Tim Loo is Strategy Director at Foolproof, a top-tier experience design agency in the UK. I spoke with Tim about his recent strategy work, and about his upcoming workshop at the UX STRAT Europe conference, which will take place in Amsterdam on June 10 – 12 (see https://www.uxstrat.com/europe for more info).
Paul: Hi Tim, thanks for taking time out to talk with me today. Can you tell us a little about yourself?
Tim: My name is Tim Loo and I’m Strategy Director at Foolproof, an experience design company, based in the UK and Singapore. I’m an experience design strategist most interested in how design is bridging the gap between business strategy and CX.
Paul: What will you be speaking about at UX STRAT Europe?
Tim: My colleague, Phil Morton (Foolproof’s Head of Strategy), and I will be running our workshop on how to sell experience design strategy in/to a big company. It’s for anyone (client or agency/consulting side) who wants to do experience design strategy work but needs help in getting sponsorship, buy-in and support (including budget). It’s based on our years of experience, both successful and unsuccessful, in selling experience design strategy engagements to companies like Shell, Sony & HSBC and we’ll share tactics and practical tips in getting stakeholders to understand and see the value.
Paul: What can you tell us about your recent work, particularly as it pertains to experience design strategy?
Tim: Increasingly we’re seeing that big companies are starting to realise that their traditional corporate strategy planning and budgeting processes are not working because of the massive gulf between Powerpoint based strategy communication and getting valuable products to market. We call this the experience strategy execution gap. We’ve been working with an incredibly diverse set of clients in financial services, pharma, consumer electronics, utilities and there are common patterns in how outmoded they are in the way they plan for the future in the digitally disrupted world. We’re getting real traction with our work. It’s an exciting time to be an experience design strategist.
Paul: What do you see on the horizon for UX / CX / Product / Service design strategy?
Tim: As digital design becomes more and more normal and embedded in the way companies plan and deliver web & mobile, screen based products and services, experience design strategists need to be getting a handle on the next important technologies (AI, VR, AR, blockchain, zero UI, IoT) - and the evolving consumer behaviours and attitudes around them (increasing automation, privacy versus convenience, who is generation z?) which will shape our work in the future. We need to help businesses start to imagine and in live in the near future and understand how they will need to reset their understanding of what they are and need to be.
Paul: Anything else that people considering attending should know?
Tim: UX STRAT has been so important to us at Foolproof over the years. In 2013, UXSTRAT USA was confirmation that our ideas and thinking on how business strategy could be shaped through design thinking and methodologies were shared with design leaders around the world. To paraphrase my dear friend Ronnie Batista (who I get to bond with each year through UX STRAT) “we had found our tribe”. UXSTRAT EUROPE has given us the chance to connect which design leaders in our part of the world and learn and share.
Foolproof are proud to be a longstanding supporter and sponsor of UX STRAT and it’s been incredibly rewarding and fun to be part of the UX STRAT tribe. We can’t wait to see everyone in Amsterdam in June. Make sure you take the time to make connections and be sure to grab a beer with Phil and I and the rest of the Foolproof team.