DON’T BUTTER THEM UP!
REAsons why you dropshouldn't out of design school
Meet
Cobi
Cobi is a customer learning manager at Protopie and a 2024 UW Design graduate. As an IxD alum, he is equipped with a full arsenal of design skills with a specialty in ideating and prototyping.
Don’t work yourself into the ground
What was something that initially sparked your interest in Protopie?
It happened to be that the seniors at the time were having another class in the IxD room as well, and I would just sit in the back, trying to see what they were doing. I knew the guest professor, Nathan Auer and he had taught another class for me before. He was teaching them about prototyping as part of their class so he brought in a Microsoft designer by the name of Eduardo Sonnino.
In Design Interface 1, we had a little bit of time to make our project and do our video. And you could use whatever tool you wanted, so almost everyone just went to Figma. At this time, I had watched... what Eduardo had talked about, and I was like, wow, I could do some really cool shit. And I had a free weekend. I was like, you know, I’ll give it a go. I just took my designs, brought them into Protopie and I did some stuff. Was it high tech? Was it like revolutionary stuff? Not at all.
But I was like, wow. I can make my designs tangible. And I think you and I have always had a hard time explaining or showing off designs to someone who doesn’t know things about design... I liked having something that you could feel, you could touch, you could see.
When you’re prototyping, using motion is essential.
When it comes to interaction design, it’s a lot of clouds. And a lot of times it’s hard for people to reach into those clouds and actually see what’s going on—it’s more just kind of air. So I was like, wow, I could make something and someone could use my phone, and touch and interact with it, and I can make it feel real.
Would you say that motion is an essential part of how you enjoy sharing your ideas?
I think as a designer, once you get to prototyping, motion is always essential. So it’s not just for me, but if I’m a designer that’s trying to show a coder, “hey, I built this app, here’s our transitions”. If I don’t have motion, the coder is gonna have to guess. That’s totally fine. But if they guess and they guess wrong, then they have to come back to me—it just takes time.
Then they’re going to understand the design of it better, which is going to lead to them maybe liking it better. They might give better insight if you’re trying to do crit. If you’re trying to again, just showcase it as the final result, overall, you’ll probably end up with a better buy-in.
What were some of your expectations going into this position of yours at Protopie? What did you have in mind for the responsibilities?
Saying this very nicely—I…thought that they were a bigger company than they were. I didn’t realize how much of a startup they were.
So I have this title, “customer learning manager.” Basically I’m helping our customers learn about Protopie, and as far as the title of “manager”, it involves managing, well, a lot.
I’m now in charge of “the Americas” for doing client calls where I am the Protopie expert. I’m the guy. So when they have questions, I need to be the one to answer.
So my expectation was a bit different. The one good thing about it all, was I realized I know a lot more about Protopie than I realized. I think this is the same for me internally, but also most people about, skills as they learn. You know more than you think you do.
What is your favorite part about working at Protopie?
Protopie is a South Korea based company, meaning that 60–70 percent of the employees are in South Korea. So most of my meetings are between 5–7 pm. There’s people in America. There’s also people in Europe. And as my role suggests, I am the Educator Trainer for the Americas, but as I have mentioned, there aren’t really any other educated trainers in the same role I am.
Jubilee, or Jubes, he’s a prototyper, he’s been kind of thrusted into also doing talks with some companies. So he’s been on the Asia Pacific side because he lives in Korea as well. So he can cover those. We have no one in Europe. So, depending on the time frame in which a European client wants a meeting, it’s either me or him.
My work schedule can get kind of funky. I’m a big advocate of, you know, trying not to work yourself into the ground and going to go for a walk, meeting friends, etc. I have a pick up frisbee leg team that plays really close to my house, like five minutes away. The whole week basically, any day, at 12 o’clock, I can just go play frisbee.
My favorite things about Protopie are time, flexibility, and also the fact that I feel like I’m always learning.
Cobi’s Passion Project, “Hidden Kitchen”
How or where do you find your creative motivation in design?
One, whenever you have that motivation, just use it. Like whenever it is. I noticed that I didn’t tell myself that I’d have the ability to do work during the middle of the day. During COVID, midday hours just weren’t for getting work done. Until I was like, it’s okay, it’s me by myself. This is my alone time, man, I could do something.
Whenever you have motivation, just use it
So I think letting yourself be creative inside instances that aren’t necessarily always by yourself is a valuable skill. Because I think that’s why a lot of designers say that they worked until the middle of the night. It’s often just because they started at like six and then had nothing stopping them.
It’s hard getting in your headspace to believe you’ll be fully creative or full momentum knowing that you’re going to have to stop in an hour. You don’t feel like you’re gonna get as much out of it. And then you’re gonna come back and you’re like, what was I doing? Where was I? You have to readjust yourself to start working again. And though it is hard, it doesn’t matter.
Since you’re remote, how do you separate your comfort zone from your work?
Yeah, that one is a bit of a challenge sometimes. Because l’ll have a lunch break, I’ll eat some food, and I’ll have like thirty minutes before I have to hop back on. I’ll end up in bed watching TikToks. And I’m like, I don’t wanna get up. So, sometimes it’s so hard.
Honestly though, I would say lunches are amazing because...I can premake a meal on Sunday and just walk downstairs on Monday and grab it. And then watch a fifty minute video and just completely disassociate from working. I think it is nice to have that, a nice break.
With that said, I can mentally tell myself: this is work, this is laying on my bed. But if those two ever bleed into each other, I’m gonna be sleepy when I work. I’m gonna be thinking about work when I’m trying to go to bed. It’s gonna kind of fuse together.
Would you still want to be a designer if you knew what you know now?
I would probably have wished I did more to get to this path than I did.
Because, again, I mean, everyone’s past is different and you’re all gonna maybe I’m happy where I’m at. I have a job, dude. I know not everyone from design has a job. And like those people are gonna answer this question differently, because they don’t even have a job. When you’re in a position where you’re lucky enough to have something like a job, you have that stability, you’re like, “oh yeah, no I’m happy with where I’m at…at least compared to someone who doesn’t have a job. I think part of me is like I worked really hard throughout college. I know I did. I did a lot of things. I didn’t even realize I was so driven to do it until afterwards people were like “wow, he did a lot”. I hadn’t even realized. I wish the year before or the year before that someone could have told me about design. No one told me about design.
Looking back on your your time at UW, what is one piece of advice you took from design school that you could pass on to current or future design students?
I feel like all they talk about in design is about finding your niche, in hopes that something pans out. It did pan out, but at the same time, I’m like, finding your niche can just be tools you like. I think again, finding your niche doesn’t just apply to design, but it can be like a type design program and the company that happens to work with type designers. It’s weird because I always think finding your niche is finding your community. I think that’s why I got the job…is because of that community.
Finding your niche is about finding your community
Other than one time I tried to post something because I was trying to get a job, all of the other ones were just because I thought it was cool. I wanted to be part of it. Like I had gone onto like Webflow forums just to figure out issues. I don’t think I ever posted, but I’d posted it in the Protopie forum because I was having a similar issue. All that to say, networking is kind of imperative to a job. And it’s so annoying because even me, I genuinely thought networking sucked. It does suck. You have to butter people up. But seriously, don’t butter them up! Just be yourself.
Don’t butter them up! Just be yourself.
Cobi showcasing his senior capstone alongside ID grad, Colton Jackson, at UW Design Show 2024.
