Designing for the web since 1996
Senior UX designer and digital strategist, with expertise in interaction design, accessibility and visual storytelling.
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Everything since 1996: projects, templates and tools, talks, publications and awards. Open the filter to see only what is relevant to you.
Testimonial
At the time my company needed expert consultation on web design of a new Journey Planner system, Per gave advice that helped us to launch an excellent interface to our customers. We believe that his work was the key to the success of the new service.
— Åke Lindström, SL
Related
Template
2026
A visual aid for discussions and learning about the impact of AI development on everything from individual to global to planetary wellbeing. Free to use in your own presentations, training and meetings, and to download as PDF in English, Swedish and French.
Comic
2026
Bella & Boi
Progress. You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means. Meet Bella & Boi.
Template
2026
cards.axbom.com and kort.axbom.se
Interactive card decks for critical thinking, free to use in work meetings, workshops and teaching: topics, challenges and questions that support better decisions in digital development. In English on cards.axbom.com and in Swedish on kort.axbom.se.
Speaking · Keynote
2025
Nexer Digital · Manchester
The Spectacular Lies of Maps
Closing keynote at Camp Digital on 3 July 2025, at the Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester: a brand-new talk on how maps and models simplify the world in dangerous ways, and what gets lost when we trust them too much.
Publication
2025
Folkets AI-kommission (The People’s AI Commission)
In 2025 I was part of Folkets AI-kommission, a newly formed network that wants citizens to have much more participation and influence over the ambitions to shape the future with new technology. On 4 June 2025 we submitted our consultation response to SOU 2025:12, the Swedish AI Commission’s “Roadmap for Sweden”.
Speaking · Talk
2025
Internetstiftelsen · Stockholm
Digital omtanke
Talk at Internetdagarna on 25 November 2025, in the session “Digital transformation with new perspectives – power, art and caring innovation”, organized by Terese Raymond of Digidel, alongside Simon Lindgren and Anne Kaun and moderated by Johanna Koljonen. Starting from ego depletion, I used smart lamps to show how digitalization multiplies the micro-decisions and worries of everyday life – and how efficiency and simplicity often turn into their opposite.
Podcast
2025
Frida Mangen
AI-bias
A Swedish conversation about bias in generative AI: why AI is so often seen as objective, how it reinforces and recreates prejudice, and how we can stay critical of the AI that increasingly affects important decisions.
Template
2024
A one-page worksheet that helps teams plan, run and evaluate trials of AI tools. Free to download as PDF or PNG, and to use and adapt under CC BY-SA.
Podcast
2024
Peter Hellgren (Consid)
242. Digital etik | Per Axbom, rådgivare digital etik | Möjligheter och risker med AI
A Swedish conversation about digital ethics at a time when everything spins faster: exploitation as the basis of the technology, copyright as a coming battleground, and why AI is more than just a hammer.
Teaching · Talk
2024
Berghs School of Communication · Stockholm
Postmortem Design
A 90-minute interactive guest lecture at Berghs School of Communication, in Joe Macleod’s course End Design, built around his concept Endineering. He asked me to talk about data, privacy and the importance of deletion and endings. I focused on designing for the fact that users die: how information can be managed, accessed and treated with care after someone passes away, how people can get more control over their content, and how the needs of close relatives can be met.
Template
2023
A poster answering the claim that AI is “just a tool”, no different from a hammer. Nine harms of generative AI and deep learning, shown as a hammer you would never buy. The page explains every topic and has the poster as PNG and PDF. Free to use under CC BY-SA.
Project
2023–2026
Swedish Sports Confederation · Stockholm
UX strategy and design for Idrottsarenan, the Swedish sports movement’s new operations system, which replaces IdrottOnline. It brings together member and organization data, popular education, analysis and financial grants for 72 national sports federations, 19 districts and around 18,000 clubs with some 3.1 million members.
Template
2023
A diagram showing the relationships between everyone involved in developing and using AI: who finances the systems, who builds and feeds them, who regulates them, and who benefits or suffers. Something to point at in discussions. The page explains every group and has the diagram as PDF. Free to use under CC BY-SA.
Project
2023–2024
A Swedish software company in the finance sector, via Ambition Group · Sweden
The company was aware of digital accessibility, but it wasn’t yet a capability built into its services as part of everyday work processes. Together with Ambition Group, we proposed four steps on “the road to improved digital accessibility”. Step 1, an initial review, was to provide a basis for improvements and build awareness of strengths and weaknesses that would help adjust future ways of working.
Template
2023
A chart of 18 harms that we are already seeing with AI, to help teams prioritize their work with “smart” tools and plan how to mitigate harm. The page explains every element and links to a PDF. Free to use under CC BY-SA.
Speaking · Talk
2023
Internetdagarna (Internetstiftelsen) · Internetstiftelsen, Stockholm (broadcast online)
AI och människor – teknikens fram- och baksidor
A talk at Internetdagarna 2023, Sweden’s big internet conference, given on location at Internetstiftelsen and broadcast to the online audience, in the track “Get to know the most important tech trends”: how ordinary people are affected by AI, what tools like ChatGPT actually are, and how to avoid creating new problems while trying to solve others.
Project
2023–2024
Swedish Sports Confederation (RF/SISU)
My first assignment for Riksidrottsförbundet, from autumn 2023: the overall strategy for a new operations system for the sports movement, and specifically a plan for the future of grant management (Ekonomiska stöd) – how federations, districts and clubs apply for, receive and report on grants.
Template
2023
A communication model for human-AI interaction: what shapes the input from a person, the output from the computer, and what the person then does with it. Useful in implementation planning, design decisions, communication and training. The diagram is free to download as PDF or PNG, and to use under CC BY-SA.
Podcast
2023
Anders Mildner
#77 – Vad är problemet med Chat GPT?
A Swedish conversation, just as the whole country went ChatGPT-crazy, about what the problem with ChatGPT really is: an AI bot that talks to you like a human and can write anything from business plans to school essays.
Publication
2023
Svenska Dagbladet
My reply on SvD Debatt on 9 July 2023 to Mathias Sundin’s “Vi behöver inte någon AI-paus” (“We don’t need an AI pause”): it is not written in stone that the benefits of AI will outweigh the drawbacks. That is why we need regulation – to set a direction that mitigates harm and creates value for the many, not the few.
