I hear lots of developers say "Oh, I could never be a designer; I just don't have the eye" – and I'm here to tell you that's BS. Design is a skill that can be learned, just like anything else! A designer's full responsibilities are complex and multifaceted; this talk won't teach you everything you need to know to get a design job. However, it WILL go over design basics in a straightforward way, for developers who want to create UIs that don't look terrible.

In 2013, I graduated with a BFA and took my first job as a Junior Graphic Designer at a small, boutique ad agency. While there, my Creative Director warned me to never let anyone find out I could code, because if I did I'd be stuck doing it forever. I ignored his warning; it turns out he was completely right, but I've never been happier. I currently work as a developer advocate on a wonderful team where I help people build web applications in React, design and maintain their UI component libraries, and desperately attempt to stop back-end devs from writing any more CSS.