Building trust and articulating design decisions for buy-in | Angela Salud Chua (Toffeenut Design Studio)

Angela Salud Chua is the founder of Toffeenut Design Studio, an independent collectives studio based in the Philippines. She has been designing products with tech leaders for over a decade, helping with ideation and strategy, and building award-winning products that scale.

We talk about fostering relationships and referrals, defending design decisions as a female Asian senior designer in Western teams, why doing unsolicited redesigns make sense, creating a fun mix of projects as a fractional worker, choosing a non-work-centric life, tips for new freelancers, and so much more.

0:00 Introductions 2:15 Journey into working independently 7:57 Product-led growth 9:52 Being an Asian woman in Western teams 11:53 Articulating design decisions 16:03 Work boundaries 19:47 Challenges as a designer 21:47 Advice for early-stage designers 27:35 Curating a non work-centric life 29:31 Advice for fractional workers

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