Quote
2023
The power we wield as digital creators is significant, as is the potential for harm. By taking responsibility for our power we can not only mitigate negative impact but also build knowledge for advancing our digital services in novel and caring ways.
— Per Axbom, education material
Speaking · Talk
2023
Vattenfall, Corporate Staff Functions · Online
AI and Humans: The Human Rights Perspective
An online talk for Vattenfall on 14 November 2023, through my own company – back with the energy company where I had worked as a consultant from 2005 to 2010. The human rights perspective on AI: what can go wrong, who is responsible, and how to ensure safe and beneficial use.
Template
2022
Own initiative
My own initiative: a solution for making QR-code login (BankID, Freja eID) work for people with visual impairments. In a film I show the problems and a possible solution, with a clickable demo – the idea can be put to use today. Since then, variants of the solution have been put to use on several sites, including 1177.
Speaking · Talk
2022
Ambition Group
Why I left algorithm-based social media and what happened next
A 15-minute talk at an Ambition Empower event in 2022, after I had left Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and LinkedIn: why I left algorithm-based social media, and how that works for a small business owner. Told with a dollhouse full of figures – and a Winnie-the-Pooh bear.
Project
2022–2023
Uppsala kommun
Training material, inspirational talks and strategies for digital accessibility work across the municipality.
Speaking · Keynote
2022
Front Conference Zürich
How to Build the Good and Responsible Thing
Keynote at Front Conference in Zürich on 26 August 2022: a practical, concrete introduction to digital ethics and responsible innovation for everyone who designs and builds digital products.
Comic
2022–2023
Wild Exploits
A free, independent comic I drew and self-hosted from May 2022 to June 2023: Pala the impala and Ellie the elephant talking about technology, while Vlad the vulture watches from a tree. Eight four-panel strips – each with a full image description – about surveillance, crypto, facial recognition, “autonomous” devices, the bird site and AI.
Podcast
2022
Domen Savič
078 Per Axbom and the ethical tech development
An interview for the Slovenian podcast Citizen D, about ethical tech development and promoting design ethics. Citizen D features experts on pressing topics in the information society and media.
Speaking · Talk
2022
Altitude Meetings and the Raoul Wallenberg Institute · Stadshallen, Lund
What does AI have to do with Human Rights?
The first speaker in Raoul Wallenberg Talks, a lecture series on human rights at the new Stadshallen in Lund, on 20 January 2022. Technology is often the driving force that keeps society moving – so what does it have to do with human rights, and how is it being used to hold human rights back?
Template
2022
Asking the right questions for moral management at each stage of the design process. The Trouble Diamond makes ethics assessment a natural part of the Double Diamond, with one question per stage. Download it as a PDF or high-resolution image, and put it up on the wall.
Teaching
2021–2024
Ambition Group · Online
Track leader for “Design Ethics = Good Business” in Ambition Empower, a year-long professional development program in bite-sized steps, from August 2021 to June 2024 – alongside Kim Goodwin, Susan Weinschenk and Chris Noessel, who led the other tracks.
Project
2021–2022
Inera / 1177, as subcontractor to HiQ · Stockholm
Responsible for user experience (UX), workflow descriptions, and instructional materials (both digital and printed) for the “Self-sampling” service during the covid pandemic.
Template
2021
A chart of 32 elements in six sections that sum up the many ways digital can cause harm, to support moral considerations in the tech space. The page explains every element, and links to a high-resolution PNG and PDF. Free to use under CC BY-NC-SA.
Podcast
2021
Lisa Welchman & Andy Vitale
Per Axbom on Compassion and Digital Ethics
Lisa Welchman and Andy Vitale talk with me about my research and work in design ethics, my first computer, and my experiences on Clubhouse, one of the newer social media platforms at the time.
Speaking · Talk
2020
Swedish Post and Telecom Authority (PTS) · Online
Hur arbeta tillgängligt när teknik och digitalisering utvecklas fortare än lagen?
A recorded expert lecture in Swedish that opened one of the theme tracks at Digin, PTS’s network day on digital inclusion and accessibility, in spring 2020. I talked about the challenges, pitfalls and risks – and the opportunities – when technology changes faster than legislation. Then I took part live as the participants continued the discussion.
Podcast
2020–2023
My personal podcast about new technology and human rights: selected blog posts read aloud and enhanced with sound effects and source material, so the writing reaches people who prefer to listen. A Swedish twin, Omtanke med Per Axbom, carries the Swedish posts.
Video
2020–2024
Acceptus
An animated explainer film (in Swedish, 2:50) for Acceptus’ service e-Brev: healthcare providers send patients’ appointment letters digitally, straight from the TakeCare medical records system, via Kivra. Patients who don’t use Kivra get the letter as ordinary post, without anyone having to do anything extra. First version 2020, updated 2024.
Podcast
2020
Anders Thoresson
#210 – Vi behöver mer digital omtanke
A Swedish conversation about digital compassion, the idea behind my book Digital omtanke: taking responsibility for what you create by understanding everyone it affects, not only the intended users.
Template
2020–2023
Systems maps, mindmaps and models
Drawing to understand, and to help others understand: systems maps, mindmaps and models I have made and shared freely – from the complexity of managing a pandemic to the many branches of the Fediverse. More of them have their own cards.
Podcast
2020
Karin Ljungklint & Kristin Olofsson
#30 Uncut: ”Vi skulle egentligen behöva pausa”. Per Axbom om ansvar och etik inom digital utveckling
A Swedish conversation about responsibility and ethics in digital development: who is responsible when something goes wrong, the people who built it or the people using it? And how can those of us in UX, often first to notice, raise it in a team or organization?
Speaking · Talk
2020
UX Copenhagen · Online
First, Design No Harm (What Design Can Learn From Medical Ethics)
An emotional talk at UX Copenhagen 2020, held online because of covid. It starts with a story of abuse – hazing at a boarding school – and the systems that support it. As designers we have the power to abuse; how aware are we of when it happens? And what can design learn from medical ethics?
Podcast
2020
Rebecca “Bex” Rae-Evans
Making Friends With… Per Axbom at UX Copenhagen 2020
A conversation about the complexity of ethics in design, recorded when UX Copenhagen 2020 moved online. The first in Tech for Good Live’s “Making Friends With…” series with the conference’s speakers.
