{"type":"rich","version":"1.0","provider_name":"Transistor","provider_url":"https://transistor.fm","author_name":"Near Future Podcast","title":"Ep #17: Frank Bach (Anthropic): Building Your Own Design Tool, Beginning Anywhere, and a Swiss Army Knife Career","html":"","width":"100%","height":180,"duration":2985,"description":"Tom and Jonny sit down with Frank Bach, a product designer at Anthropic who built his own design tool during onboarding week. They dig into why he prototypes in HTML instead of Figma, unpack his Swiss Army knife career from Red Bull to Headspace to Instagram, and get his advice for designers feeling the AI squeeze.\nKey takeaways\nBuild the tool while you build the work. Frank made his design tool feature by feature during his first project at Anthropic, adding each part the moment he hit the need for it. A share function when he wanted to show his PM, then a Loom-style recording feature the next day, camera feed and all, in about three prompts.\nLoad a control and a variant side by side and click them in sync. The most unusual thing he built steps two prototypes through the same screens on a single click. He is hoping Figma steals the idea.\nMost people inside a company have never seen the screens they own. Everyone at Headspace got the app free, so nobody had laid eyes on an upsell screen in years. A live side-by-side of current state and proposed state is what gave leadership the confidence to green-light the work.\nBegin anywhere. Frank has turned John Cage’s line into a working design principle. What matters is having something to click, see and feel, and the details get figured out along the way.\nVariety compounds differently to mastery. Energy drinks at Red Bull, meditation at Headspace, then social media at Instagram: every jump was chosen on purpose. He calls himself a Swiss Army knife of design, and reckons it is what makes someone stand out in an interview panel.\nLearning the tools on the company dime is a real benefit worth asking for. DoorDash set a goal it called Design 2028, where every designer becomes a design engineer, and gave people the time and space to get there. Frank admits he complained about it at first and is now grateful he did not have to learn it in his own hours.\nA lot of people working hard on something is a reason for empathy, and the...","thumbnail_url":"https://img.transistorcdn.com/8vUveugi5ZjKDI2pGhMY6ZwBcP7SSSqiqKb9hZCqvHM/rs:fill:0:0:1/w:400/h:400/q:60/mb:500000/aHR0cHM6Ly9pbWct/dXBsb2FkLXByb2R1/Y3Rpb24udHJhbnNp/c3Rvci5mbS9lOGE1/OTk1MmI3NWJjZTAw/Y2EyMWJjODZkODFj/MjI4MC5wbmc.webp","thumbnail_width":300,"thumbnail_height":300}