Design Breakfast: June 2025
Design Breakfast is an internal Amazon design community hosted event.
This short motivational presentation highlights how thinking more broadly about a project and having the courage to propose an alternative approach and strategy can create not only great outcomes for the business and for customers, but can help elevate your design thinking in a way you wouldn’t have considered before.
This is an abridged version of my Medium article on the same topic.
Transcript
If I asked you what the most valuable skill as a designer is...what would you say?
Maybe it's the ability to empathize with people. Or the to hone your craft to pixel perfection.
Mastery of design tools like Figma, or After Effects, recite Gestalt principals in a super non-snobby way, or (these days) write highly effective AI prompts...
And while all of these skills are great at the foundation of it all is a skill that in my 11 years at Amazon has taken me FAR longer to recognize and even longer to get decent at, and something i still struggle with.
It's courage.
Specifically, the courage to question fundamental assumptions. Out loud.
As designers, we can get caught up in the "how" - the pixels, the interactions, the workflows.
But technical excellence is just table stakes. The REAL magic happens when we dare to ask......
Why?
It's a deceptively simple question. And it's not about being difficult or contrarian - it's about understanding that our role as designers extends far beyond the interface layer.
Questioning decisions, whether it's a design choice or a strategic direction, drives better outcomes. It helps clarify assumptions and not only lead to more innovative ideas, but also ensures that right from the beginning that we're all on the same page. We're all bought in.
Think about products that truly transformed their space. Was it just better designed?
or did it fundamentally reframe the problem it was solving?
Uber didn't just improve taxi dispatch - it questioned why we needed dispatchers at all
Airbnb didn't just make hotel booking better - it challenged what a "hotel" even is
Netflix didn't improve video rental - it questioned why we needed physical media
There are three critical moments when asking 'why' has the biggest impact:
First: At the brief stage - before a single pixel is pushed
Question the problem definition itself, and challenge underlying assumptions about user needs
Second: During the discovery phase - when assumptions start becoming "requirements" (P0s or P1s)
Question whether identified solutions reflect the customer need, or just feature gaps.
And third, most importantly: when someone says 'no' or 'out of scope'"
Challenge what "out of scope" really means and dig into whether technical limitations are truly immovable.
Think about it. When was the last time you read a BRD, or PR/FAQ and took a step back.... and questioned the problem statement?
It's intimidating, isn't it? Challenging assumptions means risking being wrong.
And let's be honest: when millions of users and dollars are involved, the pressure to play it safe is huge.
The key is understanding that strategic courage isn't about being reckless - it's about taking calculated risks that question fundamental assumptions.
By regularly challenging ideas (including your own), you ensure that the work evolves and improves. Stagnation happens when we stop questioning, stop exploring.
Recently, I was asked to work on a project that looked simple on paper: Update a page to match our design system, and maybe optimize it a bit for our core use cases. Standard work, right?
But by asking 'why' at each of those three critical moments: something fascinating emerged:
Why this page?
Why this point in the customer journey?
Why does this information exist separately at all?
What we discovered was that this "simple update" was masking a deeper systemic issue. The page wasn't just not working hard enough for our customers - it was an unnecessary step in the journey. The real solution? Remove it entirely and reshape the work flow.
Admittedly, to effectively challenge assumptions, you need more than just courage.
You need data literacy.
The ability to build compelling business cases.
You need strategic communication skills to build trust with stakeholders...
But here’s the truth: all of that is meaningless... if you don’t have the courage to speak up.
Asking the right questions — challenging assumptions and decisions is VITAL for progress.
It uncovers flaws in reasoning, stimulates new ideas, fosters an environment where the best, and not the loudest or first ideas are the ones to rise to the top.
I've noticed at there is often a bit of a power imbalance when it comes to product decisions. Designers are often handed a set of requirements, and told anything beyond the P0s are essentially "out of scope".
But here's the thing about 'out of scope' - it's often code for:
"We haven't thought big enough yet."
"This makes us uncomfortable" "We didn't plan for that"
Or "This doesn't fit our current metrics"
Next time you're faced with a design challenge, ask yourself:'Am I thinking broadly enough? Am I being brave enough? And most importantly - what would happen if I dared to completely reframe the problem. To reimagine and rethink what's possible or "in scope"?
Does it feel uncomfortable? Absolutely. Will you sometimes be wrong? It would be weird if you weren’t! And that’s okay. Because the alternative — just executing on what we’re told?
Thats not design. It’s decoration.
And the greatest designs, don't just solve problems... they redefine them.
Thank you