Project
2019–2020
Swedish Association of Local Authorities and Regions (SKL, later SKR) · Stockholm
SKL’s web team ran usability tests, but often ad hoc, spending a lot of time working out how. They asked me for a simple manual or checklist to get started quickly. I created a guide to user insights, built as a website: a reference for choosing the right way to gather information for design decisions, hypotheses and evaluations, which could be shared with everyone running digital initiatives in the organization.
Speaking · Talk
2019
Internetstiftelsen · Stockholm
Digital omtanke: En mänsklig handling
A talk tailored for Internetdagarna 2019, in the track on digital ethics and morality, on the invitation of Social by default (Sarah Larsson Bernhardt and Niclas Strandh). It is the most emotionally powerful talk I have composed and given: about what happens when people stop questioning the systems they build – and what it takes to act as a human.
Publication
2019
Handbook, published by Eget förlag in English and Swedish
A handbook for everyone who wants digitalization to better address wellbeing, inclusion and social impact – with practical tools to start using in projects right away. Published in 2019 in Swedish, as Digital omtanke in the series Kunskap på nolltid, and at the same time in English, translated by Neil Betteridge.
Project
2019
Inera, as subcontractor to HiQ · Stockholm
Part of Första linjens digitala vård: a digital symptom guide where people describe their symptoms to a chatbot and are guided to the right level of care – from self-care to 112. In 2019 a first proof of concept was built and tested with people across Sweden.
Speaking · Keynote
2019
World IA Day Switzerland · Zürich (ZHdK)
So… you think you’re a good person
Two days at World IA Day Switzerland, 22–23 February 2019, on the global theme “Design for Difference”: the midday keynote “So… you think you’re a good person” at Zürcher Hochschule der Künste, and the half-day workshop “Mostly Harmless: Design for Digital with a Conscience” the day before. Alongside Sarah Barrett and Jorge Arango, who gave the other keynotes.
Project
2018–2022
Inera / 1177, as subcontractor to HiQ · Stockholm
Part of the program for first-line digital care (Första linjens digitala vård): letting nurses at 1177 Vårdguiden på telefon, the healthcare advice line, ask callers to send a photo or start a video call – straight from the call, with the caller logging in on their own phone.
Speaking · Talk
2018
Sigma (now Nexer Digital) · Manchester
Navigating the ethical minefield of digital design
Talk on how designers can take responsibility for the negative impact of their work, by building a moral framework into the design process.
Podcast
2018
Damon Razazi (with Dagens Media)
#69 – Digital etik och UX
A Swedish conversation about digital ethics in design and UX: the risks of completely frictionless services, built in companies’ hunt for as many conversions as possible, and how to create more inclusive services.
Speaking · Workshop
2018
EuroIA Summit · Dublin
Mostly Harmless: Design for digital with a conscience
A workshop at the EuroIA Summit in Dublin on 28 September 2018: how to incorporate ethical, sustainable and inclusive thinking into the design process. I gave “Mostly Harmless” again at World IA Day Zürich in February 2019.
Teaching
2018–2025
Nackademin
Teacher of design ethics in Nackademin’s vocational program for UX designers from 2018 to 2025, with the course Ethics in Design. The Digital Ethics mindmap started out as the syllabus for the course.
Speaking · Workshop
2018
IxDA – Interaction 18 · Lyon, France
Manage misusability: design for digital with a conscience
A half-day workshop at Interaction 18, the Interaction Design Association’s conference in Lyon, on 5 February 2018: how to incorporate ethics thinking into your current design process in a very practical way – and feel immensely better about the work you do. More than half of it hands-on.
Project
2018–2022
Inera, as subcontractor to HiQ · Stockholm
UX lead in Inera’s program Första linjens digitala vård (first-line digital care), 2018–2022: design strategy, needs research and analysis, and visual explanations in images, films and prototypes – to help people find the right care, digitally, for their needs and urgency.
Speaking · Talk
2018
Feira do Polo Digital de Manaus · Manaus, Brazil
Mostly Harmless: Design for digital with a conscience
A talk at the first Feira do Polo Digital de Manaus in November 2018, in the middle of the Amazon rainforest: on digital ethics, and why we must re-evaluate the maps we use if we want to get where we are going.
Template
2018
A model for mapping everyone your design affects, not just the people you design for. Drawn as a panda face: participants, included, excluded, unwanted, and the people who are hurt despite your best intentions. Made for my ethics workshops and later part of the handbook Digital Compassion. Free to use, with credit.
Speaking · Talk
2018
STHLM Xperience Conference · Stockholm
Don't feed the designers after midnight
A talk at the first STHLM Xperience Conference, on World Usability Day 2018 and its theme “Design for Good or Evil”. Told with a Gremlins theme – Gizmo and Stripe, which I drew myself in Keynote with the path tool.
Podcast
2018
Lisa Welchman & Anna Dahlström
#200 Retrospective with James Royal-Lawson & Per Axbom
For UX Podcast’s 200th episode the tables were turned: Lisa Welchman and Anna Dahlström hosted, and my co-host James Royal-Lawson and I were the guests. Almost five days of podcast content, recorded over seven and a half years.
Speaking · Talk
2018
WSA-dagen, Web Service Award
Det osynliga problemet med sagolika användarupplevelser
A talk at WSA-dagen, the Web Service Award day, on 31 January 2018: inspired by behavioral science, digital designers have become ever more focused on steering people to act as we want them to. But when we remove every barrier and deliver the fairy-tale experience that takes minimal brain power to move forward, we abandon our promise to help people choose what’s best for them.
Teaching
2017–2024
Talks, lectures and training sessions for companies, agencies and schools – from podcasting and design thinking to accessibility, inclusive design and the ethics of AI. The larger conference talks have their own cards.
Speaking · Talk
2017
EuroIA Summit · Stockholm
The Hidden Persuaders of the Digital Age
A talk on ethics in design at the EuroIA Summit in Stockholm in September 2017. Sixty years after Vance Packard’s classic The Hidden Persuaders exposed “motivation research”, many of the same techniques are used without hesitation to make users of digital products subscribe, click, scroll, buy and invite.
Teaching
2016–2022
Nackademin
Member of the steering committee (ledningsgrupp) for Nackademin’s vocational program for UX designers, 2016–2022 – helping shape what future UX designers learn. I also taught design ethics in the program from 2018 to 2025.
