HIGHLIGHTS: Dylan Field - CEO of Figma

0:01Hi, everybody. Tune in to this short version of the podcast, which we do every Friday. For the long version, tune in on Wednesdays. Hi, everybody. Welcome to In Good Company. I'm Nikolaj Tangen, the CEO of the Norwegian Sovereign Wealth Fund. And today we have the founder and CEO of Figma visiting us, Dylan Field. Now, quite incredibly, Dylan founded Figma when he was 19 years old and now 14 years later. Figma had one of the biggest IPOs of 2025. So, warm welcome. Thank you for having me. So, Dylan, we have to start. What does Figma do? Yes. So Figma is a platform that helps you go from an idea in your head to a production application in the software space.

0:45But also once you ship something, once you ship some software, you want to then market it. And we also help with that too. We help you get your brand out there and make it so you can create more collateral around it. And ultimately, it's not just some linear process where you have an idea and you get to finish product and you're done. Perhaps in the industrial design world, we were talking about that before. We started, that's more of what it is. But in software, it's always a loop. And you're always iterating and you're learning and you're trying to figure out how do I evolve this thing that I've created with my team.

1:18And we try to make it very collaborative so that designers can bring their entire team in to do that. Why is design such an important differentiator? So I think going back a bit and speaking about digital product design, the history of design, I think, is interesting in the digital realm. Because for a long time, there were very, very few designers. Almost none of them had a traditional art school background, or very few did. And many of them randomly found their way into design, sometimes from engineering. Sometimes they were in a band and made a poster. it could come from any different place but there's a period of time in for example 2000 the dot-com era where the mantra was build it and they will come and at that point if you had a which was rare the sort of role of design was conceived to be what sometimes in america we call lipstick on a pig the uh you know you've got a pig but we're gonna put some lipstick on it to make it pretty.

2:26And it was really about making it aesthetically pleasing, but not thinking about the function, the form, how it works. And that has changed dramatically over the past 25 years. First, we got to the 2010 era, where you not only have Apple evangelizing design and saying, how it works matters. This is why you should buy this iPhone, with Steve Jobs championing design. but also you have the advent of consumer applications like Facebook or Gmail. And suddenly the expectations rise. At the same time, things like AWS, cloud computing are starting to pick up. And we've moved from a world of managed servers to cloud, from box software to app stores.

3:14And it's easier than ever to build software as well because developer tools are improving. And as all this is happening, what's happening to the distribution? Well, no longer are we in the world of building the will come. We're starting to transition out of that into a world where, well, if you build it and you have really great design and really great marketing, then you might have a chance. Because there's more software and it's not the case anymore that you're building something that's the only thing like that that exists in the world. Competition is increasing. and the value is moving up the stack.

3:51What is Dylan Fields' taste? On what? Open-ended question. Well, I care a lot about complexity and being able to understand the world. So I think I've got a lot of taste when it comes to framework building, mental models. That applies to design as well. if you can clearly communicate a mental model to a user in a visual form, I think that's a great thing. And not everyone's able to do that properly. Because if you think about it, if I design the right chair for you, for example, that might not be the right chair for me. You know, we've got different bodies and perhaps, you know, we could create something custom for both of us.

4:44and yet there's a reason why we create the same software for everyone and there's a reason why beyond mass production we lean into how to create you know the same chair in a bigger run it's I think this opportunity to actually apply craft and figure out what is it that you can do to, as an expression of yourself, put something into the digital or physical world. Does AI have taste? I think AI is still a pattern-matching machine, and humans have taste, and it's been trained in the data. And so if you can RLHF the right parts of AI, you can emulate taste. But that's only with advanced prompting that you can access it.

5:34What is design going to look like in 10 years' time? 10 years is a long time. to make predictions about right now. In a world where AI is a chaotic force that could be exponential, but then if you really draw that exponential, the earth is covered every square inch with data centers. So something might not eventually keep up with the exponential. Or perhaps we could have data centers in space, I don't know. In any case, I believe that the role of design will continue to elevate. and what are the real moats in software now? I think that liquidity, liquidity of data, liquidity in a marketplace, liquidity of social interaction, those are moats.

6:24There are businesses where you have these individuals interacting in a certain way or there's regulatory constraints. That could be a moat. But we can name many more. But in general, I think that a lot less software has moats than in the past. And also software is so much easier to create. Now, I'm not of the mind that you're going to go and vibe code your way to Salesforce or Workday. I think the people that are saying that right now are maybe extrapolating a bit too much. but I think in general we're going to see so much more competition and design will be a huge part of why you win or lose as will craft, as will point of view.

7:13Is it right that you started to charge because Microsoft told you that if you don't charge we can't buy because you don't get to survive, is that right? Yes, it is the story. It was a surprise when, I mean they're so nice about it. The person that told me that is actually still at Microsoft and he's just a wonderful guy. But yeah, they came to our office and they're like, hey, we've got a lot of people using your software. It's starting to be kind of important for us. What's your business model? And I'm like, oh, well, we're going to figure it out. They said, yeah, that makes sense. Why are you waiting?

7:48I said, well, I know the product's not good enough yet, going back to perfectionism. And I just think it'll be spread faster if it's free. And they said, well, if it's free, you could go to business. And so we want to make sure you don't. We cannot rely on software for critical operations. It could go into business, so please charge money. And that was the point where I'm like, oh, I think we're really behind here. Came back to the team, we've got to charge. We've got to get pricing in order. And everyone's like, yes, duh, we've been telling you this. So, you know, sometimes a little slow. One word that come up again and again when people talk about you is that you are kind.

8:26Thank you. A kind leader. I try to be. Why is it important to be a kind leader? Look, I mean, I'm Jewish, but the sort of golden rule, I think, is a very good one. Treat others the way you want to be treated. Such as like a moral thing. The energy you put out into the world is the energy you'll receive back, whether that be because of your perception, your way that you frame the world and sort of your viewport into the motivations of others. But people match you. And if you want to create an environment that fosters creativity, then yes, I think you really need to create an environment that's supportive.

9:09And kindness is a big part of that. But it's also, I'll be clear that kindness is not always saying the thing that feels nice or non-confrontational. If I believe that you have something that you need to know, even if it's hard feedback, it's my duty to tell you. And if I don't, that's not kind because it's going to come up later and it's going to create an issue for you, for me, for both of us, and that could actually escalate. So the kindest thing is to be extremely direct, in my opinion, and upfront make sure that people are communicating. And that's something I'm always pushing on is how to get people to be more direct with each other.