After a short sabbatical, Agile for Humanity meetup restarted with an amazing presenter.  Adrienne Guillory delivered Foundation of Design Thinking - UX Research building Human-Centered Experiences.

Listen to the questions and discussions to expand your knowledge of design thinking and human centered design.

I’m pushing for reaching out to customers and get feedback, but main stakeholders are afraid that the customer perception pf the company as an industry leader would some how become tarnished if we ask customers for feedback. So we get into this catch-22 where we need customer feedback after releasing a new update but don't ask too much because they (customers) may think we don't know what we're doing

Not sure why your org is resistant to getting to customer feedback. It must be as a result of the existing culture. In the past few years in the UK there has been a big focus on NPS (Net Promoter Scores) and the level of the score ties into the bonuses within the company. It is so important to get feedback from the customer. You will need to find a sponsor the Exec level who also understands the importance of customer feedback.

The reason why they are resistant is a fear to customer perception of the company as an industry leader, so change is hard….for a lot of people so it takes time and persistence. Expecting different results performing the same action is the definition of insanity!

How do we approach leadership that is disconnected from these values? Is it possible to open them up to the value of this approach.
"We watch people make bad decisions and don’t say anything." So what if those making bad decisions are not open to feedback?

The Design for progressive companies often happen before the start of the initiative. But is also working during the Build cycle to get validated learning.

There is also a disconnect between Scrum, product and design teams, they are required to collaborate more often and developers should be part of initial design discussions to understand the feasibility from technical side of things as well. e.g how to design something keeping accessibility features in mind.

How do you separate or prioritize the user’s needs vs marketing needs (metrics)?

How do we approach leadership that is disconnected from these values? Is it possible to open them up to the value of this approach. "We watch people make bad decisions and don’t say anything." So what if those making bad decisions are not open to feedback?