Speaking · Talk
2016
UXLx – User Experience Lisbon
The Invisible Problem with Fairy Tale Experiences
A talk at UXLx in Lisbon on 26 May 2016, the English version of a talk that began as a lightning talk at UX Open in Stockholm: when we remove every barrier and design the fairy-tale experience, we may abandon our promise to help people choose what’s best for them.
Teaching
2016
Jönköping University
Member of the advisory board for a master’s program in information architecture at Jönköping University – the university where I took my bachelor’s degree in media and communication studies in 1995, and later taught a course in digital communication (2010).
Speaking · Talk
2016
Webbdagarna · Scandic Continental, Stockholm
En nationell vårdplattform. Utmaningar & konkreta tips för framgång i stora projekt
Starting from the development of the new national care platform Stöd och behandling, in October 2016 I shared experiences and tips on how to make big projects work over time and become truly user-centered. The talk was in Swedish.
Award
2016
STIMDI · Stockholm
STIMDI, the Swedish interdisciplinary society for human–computer interaction, has awarded its Grand Prize since 1997 – earlier recipients include Jonas Löwgren, Kia Höök and Jan Gulliksen. I received it on World Usability Day, 10 November 2016, two minutes after stepping off stage from a talk on ethics.
Speaking · Talk
2016
Webbdagarna · Clarion Hotel Post, Gothenburg
Innehåll först med innehållsprototyper
On the problem of producing visual design before the content is ready, so the content has to be squeezed into an ill-fitting suit. The solution: start with a content prototype that gives the visual form something to build on. In September 2016 I showed how far you can get by working with text alone as design material, together with all the stakeholders. The talk was in Swedish.
Testimonial
2016
You can’t ask for a better outside perspective than you get from Per Axbom. He’s been extraordinarily helpful to me in providing the type of insight that only someone with his particular mix of real-world experience and natural inquisitiveness can.
— Jason Kirst, coaching client
Speaking · Talk
2016
STIMDI · Stockholm
Design som lyssnar till hela människan
A talk – or rather a rant – on ethics at STIMDI’s World Usability Day evening in Stockholm on 10 November 2016, about the ethical responsibility of the people doing UX work. Two minutes after I stepped off stage I was awarded STIMDI’s Grand Prize.
Teaching
2015–2026
Individuals and teams
Trained as a coach in Leapfrog’s ACC-accredited coaching program. I coach individuals and teams, in leadership as well as junior positions, working by the ICF (International Coach Federation) code of ethics.
Project
2015–2023
Through Axbom Innovation AB
Smaller assignments alongside my longer engagements: interaction design, advice, writing, film and jury work.
Speaking · Talk
2015–2017
UX Open unconference · Stockholm
Det osynliga problemet med sagolika användarupplevelser
A lightning talk at UX Open, an unconference for the UX community in Stockholm, on 16 October 2015 – one of 16 lightning talks in front of 180+ participants. The start of the fairy-tale talk: when we design away every barrier, we may stop helping people choose what’s best for them.
Project
2014
Stockholm County Council, as subcontractor to Softronic
A clickable prototype for Katalogadministration, which became a real tool: the view where a care unit – here Vivalla vårdcentral in Örebro – keeps its details up to date, fetching data from the national HSA directory and reporting information that is wrong or missing. In the film I explain the prototype myself (in Swedish, 8:43).
Speaking · Talk
2014
Webbdagarna · Rival, Stockholm
Enklast vinner! Från höstack till syskrin på skl.se i 3 steg
On 27 November 2014, Tomas Johansson Haavik, web strategist at SKL, and I presented the new skl.se, which I was lead designer for, and how we worked strategically with content and design to give users what they need. Sitevision gave us the speaking slot after skl.se was named Best public website at the Sitevision Days. The talk was in Swedish.
Publication
2013–2023
Free online guide (in Swedish)
A free Swedish guide to digital accessibility at digitill.se: all 13 guidelines of the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) explained simply, with examples – so anyone can start contributing to more accessible digital services, and make demands on the people who build and maintain them.
Project
2013–2018
Stockholm County Council and Inera – as subcontractor to Softronic, later Omegapoint and HiQ
Five years on the national e-service for online support and treatment (Stöd och behandling), from the pre-study in 2013 to launch: a platform where healthcare providers build support and treatment programs, such as internet-based CBT and psychoeducation courses, for their patients. The project that steered me toward digital ethics.
Publication
2013–2016
E-book in English and Swedish
An experience model for designing digital services in a holistic, structured way that truly helps the people you want to reach. AceAwe (“Ace your service, awe your users”) describes the whole experience as a circle in six steps: Attract, Clarify, Enable, Adapt, Wow and Extend.
Project
2013–2014
Sveriges Kommuner och Landsting (SKL) · Stockholm
Wireframes and a prototype for SKL’s new public website, with usability tests, idea sessions and workshops. The new skl.se was named Sweden’s best public website at the Sitevision Days on 7 October 2014.
Speaking · Talk
2013
UXLx, Lisbon
Eliminate Design – a rant about the responsibility of UX professionals
A lightning talk at User Experience Lisbon in May 2013: jumping head first into sketching wireframes makes us fail the user and lose sight of the real problem. The screen should not be singled out as the primary medium for human-centered design – and it is the UX lead’s job to make sure it isn’t. Recorded on an iPhone from the audience.
Testimonial
2012
Per has an enormous knowledge of usability. When we were rebuilding our web tool, Per’s input was decisive in creating an easy-to-use experience. If simplicity and intuitive interfaces matter to you, hire Axbom Innovation!
— Andreas Ahrens, Prosocyal AB
Translated from Swedish
Project
2012–2019
From 2012 to 2019 I drew sketchnotes live at conferences – usually one talk per iPad screen, published straight after the session. The first set, from UXLx 2012, had more than 34,000 views on SlideShare by February 2013. My favorites are the most recent, from UXLx 2019.
Testimonial
2012
Last show was probably (one of the) best in show. Thanks for the book! Will be beside my bed for keeping nightmares away.
— Bettina Braesch, after Scandinavian Developer Conference, April 2012
Publication
2012–2013
Infographic for Digidel
An infographic on the people who stand outside the internet in Sweden – 1.2 million people, 14% of the population over 12 – built on .SE’s yearly surveys. My contribution to spreading knowledge about the people who keep risking being forgotten, published with a full image description and free to download.
