Katie Dill is the Head of Design at Stripe. Previously, she was Head of Experience Design at Airbnb and Head of Design at Lyft. Katie has been named one of Business Insider’s 10 People Changing the Tech Industry as well as one of Fast Company’s 100 Most Creative People in Business and received the Girls in Tech “Creator of the Year” award. In today’s episode, she shares: • What makes a design great • Advice on building high-performing teams in hyper-growth environments • A pivotal lesson in leadership she learned at Airbnb • Stripe’s focus on quality and how it’s tied to growth • A formula for removing organizational friction • How to increase productivity • What to look for when hiring a designer — Brought to you by Sidebar—Catalyze your career with a Personal Board of Directors | Jira Product Discovery—Atlassian’s new prioritization and roadmapping tool built for product teams | OneSchema—Import CSV data 10x faster Find the transcript and references at: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/building-beautiful-products-with Where to find Katie Dill: • X: https://twitter.com/lil_dill • Threads: https://www.threads.net/@lil_dilly • LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/katie-dill-79168b3/ Where to find Lenny: • Newsletter: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com • X: https://twitter.com/lennysan • LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lennyrachitsky/ In this episode, we cover: (00:00) Katie’s background (04:47) Katie’s pivotal leadership moment at Airbnb (10:55) Advocating for design ROI (16:07) Stripe’s quality focus (17:50) Stripe’s vast scope (18:45) How design enhances utility (21:39) Defining beauty and its role in product growth (26:19) Operationalizing quality (28:44) Katie’s insights from dialogues with diverse organizations (34:47) 15 Essential Journeys: Stripe’s method for holistic UX understanding and unified vision (44:35) Stripe’s PQR quality review (46:25) Stripe’s prioritization philosophy (48:29) Measuring impact beyond metrics (50:28) Performance = potential – interference (54:09) Building and managing large teams (1:01:46) Removing interference at Lyft: a practical example of Katie’s leadership impact (1:06:10) Stripe’s physical workspace design (1:07:41) Embracing bold ideas (1:11:07) Qualities of great designers (1:15:15) Stripe Press (1:19:19) Katie’s parting wisdom (1:23:17) Lightning round Production and marketing by https://penname.co/. For inquiries about sponsoring the podcast, email podcast@lennyrachitsky.com. Lenny may be an investor in the companies discussed.
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Even the most successful websites eventually need a redesign. Take Stripe for example. After six years with the same homepage, they recently unveiled a brand new site that reflects how the fintech giant has evolved over the past few years. So when is the time right for a new landing page? And what should you prioritize in the redesign? In this episode of Design Review YC’s Aaron Epstein sat down Stripe’s Head of Design Katie Dill to pull the curtain back on their high profile redesign and to discuss how their team is evolving in a world dominated by new AI design tools. 00:00 - Intro 00:30 - The Old Site 01:30 - Why Stripe Redesigned a Site That Still Looked Good 03:00 - The Biggest Thing They Needed To Change 03:30 - Crafting A New Narrative For The New Site 05:00 - What Story Was Missing From The Old Site 05:30 - “What Is The Point Of A Website?” 06:00 - The New Site 06:44 - New Landing Page Breakdown 07:10 - The GDP Counter: A Homepage Element Only Stripe Could Pull Off 07:40 - Building Trust Through Design 08:45 - Inside Stripe’s “Bento Box” Approach to Product Storytelling 10:37 - Why Stripe Used Modals Instead of Sending People to New Pages 11:37 - Adding Lively Animations That Don’t Feel Distracting 13:50 - The Value Of Beauty In Web Design 14:30 - How To Be Intentional With New Design Elements 15:40 - The Balance Between Getting It Right and Endless Iteration 16:24 - AI-Generated Brand Imagery 17:30 - How A Website Is Like A Song 19:11 - Designing the Perfect Stripe Wave Background 24:48 - All the Homepage Concepts Stripe Tried Before Landing on the Final Design 27:10 - How AI Is Changing Stripe’s Design Process 35:00 - Fighting the “Gravitational Pull to Mediocrity” 40:00 - Walking the Store: Stripe’s Secret to Better Product Design Apply to Y Combinator: https://www.ycombinator.com/apply Work at a startup: https://www.ycombinator.com/jobs
Stripe’s Head of Design Katie Dill is one of the most influential designers in Silicon Valley. Before joining Stripe she led the design team at Lyft and was Head of Experience Design at Airbnb. Throughout her career she’s leveraged the power of great design to help build a few of the most successful companies in the world. So what’s the secret to her success? For Katie it’s all about focusing on the details, and making sure that every pixel counts. In this episode YC’s Aaron Epstein and Katie Dill review startup landing pages with a focus on creating sites that build trust, convert customers and brings some joy to the user experience. If you would like to have your startup's website reviewed in a future episode of Design Review, please submit your info here: https://forms.gle/Yv7sCGpsi4PpAfRP9. Thank you to these companies for volunteering to have their sites reviewed: https://mitohealth.com/ https://signoz.io/ https://www.taiv.tv/ https://www.metriport.com/ https://aminoanalytica.com/ *Keep in mind that some of the featured websites may be updated between the time we film and publish Apply to Y Combinator: https://yc.link/DesignReview-apply Work at a startup: https://yc.link/DesignReview-jobs Chapters (Powered by https://bit.ly/chapterme-yc) - 00:00 - Intro 00:50 - Mito 05:20 - SigNoz 10:27 - TAIV 14:22 - metriport 17:21 - Amino Analytica
Stripe, Airbnb and Lyft are a few of the most successful companies of the past decade. And there are at least two things they all have in common - great design, and Katie Dill. Katie was Head of Experience Design at Airbnb, led the design team at Lyft and is now Head of Design at Stripe. We spoke with Katie about her design philosophy, what sets companies like Stripe apart, and how important it is to instill a culture of design in your startup from day one. Apply to Y Combinator: https://yc.link/DesignReview-apply Work at a startup: https://yc.link/DesignReview-jobs Chapters (Powered by https://bit.ly/chapterme-yc) - 00:00 - Intro 01:55 - The importance of design 04:00 - The role of trust 05:30 - Founder involvement in design 07:10 - Balancing quality with shipping early 09:00 - Focus on solving user problems 10:30 - Checklist 12:40 - Developing design skills 15:45 - Constant user feedback is key 18:50 - Design process at Stripe 24:40 - User experience scoring at Stripe 25:20 - Examples of design improvements at Stripe 31:40 - User feedback and community 32:20 - Takeaways