You find your group, right? You find people with a similar mindset.

00:51:37:09 – 00:51:55:17
Ryan Whitmore
I think work is still the same. Like you don’t necessarily you’re always going to work with people that are a little bit different. You’re going to have challenges and those sort of things. There’s a company culture and there’s a thing that really allows you to thrive. It allows you to be your best self as a human person, but also as a professional as well.

00:51:55:19 – 00:52:15:03
Ryan Whitmore
Like everybody has their place. And I think that was a big lesson for me that P.W See was great. It was some people’s place and it was a really good learning experience for me, but it wasn’t my place and it resulted in some poor experiences and I could have been objectively bad in some ways in that particular role.

00:52:15:05 – 00:52:44:00
Ryan Whitmore
I don’t know whether I was I didn’t think I was, at least at the time. But, you know, there could have been people with that interpretation. Right. And I do think that that ultimately comes back to me not really feeling like that was where I belonged. Right. So that’s been really helpful for me. And I also think it’s a powerful thing to me to acknowledge because when I stepped into two matters, it felt much more like my place ready to act much more as well.

00:52:44:00 – 00:52:56:20
Ryan Whitmore
Write similar levels. Matt Pull. It’s just a different flavor. So that was just a life, a really hard one to learn, but it really was a life lesson that I think is important for people to hear me say. I feel it’s important for people to hear.

00:52:56:23 – 00:53:14:12
Ellen Bennett
Yeah, it’s a conversation have with quite a few different people. They get, I think with every role. It’s kind of like relationships, like you figure out what you don’t want and then you move on, figure it and then you just kind of like whittle it down until you’re in a really good spot. But then that also changes as well.

00:53:14:14 – 00:53:19:23
Ellen Bennett
So there’s no right or wrong answer. I think it’s just yeah, just figuring out where you fit.

00:53:19:24 – 00:53:22:14
Ryan Whitmore
Yeah. Yeah. 100%.

00:53:22:16 – 00:53:36:11
Ellen Bennett
CI Ryan kind of going, going from that. Is there anything that like any activities or books or mentors that you love listening to or get advice from that has kind of helped you out throughout your journey?

00:53:36:13 – 00:54:05:17
Ryan Whitmore
My previous manager, my it was Mike Yep. He’s someone who has had a massive impact on my mindset, massive impact on my career path, and I’ve really, really appreciated my time working with him and my, my the opportunity to be under his guidance. He’s a designer that stepped up into a head of product role, and I feel like a lot of times head of products tend to come from product management perspective.

00:54:05:19 – 00:54:48:21
Ryan Whitmore
And so having a product design in that position I felt was really refreshing and it really helps my perspective on what I was trying to stand for beforehand. And his approach is just unbelievably empathetic. He would always listen first, acknowledge what you had said and then have a constructive conversation as to where that might objectively stand and drawing very clear boundaries around that which, you know, when you’re trying to solve problems like we do in the product design space, it’s often pretty strong ideas and concepts and opinions about how you might go about that or there might be money.

00:54:48:21 – 00:55:11:16
Ryan Whitmore
It’s hard to a particular thing. People can get really attached or motivated or sometimes personal, not often, but sometimes personal with that particular things. And so being able to have a, you know, a boss, a mentor, a friend that I could be really wrong with and tell him where I sat and know that that was a safe space.

00:55:11:18 – 00:55:36:01
Ryan Whitmore
I value so unbelievably highly. I’m also a talker, as you might have realized from this podcast. Anyway, as my current manager Chris says, you know, I might use 48 words to say something. It could be done at 58. So like for me, you know, coming back to the my place, my people culture, that sort of stuff, like having that, you know, we can laugh at it.

00:55:36:01 – 00:55:59:18
Ryan Whitmore
I know I do it right. But also having that not pushed down or shunned or something like that and having it sort of channeled. Yeah, I really, really values and I really, really appreciate it. And it helps me see myself through a different light as well, but then helps me realize that, like, that’s not sometimes it’s inefficient, but it’s not a bad habit necessarily, right?

00:55:59:18 – 00:56:11:03
Ryan Whitmore
So yeah, I’ve very much expressed to him my gratitude for the time that we’ve had to work together, and I do stay in contact with him. So he’s been very helpful for my career in the last couple of years.

00:56:11:05 – 00:56:32:09
Ellen Bennett
Nice. So good. It’s always nice to have a bit of a shout out to some of the leaders that have shaped us. And yeah, it’s great that you guys still get on and still chat. I’d like to finish up with one last question, if you don’t mind, which I like to ask to everyone. If you could give your younger self some career advice, what would that be?

00:56:32:11 – 00:57:07:15
Ryan Whitmore
It’s probably the advice I did receive from my my parents, and that is trust your gut. It’s a little bit ironic. Some of the people I’ve liked, it’s probably chocolate that because I’m very scientific in my method in terms of design evidence, why we doing it? But in terms of what draws you to a role in terms of the the reason why you feel you need to move on or the reason why you feel this would be good for you, even if you’re not able to articulate it, to trust your gut, You know that it’s a very general statement, but it seems like the right thing for me to go and study games.

00:57:07:15 – 00:57:23:15
Ryan Whitmore
Did I know I was going to end up here? Absolute and our there way? Not at all. Right. That it seemed like it was the right thing for me to move. P.W. say it was another step. I’ll get to learn more things. Was it the end spot for me? No, absolutely not. Did I learn a lot? Absolutely right.

00:57:23:17 – 00:57:47:11
Ryan Whitmore
So moving on from that pause was really, really challenging, right? Because it’s been a company that helps me re identify myself as a professional. Did I want to leave like, no. Right. That I knew it was time and ready check was it was a great opportunity for me. Right? And I trusted my gut with that. So it’s a statement that applies to personal as well as professional.

00:57:47:13 – 00:58:17:06
Ryan Whitmore
And sometimes you sort of just know this thing is going to be right or is going to work. You can’t articulate it, kind of just know. And sometimes to go back to even like famous people like Jim Carrey or something like I manifest the thing, I manifested the role, right? Like if you have that intention or you have that belief that what you’re doing has purpose and you trust in yourself for doing that, I think that might have a part to play in it.

00:58:17:08 – 00:58:26:05
Ryan Whitmore
I don’t know if it does. I don’t even get any of that stuff behind that, but I’d like maybe that has a part to play in. It’s there.

00:58:26:07 – 00:58:43:12
Ellen Bennett
No, thank you. And that that seems to be a piece of advice that a lot of our guests have. So it’s it’s broad, but it can also be super duper specific. So it’s interesting to hear why that matters so much to you. So thank you so much for for joining us today.

00:58:43:17 – 00:58:44:14
Ryan Whitmore
Thank you for having me.

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