Testimonial
2012
Personal, knowledgeable and engaging. You can always rely on Per, and every time we have worked with him he has delivered beyond expectations.
— Funda Denizhan, Manager User Experience, Valtech
Translated from Swedish
Project
2012
Prosocyal AB
Expert review, new interaction design and an action plan for Prosocyal, a web tool companies used to monitor and manage their social media.
Testimonial
2012
Over the past year Per Axbom has helped us develop services that make sure people who have been victims of crime get information about their rights. In this work Per has been not only knowledgeable and creative but also deeply committed. We are very happy with his work and warmly recommend him!
— Magnus Lindgren, Secretary General, Stiftelsen Tryggare Sverige
Translated from Swedish
Speaking · Talk
2012
Scandinavian Developer Conference · Gothenburg
Ace your website. Awe your users. 7 steps to master UX.
A talk on 16 April 2012 in the new track on usability and interaction design at Scandinavian Developer Conference: getting into the mindset of pleasing the user, so a digital service can become “the beginning of a beautiful friendship”. Built on the AceAwe experience model – six steps and one more – with plenty of web forms as examples.
Testimonial
2012
Per got “top marks” from the university’s web editors and social media editors at an internal training within Stockholm University’s communication network.
— Marie Jackalin, Content Manager for su.se, Stockholm University
Translated from Swedish
Award
2012
SEB
Won SEB Innovation Awards in October 2012 – the bank’s yearly award since 2010 for an idea that can develop customer experience in banking. My idea: “a robot friend that keeps track for you” – solve everyday money problems that cause stress, using information the bank already has.
Testimonial
2012
I have engaged Per several times as a subject expert when our networks for owner-managers have taken on social media and communication strategy. Per’s strength is that he listens, reflects and shares his knowledge in a matter-of-fact way. That he does it with a humble manner makes him all the more credible in conveying value.
— Ulf Mattebo, CEO, ÄgarLedare
Translated from Swedish
Project
2011–2022
Inera and Stockholm County Council – as subcontractor to Valtech, Softronic, Omegapoint and HiQ
More than ten healthcare projects for 1177 and Inera, including the e-service for online support and treatment (Stöd och behandling), Högkostnadsskydd, Tidbokning and, during the covid pandemic, self-sampling (Egen provhantering).
Testimonial
2011
Per Axbom has a rare and valuable combination: he can talk to techies in their own language while capturing, understanding, translating and conveying the communicators’ perspective. Worth its weight in gold! He is also curious about everything – a cool, decent and competent guy!
— Eva Stattin, Vattenfall AB and Universum Communication AB (has hired me several times)
Translated from Swedish
Project
2011–2018
Safer Sweden Foundation (Stiftelsen Tryggare Sverige) · Stockholm
A new website, new social media channels and training for the team, followed by responsibility for all digital media during the Almedalen political week.
Testimonial
2011
As a consultant, Axbom has brought key expertise to several web projects in recent years. He has supported and guided development projects and acted as advisor on various web strategy questions.
— Jonas Berg, Product Manager, Svensk Byggtjänst
Translated from Swedish
Project
2011–2015
Stockholm County Council and Inera – as subcontractor to Valtech, later Softronic
From 2011, via Valtech: a complete review of minavardkontakter.se – the e-services where people log in to contact their healthcare – as part of Virtuell Portal 2.0, the next version of 1177 Vårdguiden’s e-services: the start page, booking appointments, logging in, and acting on someone else’s behalf.
Testimonial
2011
We hired Per to review our web structure and recommend improvements in usability, navigation and clarity. Per was an enormously knowledgeable and efficient resource and delivered input of the very highest quality, which has been of the greatest value in our work for change.
— Magnus Nylander, CEO, Vroom Stockholm AB
Translated from Swedish
Podcast
2011–2025
James Royal-Lawson & Per Axbom
Co-founder, producer and co-host of UX Podcast with James Royal-Lawson, 2011–2025. 339 episodes and more than 3 million downloads, with interviews with many of digital design’s most interesting minds.
Project
2011
Faculty of Science, Stockholm University – through XLENT
A pre-study for the Faculty of Science at Stockholm University, together with Lisa Norman at XLENT. Every year the faculty mailed its catalog Naturvetare to 33,000 upper secondary pupils, at a cost of 600,000 kronor – were there better ways to attract the right students?
Testimonial
2011
Easy and uncomplicated to do business with. Committed, reliable and conscientious. Creative, innovative and healthily questioning.
— Tobias Bergdahl, Managing Partner, XLENT Strategy
Translated from Swedish
Teaching
2011
Universum Communication AB
Hired as the external lecturer when Universum wanted to develop how the whole organization worked with search engine optimization and writing for the web: training for about 40 people, on site in Sweden and by video link to the other markets.
Project
2010–2013
Consulting assignments
Shorter assignments from around the start of my own company, Axbom Innovation AB (founded 2010): expert reviews, interaction design, workshops and support when buying web services.
Teaching
2010–2013
ÄgarLedare, a network for owner-managed companies
Training and workshops on social media, communication strategy and digital tools for owner-managers.
Project
2010–2012
Stockholms universitet – through XLENT Consulting Group, then Axbom Innovation AB
Strategist and experience designer for the Faculty of Science, on its printed catalog and on recruiting new students through other channels: I mapped the whole journey of future science students, from fifth grade to admission, and turned it into a strategy and new digital services.
Teaching
2010–2013
Various organizations
Shorter lectures and training sessions on digital media and tools.
Project
2010–2011
Svensk Byggtjänst – through XLENT, then Axbom Innovation AB
Advisor and subject expert, through my own company Axbom Innovation AB, in recurring workshops and working meetings, supporting web development projects and web strategy decisions.
Teaching
2010–2011
Ability Partner, through Axbom Innovation AB
From 2010 to 2011 I was responsible for Webbcopy 2.0, a two-day course in writing for the web given twice a year by the training company Ability Partner. The course was in Swedish.
Project
2010–2011
Vroom Stockholm AB
A new interface for the digital tool that most car salespeople in Sweden used to map customer needs and send out campaigns.
