Compliance, low-code, and the user as hero: highlights from Drata's podcast

2023-03-09T00:00:00-05:00

I joined Helina Medhin and Arlo Guthrie (Drata's Director of Design) on Compliance Uncomplicated to talk about PixieBrix — how low-code can democratize software customization, where humans still beat computers, and why we went after SOC 2 early.

A few highlights from the episode:

On democratizing customization

You should be able to customize it to your needs, even if you aren't a programmer or a software developer.

On software as a representation of knowledge

[Software is] a representation of human knowledge about how the world works. When you build tools for analyzing software or creating software, you're actually deepening your understanding of the world and how to create things within that. And then, when you start running analyses or synthesizing, you're actually also creating new knowledge as you go.

On humans vs. computers (and AI)

Humans and computers have different strengths. Humans are very good at framing problems, navigating ambiguity, relationship building, whereas computers are good at rote memory, solving large computations. [...] [Computers are efficient at] rapidly synthesizing information from different sources to create new information. But they still need that interplay with humans to really drive outcome.

On user experience

Make the user the hero of the story. [...] To really empower them to be the hero of their own [story] — help themselves out and help their team members out.

On compliance

Compliance is about agreeing to do important things and then keeping your word. [...] [We wanted to be] communicating our compliance and controls in a way that our customers, and IT departments were already familiar with. [...] It's really about keeping our word, and then also communicating that in a way that's simple and makes sense to our customers.

The full episode is on Spotify and Amazon Music.

Everything is UI/UX: highlights from Masters of Automation

2022-08-09T00:00:00-04:00

I joined Alp Uguray on the Masters of Automation podcast to talk about why we started PixieBrix — what low-code/no-code really means, why the future of work has to be human-first, and what we'd been hearing from the community. A few moments from the conversation worth pulling out — the full transcript is here.

On the spreadsheet as the original citizen-development tool

The spreadsheet is the most successful citizen development tool of all time. In Microsoft Excel, you can start with static documents, you can add styling, you can add your text, and then you can start building out models with basic calculations. […] What people do in the financial world is they actually record macros, they write macros, they build out pretty much full-fledged applications in these spreadsheets that can run entire companies.

On everything being UI/UX

There's this joke that people throw around, that everything in life is sales. […] When it comes to computers, the same is true for UI/UX. Everything is about user interfaces. If you want to build a game, it's about the user interface. A productivity app — it's about the user interface. A smart device for your home — like, I have a smart thermostat — it's about the UI/UX.

On the future of work being human-first

At PixieBrix, we fundamentally believe that the future of work is human-first. It's about putting the human in the center of it. A lot of times when I hear people talk about future of work, they're coming at it from a view of a particular SaaS app, like a CRM, or a particular business process or process management platform […]. But what it really comes down to is that each person actually has multiple areas of responsibility. They're participants in multiple processes, multiple different functions in the business.

On not loving chat interfaces

I know a lot of people like using chat interfaces to AI, or other things. I actually can't stand that. I prefer to have a different sort of interface — clicking, seeing multiple options — instead of engaging in a conversation. It's really about being able to craft the perfect experience for yourself, regardless of what enabling technologies you're using under the hood.

On embracing imperfection because the human is in the loop

Because the human is in the loop, you don't need to be perfect. You don't need something that you write once and then it's going to go off and run on its own for two years, five years, ten years. You can really embrace that imperfection and really embrace that personalization, based on what that individual is, or what that business unit values, as part of the process.

On empowerment and the safety net

What's really interesting about empowering is, it's about giving those capabilities, but it's also about having a good safety net. Making it so that it's okay to make mistakes, it's okay to experiment. You're not accidentally sending out thousands of emails if you mess up a line of code, or you're not accidentally breaking compliance rules. […] It's about combining that sort of safety net with also those incredible creator tools, for people to really express themselves and experiment.

On low floor, high ceiling

We really try to make it so that there's a low floor to starting to use us, but a high ceiling to what's possible. And then really trying to create a welcoming community for people to get inspired, get help extremely quickly, and really showcase what they've created.

The full episode is on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and the show's website. A lightly edited transcript is on this site.

Todd Schiller - user experience