UI/UX Articles and Interesting Tidbits of the Week
September//5//2025
Here are some interesting finds on UI/UX of the past week!
1.
Gen Z and Career Minimalism. Interesting article hailing from the Glassdoor blog on the topic of “Career Minimalism” that is becoming a paradigm closely associated with Gen Z. The term symbolizes a shift in the focus of professionals from essentially placing all their focus on getting a single opportunity/job and expecting it to fulfill all their requirements/desires, to seeking a rewarding balance between a job that provides financial stability, and other activities which provide personal and even professional ambitions. I’ll dispute the statement that this perspective is closely aligned with Gen Z, as I’ve been reading about this fluctuation of priorities for quite some time. Ultimately, and in my opinion, what always influences priorities is governed by the fact that the job market shifts, and particularly since the pandemic those shifts have been more dramatic and visibly felt by everyone. And for younger professionals getting into their first jobs now, they face a very different set of challenges that people did 10 or 20 years ago. Highlight of the article includes:
“Career minimalism represents a fundamental shift in how we define professional success that’s reshaping expectations across all professional levels. It’s not anti-work; it’s pro-sustainability. Gen Z has looked at the traditional career path and asked a simple question: “What if there’s a better way?” Their answer involves stable day jobs that provide security, side hustles that provide passion, and boundaries that provide sanity. They’re proving that you can be professionally successful without making work your entire identity. This shift in priorities reflects the broader career minimalism movement: It isn’t just a Gen Z trend — it’s a preview of the future of work for everyone.”
2.
Building a Resilient Design Team. Very pertinent article from Jonas Downey for the Figma Blog on the topic of building robust and resilient Design teams. The author provides some great recommendations on how to do so, with an appropriate combination of meaning and practicality, which is emphasized by some of the recommendations themselves. Amongst those are Encouraging Experimentation (and shifting roles), Building Bridges Across the Organization, Scaling with Intention, to name but a few. The article has an underlying tone that is important to keep in mind: credibility. For a Design team to be resilient, it also has to build credibility for their craft, their value, and their ability to impart recommendations that are of value for the Organization (and its clients). Highlight of the article includes:
“Creative people — like designers — spike in different ways; a problem that confounds one designer might be a dream project for another. That’s why I like to be mindful of everyone’s superpowers and growth areas. If you’re leading a larger organization, group people who have complementary skillsets together so teams feel balanced, and everyone has a chance to learn from each other. This is even more critical at a time when traditional roles and work processes are up for debate. Research, design, product, and engineering are getting closer than ever, with folks increasingly shifting across specialities and role boundaries. Encourage designers to lean into these shifts and experiment with new tools and approaches. The goal is to reorient your whole team such that it’s built to adapt, and feels excited about embracing change.”
3.
Gmail Bounce. Great article from Andrian Valeanu on the topic of email bouncing on Google. It’s a very thorough examination of what is happening with email send-outs and why soft and hard bounce is occurring (the difference between soft and hard being temporary and permanent failures). The author itemizes what may be causing these issues, including Invalid Contact Addresses, Illegal Attachments, Dubious Email Content, to name but a few. And it’s worth remembering the three aspects of email protocol that are mentioned in the article, SPF (Sender Policy Framework), DKIM (Domain Keys Identified Mail), and DMARC (Domain Based Message Authentication, Reporting, and Conformance). Well worth reading through. Highlight of the article includes:
“Email authentication turned from a mere recommendation into an absolute must-have last year for all companies that want to reach their Gmail subscribers. In 2024, Google rolled out one of the major updates concerning privacy policy and regulations in the email channel and platform. The update covers many important things, like staying under a reported spam threshold or allowing for easy and quick unsubscription. However, most importantly, it demands that all bulk senders (companies that send over 5,000 emails) authenticate their emails. Otherwise, emails will be rejected. This means that companies are obliged to secure and configure their systems appropriately and provide clean and concise validation that a sender is who they claim to be. This helps to declutter inboxes, block malicious messages with higher precision, close loopholes exploited by attackers, and ensure a secure environment for all participants.”