Speaking · Talk
2010
Royal Swedish Academy of Engineering Sciences (IVA), with the Swedish Institute · Stockholm
Tame your Internet Superpowers – What’s happening on the Internet and why you must care
A talk on 28 October 2010 at IVA’s Royal Technology Forum “Innovative ICT – Networking in the Baltic region”, in the session on ICT and new media: the everyday superpowers the internet gives us – and the gap between people who have them and people who don’t.
Project
2010
Compatec AB, through Axbom Innovation AB
A fixed-price assignment in 2010: a new WordPress website connected to social media, with image publishing through Flickr – from setup and design to moving the content and the domain.
Teaching
2010
Jönköping University
I planned, taught and examined a 7.5-credit course in digital communication, given in English to 120 students in the Media and Communication Science program. It was the first assignment for Axbom Innovation AB, the company I founded in 2010 – at the university where I took my own bachelor’s degree in 1995.
Testimonial
2010
Per has a fantastic ability to think interactively. To turn ideas into usable solutions online, and into modern ways of communicating through the noise.
— Mikael Hägglund, CEO, Compatec AB
Translated from Swedish
Speaking · Talk
2009–2012
Talks, blog posts and free redesigns
Around 2009–2012 web forms were one of my specialties: the part of a website where a visitor goes from window-shopping to actually doing something – buying, booking, getting in touch. I wrote about them, redesigned them and gave talks on how to design forms so more people fill them in and send them.
Podcast
2009
My second podcast (2009), in Swedish: every Friday, a short interview with a topical, exciting person “in the bubble” – Swedish internet entrepreneurs, developers and thinkers. The follow-up to Webbtrender, and the step before UX Podcast.
Template
2009
A one-page flowchart for how organizations can assess and respond to posts and comments about them online – from trolls and smart alecks to unhappy customers. Published on my blog in January 2009, free to use. The diagram is in Swedish.
Project
2008
Intrum Justitia, through XLENT
Most visitors to Intrum Justitia’s Swedish website were people in debt. In 2008 I did the feasibility study for a new site just for them – about preventing debt, preparing for a loan and coping when in debt – and then supported the project until it launched as My Money (mymoney.intrum.se).
Podcast
2007–2008
My first podcast (2007–2008), in Swedish: interviews with internet and design profiles about building better experiences on the web, produced and mixed by me.
Publication
2007
Computer Sweden
A debate article in the trade paper Computer Sweden, printed on page 2 on 31 October 2007: search engine optimization is ugly, because manipulating results stops search engines from giving people what is most relevant – and risks turning them into just another advertising channel. Usability and accessibility should come first.
Project
2006–2011
XLENT Business Integration / XLENT Consulting Group · Stockholm
Consultant at XLENT from 2006 to 2010, then hired back as an independent consultant for the strategy and interaction design of the group’s new website (2011).
Publication
2005–2008
Datormagazin · Stockholm
Monthly articles for Datormagazin, Sweden’s largest magazine for computer users – the magazine I devoured every month as a young computer nerd in the 1980s. Each article described a current interactive Web 2.0 phenomenon and how to apply it, complete with code examples, and put the technique, often Ajax, in a context that mattered for usability and accessibility.
Project
2005–2010
Vattenfall, Group Communications – through Lumano, XLENT and Axbom Innovation AB · Stockholm
Five years with one of Europe’s largest energy companies: usability and accessibility for vattenfall.com and vattenfall.se, then advisor to Group Communications on web strategy and social media.
Testimonial
2005
At the time my company needed expert consultation on web design of a new Journey Planner system, Per gave advice that helped us to launch an excellent interface to our customers. We believe that his work was the key to the success of the new service.
— Åke Lindström, SL
Project
2004–2005
Storstockholms Lokaltrafik (SL), through Lumano · Stockholm
A usability study and interaction design of Stockholm public transport’s journey planner, both on the web and on mobile, and interaction design and coding of the web-based planner used by customer service.
Publication
2004
Computer Sweden
A debate article in Computer Sweden on 24 March 2004: a web survey is good for finding out about attitudes, but says nothing about how usable a website is. When I watched people use a web service, what they said and what they did were often two different things.
Project
2004–2005
Utbildningsradion (UR), via Lumano · Stockholm
First user tests of the media library at Utbildningsradion (UR), the Swedish educational broadcaster – and then project manager when UR rebuilt the search based on the results.
Project
2003–2005
Outokumpu (incl. AvestaPolarit), Biovitrum, Protelma, through Lumano
Making companies findable at a time when search engines were still new territory.
Project
2001–2002
Pharmacia Sweden, through Lumano
Pharmacia’s Swedish operations brought their printed and digital internal channels together in one shared information system, Phorum Cross Media. Together with the client, Lumano helped formulate the project, then start, staff, run and evaluate it.
Testimonial
2000
I was Per’s manager at Ericsson while he was a consultant within web and intranet. Per had deep knowledge in his subject area. After a while I made him team leader. Just before I left Ericsson I made a leadership assessment of Per and recommended him to the Ericsson Management Planning Programme, ready for next level, with outstanding “power of initiative”.
— Stefan Pettersson, Manager of the Consultant Department, Ericsson Business Consulting
Project
2000–2005
Through Lumano · Stockholm
Reviews, user tests, focus groups and structure work for a long list of organizations in the early 2000s, usually ending in a concrete action plan.
Project
1998–2000
Ericsson Data and Ericsson Business Consulting · Stockholm
I started as a web designer at Ericsson in 1998: early web work inside the company, including the first time Ericsson streamed its press conference live over the internet.
Publication
1997–2026
Blog and newsletter
My blog and newsletter on the human impact of tech, with essays on digital ethics, UX, accessibility and the real-world consequences of design decisions. I started writing online in diary form in 1997, a few years before the word “blog” was coined. Today I publish in English (axbom.com) and Swedish (axbom.se), with more than 1,000 posts between them.
Project
1996–1998
Stockholms Studenters Idrottsförening (SSIF)
I built the first website for Stockholms Studenters Idrottsförening, the sports association for students in the Stockholm area – on ssif.su.se, with information for 30,000 students, from registering the address to building contact forms and training the people who would publish.
Project
1996–1997
Own business, alongside my jobs as information officer at the Stockholm University student union and at SSIF
Where it started: a small side business building web pages. Three clients – among them a travel agency and Compatec – whom I helped put their brochure material online.
