Newsletter

September 2023 Updates

Grace Lau

Oct 4, 2023 — 4 min read

Photo by Jeremy Thomas on Unsplash

Fall has started in the Northern Hemisphere~

The summer heat finally calmed down and now we’re entering chillier times! We hope everyone is enjoying the weather, pumpkins, and colorful leaves!

In the meantime, DIA has some news to share with you.

#1: A Venture into Narrative Fiction

One of our apprentices, Justin Kim, went on his first solo trip to Pittsburgh for NarraScope 2023. Check out his reflection to learn what it’s like to attend a conference all by yourself for the first time!

#2: Read Experience Mapping with DIA!

We started the Read-aloud Book Club so that

1) there’s no pressure to finish reading a book before a meeting
2) there’s no pressure to go out and get a book so that you can participate, and
3) there’s a group of us reading the same book together, albeit slowly, and having discussions.

A new book has been chosen: Mapping Experiences 2nd Ed. by Jim Kalbach. Experience mapping has more direct applications in people’s work which can be helpful when looking for a new role. The intention is it will help you think holistically about your work which will help provide better case studies.

Register for updates on when the first reading will take place.

If you’re interested in the book club and have feedback on how it’s run, when it takes place, how we’re presenting it, reply to this email, or email events@diadesign.io and let us know! We love to learn and adjust based on community feedback.

#3: Game Club Updates

The Game Club’s Jam #7 update will come in October! Justin and the gang have been busy with life but promise to talk about their experiences using RPG Paper Maker.

#4: Be a mentor with DIA

DIA is getting started on recruiting mentors for next year's apprentice program. We’re currently looking for people with 5+ years experience in UX in any role capacity to join DIA Design Guild as a volunteer mentor.

Local and community announcements:

DIA Design Guild hosts our own local events in the Los Angeles area as well as supports a number of communities in hosting and producing events. Here are a few we’re fond of:

#5: World Information Architecture Café

Over 60 people joined us at the last World IA Café event a few weeks ago, “Integrating Accessibility into Product Making for More Inclusive Products”, with Nandita Gupta. Check out past event recordings (Vimeo).

Meanwhile, there are two events coming up in October:

Oct 5, Experience Maps - A Designer's Framework for working in Agile teams and managing UX Debt, with Mohit Gupta
Oct 19, Designing Against Bad Mental Models, with Miranda Sawyer

See the full calendar: https://lu.ma/worldiaday

#6: Building a Personal Knowledge Garden

If you have trouble managing, organizing, and taking notes. If you seek ways to manage information in your life. If you are looking for ways to remember what you’ve read or watched better. There’s a workshop for that!

Since earlier this year, DIA’s Grace Lau and Justin Kim have been supporting information architects and authors Jorge Arango and Karl Fast on a new workshop they’ve developed on digital note-taking. This is a 4-week workshop series with live sessions, a community, and practical takeaways for life and work at the same time.

Details and register at: https://store.jarango.com/workshop-build-a-pkg

#7: Mark your calendars for IAC24!

Conferences are a great way to build a professional network and get insights into what is happening right now in the field. This year's IAC will be taking place in Seattle, April 9-13, 2024. Hope to see you there!

Submit a proposal, learn about the conference, and check out the past conferences at: https://www.theiaconference.com/