Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Kateryna Demchenko. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.
Kateryna, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. What was the most important lesson/experience you had in a job that has helped you in your creative career?
I knew I was going to move to another country, so I started looking for career options that would allow me to work remotely in case I couldn’t find a job in the UK. It was quite a stressful period because I was around 27 years old and felt fairly confident in my skills in another area. However, when I joined an IT, I found myself surrounded by younger colleagues who were already skilled more than me, while people my age were holding senior positions.
Kateryna, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?
I am currently in the UK, working for a product company www.grocerygenius.com
We help supermarkets & their suppliers to build powerful next-gen shopping experiences that combine conversational AI and visual UX. Built around missions, inspiration and time-saving tools.
It’s an interesting path from an internship at a Ukrainian design agency to working at a London company
In your view, what can society to do to best support artists, creatives and a thriving creative ecosystem?
I’ve noticed an interesting nuance, though it might be a cultural difference—or perhaps just specific to my own experience and the people I’ve encountered. When I was starting out, it was natural that my knowledge was limited. I often received reactions that focused specifically on what I didn’t know. Of course, I can’t rule out the possibility that I was the one fixating on this and paying too much attention to it in my interactions with colleagues.
When I moved to the UK and finally landed my first job, I was initially supposed to be responsible for the visual aspects of the product. However, I was given a lot of tasks that were almost more on the programming side. At first, I didn’t understand anything—there was code, lots of nuances, and it all seemed overwhelming. But my colleagues simply showed me what to do with complete confidence that I would manage. And I did. It was both surprising and inspiring to realize that I was able to create things that initially seemed too complex for me, and everything worked as it should.
It wasn’t the creative part of the job. But I really enjoyed it.
Have you ever had to pivot?
I’ve always tried to defend my design decisions because, after all, I’m a designer—I’m a creative person. And honestly, who understands design better than me? I was hired for this mission—to create. But working in a product company, I came to accept that my brilliant ideas, no matter how relevant and on-trend they were, weren’t always what was needed at a given time or place.
I often found myself realizing that a manager had a broader perspective on a particular project and was more attuned to what would actually work best in that context. Many times, the trends I suggested weren’t chosen among the final options. But now, I no longer find that surprising.
You will rarely find on the website of large companies, and especially the products of companies, something similar to Dribbble trends or interesting ideas from Awwwards.
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