Project
1992–2010
Employers and studies before Axbom Innovation AB
Before founding Axbom Innovation AB in 2010: fifteen years of employment in web, communication and usability – and the studies that came first.
Video
1988
Made at home
Not work, but a glimpse of how early computers, animation and communication caught my interest: three short films I made as a teenager in 1988 – a stop-motion film starring a stuffed gorilla, and two animations drawn on my Atari 600XL home computer.
Nothing matches these filters. Try removing a skill or clearing the search.
Video
An animated explainer film (in Swedish, 2:50) for Acceptus’ service e-Brev: healthcare providers send patients’ appointment letters digitally, straight from the TakeCare medical records system, via Kivra. Patients who don’t use Kivra get the letter as ordinary post, without anyone having to do anything extra. First version 2020, updated 2024.
Skills
Project
The company was aware of digital accessibility, but it wasn’t yet a capability built into its services as part of everyday work processes. Together with Ambition Group, we proposed four steps on “the road to improved digital accessibility”. Step 1, an initial review, was to provide a basis for improvements and build awareness of strengths and weaknesses that would help adjust future ways of working.
Skills
Related
Publication
An experience model for designing digital services in a holistic, structured way that truly helps the people you want to reach. AceAwe (“Ace your service, awe your users”) describes the whole experience as a circle in six steps: Attract, Clarify, Enable, Adapt, Wow and Extend.
Links
Skills
Teaching
Training and workshops on social media, communication strategy and digital tools for owner-managers.
Skills
Related
Template
A poster answering the claim that AI is “just a tool”, no different from a hammer. Nine harms of generative AI and deep learning, shown as a hammer you would never buy. The page explains every topic and has the poster as PNG and PDF. Free to use under CC BY-SA.
Template
A diagram showing the relationships between everyone involved in developing and using AI: who finances the systems, who builds and feeds them, who regulates them, and who benefits or suffers. Something to point at in discussions. The page explains every group and has the diagram as PDF. Free to use under CC BY-SA.
Skills
Template
A one-page worksheet that helps teams plan, run and evaluate trials of AI tools. Free to download as PDF or PNG, and to use and adapt under CC BY-SA.
Skills
Speaking
Original title
Why I left algorithm-based social media and what happened next
A 15-minute talk at an Ambition Empower event in 2022, after I had left Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and LinkedIn: why I left algorithm-based social media, and how that works for a small business owner. Told with a dollhouse full of figures – and a Winnie-the-Pooh bear.
Related
Teaching
Track leader for “Design Ethics = Good Business” in Ambition Empower, a year-long professional development program in bite-sized steps, from August 2021 to June 2024 – alongside Kim Goodwin, Susan Weinschenk and Chris Noessel, who led the other tracks.
What people said
Per doesn’t shout, and he doesn’t judge. Per is a problem solver, and a toolmaker. Instead of ranting, he continuously provides tips, tricks and tools that enable us to have those really difficult discussions, and make informed decisions.
Skills
Video
Videos (3)
Not work, but a glimpse of how early computers, animation and communication caught my interest: three short films I made as a teenager in 1988 – a stop-motion film starring a stuffed gorilla, and two animations drawn on my Atari 600XL home computer.
Project
Smaller assignments alongside my longer engagements: interaction design, advice, writing, film and jury work.
Skills
Publication
My blog and newsletter on the human impact of tech, with essays on digital ethics, UX, accessibility and the real-world consequences of design decisions. I started writing online in diary form in 1997, a few years before the word “blog” was coined. Today I publish in English (axbom.com) and Swedish (axbom.se), with more than 1,000 posts between them.
What people said
I just want to say thank you for your insightful and important newsletter! Thank you for always striving for collective improvement. Your experience and knowledge is invaluable to someone like me, who is new to the industry.
I work in the field of medical and policing ethics. I’m struck by your deeply thoughtful, values-based and person-centered approach to digital/UX ethics. You’ve encouraged me to reflect on my own approach to working in the fields I do, and what sorts of ethics discourses we need.
I could not thank you enough for this newsletter. I feel you heard my thoughts and what has been sucking the living life out of me for the last 3 years. Beating the algorithm game.
Links
Skills
Project
Where it started: a small side business building web pages. Three clients – among them a travel agency and Compatec – whom I helped put their brochure material online.
Comic
Progress. You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means. Meet Bella & Boi.
A monochrome drawing of two figures (anthropomorphic animals), a deer and a fox, standing and looking at a TV and a rectangular device beneath it, like a VCR or DVD player. Above the TV hangs a star-shaped sign with the command “Buy!” On the TV screen, they see themselves in real time, standing there and watching the TV. The deer (named Boi) is wearing a neck warmer, and the fox (named Bella) is wearing a short-sleeved top. Behind the deer, to the left, is a surveillance camera.
Boi: I’m stressed out by all this technological progress, Bella.
Bella: If technology is making you stressed, Boi, it’s not a kind technology.
Bella (cont’d): And there are less kind people behind it.
Bella (cont’d): And that’s not progress.
Skills
Related
Project
Videos (2)
Part of the program for first-line digital care (Första linjens digitala vård): letting nurses at 1177 Vårdguiden på telefon, the healthcare advice line, ask callers to send a photo or start a video call – straight from the call, with the caller logging in on their own phone.
Skills
Speaking
Original title
Navigating the ethical minefield of digital design
Talk on how designers can take responsibility for the negative impact of their work, by building a moral framework into the design process.
What people said
Absolutely fantastic talk by @axbom at #CampDigital. Really thought provoking, and gives me hope that there are good people trying to make positive changes in the world.
Related
Speaking
Original title
The Spectacular Lies of Maps
Captions: English
Closing keynote at Camp Digital on 3 July 2025, at the Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester: a brand-new talk on how maps and models simplify the world in dangerous ways, and what gets lost when we trust them too much.
Links
Skills
Related
Project
Before founding Axbom Innovation AB in 2010: fifteen years of employment in web, communication and usability – and the studies that came first.
What people said
Intelligent, analytical, efficient – and great fun to work with. Motivated by intellectual challenges. With my best recommendations for assignments that match his profile.
Skills
Podcast
My personal podcast about new technology and human rights: selected blog posts read aloud and enhanced with sound effects and source material, so the writing reaches people who prefer to listen. A Swedish twin, Omtanke med Per Axbom, carries the Swedish posts.
