Hope Tambala

MSI 2020

Hope Tambala’s career is proof that best-laid plans are no match for bold pivots. As a master’s student at the University of Michigan School of Information, he studied user experience research and design. Approaching graduation in the uncertain job market of 2020, Tambala broadened his search to include software engineering roles. That decision led him to landing a position at The Washington Post right out of the program.

Now a senior software engineer at Etsy, Tambala works on a team that ensures the user experience is cohesive from sign in to check-out. “Understanding how people interact with products, being a good teammate, and articulating why something should be done this way instead of that way — these are the skills that get you jobs,” he says.  

His desire to create people-focused solutions brought him to UMSI in the first place. After earning his bachelor’s degree in chemistry, Tambala served as a community health facilitator in the Dominican Republic through the Peace Corps. He educated families about health and nutrition, taught teens about sexual health and worked on environmental engineering projects. 

Tambala noticed that many Dominicans’ health records were recorded on paper and weren’t accessible to local doctors or the next medical mission that came to the area. This problem inspired him to found a tech nonprofit, Puente — meaning “bridge” — which facilitates data collection to respond to community health needs. 

“In creating that application, I heard of this thing called user experience,” he says. “The first version of my app was unwieldy. No one liked to use it. Luckily, I had a friend who had gone through the MSI program.” Tambala spoke to this UMSI alumnus, who now works as a UX designer at Netflix, about the issues he had encountered while developing Puente. 

“He asked me, ‘Have you thought about guiding people through the journey of this solution you want them to adopt?’ He suggested the master’s program at UMSI, so I applied, got in and the rest is history.”

In this Q&A, Tambala offers an in-depth look into his role at Etsy and describes how UMSI students can differentiate themselves when applying for UX roles. 

UMSI: Can you give us a glimpse into your current role? What does your day-to-day look like? 

Hope Tambala: My user experience foundation team is split into two sister teams: accessibility engineering and design systems engineering. I'm on the design systems engineering side.

We have many teams at Etsy, each building a different feature in the end product. When there is one team building the checkout experience, a second team doing listings, then another one handling authentication, our users could get three completely different experiences, right? 

So our team, the user experience foundation team, steps in to ensure every experience feels cohesive, from sign in to check-out. That involves a lot of front-end engineering code: HTML, CSS, JavaScript, a lot of PHP. I also work with iOS and Android engineers to make sure the mobile application feels the same as the website.

My day-to-day is handling a lot of component engineering. This means breaking down the user interface to granular levels, and for example, making sure all buttons on Etsy look the same and have the same hover state and focus state.

I'm curious to know what the process is on your design systems team. Do you have to complete your work before individual teams start on their features?

The process is quite dynamic, because we often have to anticipate what teams will need before they even know it themselves. We conducted internal UX research, observing how Etsy engineers and designers would use the design system to build their features. We have to be very proactive about building a good experience for employees within the company to make sure they're building a better experience for the actual end user.

How's your experience at Etsy compared to the previous companies you worked at or the company you founded?

When I started my own company, it was a small team of three people, and I had a hands-on role in building our app. Now, Puente has expanded to 40 employees across three different countries. My involvement transitioned to more of a part-time capacity, focusing on maintenance remotely while our core team handles day-to-day operations on the ground.

The Washington Post is a typical corporate environment. A lot of people were working on the same thing. My role was more execution-based, talking to a lot of people to make sure my work followed a structured framework. In my next role at a health-tech startup, the cycle went test, build, launch, very rapidly. The pace was exhilarating yet demanding, as we constantly worked to iterate and improve our product. 

Etsy is a much bigger company. Millions of people use Etsy. If you introduce a bug, it instantly affects millions of users, ads and revenue. So, the pace is slower and more intentional. People want to make sure they're getting things right the first time. There is definitely an aspect of making sure everything we do is done to the best of our ability, and only launching features that align with Etsy’s values and mission. 

Do you find yourself applying the skills you developed at UMSI?

During my time at UMSI, a PhD student taught a course on React.js, a Javascript framework. I probably learned everything I needed to get my first software engineering position in that class. It was really hard. But it was fundamental to learn, and it directly applied to my first interview. I would encourage people to take advantage of the self-directed courses. 

The coolest, most fun course I took is Interaction Design. That one transformed my way of thinking about design. My UX research course with Cliff Lampe was also awesome. I still employ those methods when I want to build a research plan, or even in personal tasks.

Graphic Design and Visual Communications was huge, because they taught you how a user interface should work. Sometimes, as an engineer, you may receive a mockup from a designer and just think, “What is this? This doesn't make any sense.” But taking this class will give you the ability to give clear, specific feedback about what you do like or don't like about the user interface. 

Were there any ways you were underprepared?

If I had decided to become a UX designer or UX researcher, a lot more UMSI courses would apply in my day-to-day job. Because I wanted to go the engineering route, I needed to do a decent amount of work outside of class. But there are a lot of opportunities outside of coursework to code and sharpen your skills. I have friends who graduated from the program, and they're all doing super well in amazing positions.

For students now, I would advise you to take advantage of UMSI programs and resources that let you apply your skills outside of coursework. When I was in school, there was a program in Detroit where I got to do user testing and research. That taught me how to balance professionalism with approachability in asking research questions and getting product feedback from people.

What are the skills that can set students apart during the hiring process?

When you talk to recruiters and hiring managers, you need projects that weren’t completed in a classroom. I've been on panels where the candidate relied solely on projects from boot camps or coursework. The panel will instantly think, this person hasn't interviewed real users. They haven't done real user testing. They haven't built a real prototype. When a candidate only has fancy, pretty portfolio pieces, people can see through it. 

Because of how intense tech recruiting is right now, you can differentiate yourself by doing outside projects, using your UMSI skills. 

The best interview I've had was talking about a project I did outside of school that failed. It was a project where I had done all this research, I proposed a design and explained why I thought it worked. I backed my ideas up with insights from interviews and user tests, and presented the research points I had to validate that solution. Then my client said, they didn’t want to go with that idea. The interviewer asked me if it got implemented. I told them, no, it did not get implemented. Real clients will tell you no, all the time. And these are the experiences that matter in interviews.

Can you share some advice for new graduates entering and trying to keep up with the information field?

UX moves so fast. I bet Figma is releasing something new every week, and it’s easy to get overwhelmed when there's constantly something new to learn. But I've found that the key is not necessarily mastering every tool or technique, but focusing on honing soft skills and staying adaptable.

The tools aren't where most people are going to be looking for your expertise. It's about how you think and conduct research, validate your research, explain your research or designs, and critique other people's designs. Understanding how people interact with products, being a good teammate, and articulating why something should be done this way instead of that way — these are the skills that get you jobs. 

Were there strategies that helped you personally when you were looking to enter the workforce?

The best thing you can do is reach out to the recruiter directly. I don't think enough people do this. My last three jobs have just been me reaching out to a recruiter and saying, “Hey, I think I'm the best candidate for these three reasons. Here is my resume. And here's the link to the job post. Can you refer me?” They'll look at my resume and say, “OK, let's have an interview.” That was the last three jobs I've had. No joke.

During my job search, I tracked everything. I had an 85% rejection rate if I just applied to the job website. But I got a 75% response rate and moved to the next round when I messaged the recruiter directly. I think more people need to do that, and I’m sharing it in case it could help someone else.