Episodes (6)
Links
Skills
Related
Podcast · Episode
From the show Carefully with Per Axbom
Fraud with cloned voices is becoming more common: the voice at the other end of the phone can be one you know, even one you share a home with. Your safest option is to hang up and call back.
Podcast · Episode
From the show Carefully with Per Axbom
It’s never easier to get scammed than during a hype. March 2023: why it’s time to shake off the mass hypnosis and examine what’s in the new bottle of AI that so many have started sipping.
Podcast · Episode
From the show Carefully with Per Axbom
“But what is it you really work with, Per?” On being a listener: hearing what you already know but haven’t yet heard yourself say.
Podcast · Episode
From the show Carefully with Per Axbom
The trailer: why I want to boost knowledge about harmful impact and encourage balanced and honest conversations about possible, plausible and desirable futures.
Podcast · Episode
From the show Carefully with Per Axbom
Bert Hubert made his computer emit a scratchy beep every time it sent data to Google. The noise makes online tracking impossible to ignore.
Podcast · Episode
From the show Carefully with Per Axbom
As early as 1860, telegraph operators could recognize each other by their tapping rhythm. The more you type, the more of your unique qualities can be collected.
Teaching
Trained as a coach in Leapfrog’s ACC-accredited coaching program. I coach individuals and teams, in leadership as well as junior positions, working by the ICF (International Coach Federation) code of ethics.
Skills
Related
Project
A fixed-price assignment in 2010: a new WordPress website connected to social media, with image publishing through Flickr – from setup and design to moving the content and the domain.
Publication
A debate article in Computer Sweden on 24 March 2004: a web survey is good for finding out about attitudes, but says nothing about how usable a website is. When I watched people use a web service, what they said and what they did were often two different things.
Publication
A debate article in the trade paper Computer Sweden, printed on page 2 on 31 October 2007: search engine optimization is ugly, because manipulating results stops search engines from giving people what is most relevant – and risks turning them into just another advertising channel. Usability and accessibility should come first.
Links
Skills
Publication
Monthly articles for Datormagazin, Sweden’s largest magazine for computer users – the magazine I devoured every month as a young computer nerd in the 1980s. Each article described a current interactive Web 2.0 phenomenon and how to apply it, complete with code examples, and put the technique, often Ajax, in a context that mattered for usability and accessibility.
Links
Related
Publication
An infographic on the people who stand outside the internet in Sweden – 1.2 million people, 14% of the population over 12 – built on .SE’s yearly surveys. My contribution to spreading knowledge about the people who keep risking being forgotten, published with a full image description and free to download.
Skills
Speaking
Original title
Hur arbeta tillgängligt när teknik och digitalisering utvecklas fortare än lagen?
In English: How to work accessibly when technology and digitalization move faster than the law?
Videos (3)
A recorded expert lecture in Swedish that opened one of the theme tracks at Digin, PTS’s network day on digital inclusion and accessibility, in spring 2020. I talked about the challenges, pitfalls and risks – and the opportunities – when technology changes faster than legislation. Then I took part live as the participants continued the discussion.
What people said
The track “How to work accessibly when technology and digitalization move faster than the law?” at #Digin opened with a BRILLIANT film by @axbom. PLEASE SAY IT WILL BE PUBLISHED SOMEWHERE SO I CAN WATCH AND SHOW IT AGAIN AND AGAIN AND AGAIN! #design #inclusion #rallyingcry
You push back so elegantly in this video.
Skills
Publication
A handbook for everyone who wants digitalization to better address wellbeing, inclusion and social impact – with practical tools to start using in projects right away. Published in 2019 in Swedish, as Digital omtanke in the series Kunskap på nolltid, and at the same time in English, translated by Neil Betteridge.
What people said
Per Axbom offers teams a set of essential questions and concepts to get started on a better path.
A handy, easy-to-read handbook on sustainable digital development for anyone who builds digital services – whether you’re a developer or a CDO. Compassion as a competitive advantage, writes Axbom. Brilliant!
A great book with a lot of gold nuggets and great insights. It brings a much-needed heart to the digital design world that sometimes just feels stressful and all about the sales numbers.
Good content, easy to read and straight to the point! Recommended for practically anyone who influences how something is designed.
Lots of small, often razor-sharp reflections that help you question things some of us do out of old habit… Personal takeaway: sometimes friction is good. I think about that too rarely.
Links
Skills
Publication
A free Swedish guide to digital accessibility at digitill.se: all 13 guidelines of the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) explained simply, with examples – so anyone can start contributing to more accessible digital services, and make demands on the people who build and maintain them.
Links
Project
Videos (2)
Responsible for user experience (UX), workflow descriptions, and instructional materials (both digital and printed) for the “Self-sampling” service during the covid pandemic.
Skills
Template
A chart of 18 harms that we are already seeing with AI, to help teams prioritize their work with “smart” tools and plan how to mitigate harm. The page explains every element and links to a PDF. Free to use under CC BY-SA.
Skills
Template
A chart of 32 elements in six sections that sum up the many ways digital can cause harm, to support moral considerations in the tech space. The page explains every element, and links to a high-resolution PNG and PDF. Free to use under CC BY-NC-SA.
Skills
Project
I started as a web designer at Ericsson in 1998: early web work inside the company, including the first time Ericsson streamed its press conference live over the internet.
What people said
Per is one of those people who knows “everything”. At least it feels like that, since Per is passionate about communication in general and web communication in particular. He has an overview of the web communication area that’s amazing, and at the same time the ability to combine detailed hands-on knowledge with strategic knowledge. I’m impressed :-)
Links
Skills
Teaching
Teacher of design ethics in Nackademin’s vocational program for UX designers from 2018 to 2025, with the course Ethics in Design. The Digital Ethics mindmap started out as the syllabus for the course.
Skills
Speaking
Original title
The Hidden Persuaders of the Digital Age
A talk on ethics in design at the EuroIA Summit in Stockholm in September 2017. Sixty years after Vance Packard’s classic The Hidden Persuaders exposed “motivation research”, many of the same techniques are used without hesitation to make users of digital products subscribe, click, scroll, buy and invite.
Speaking
Original title
Mostly Harmless: Design for digital with a conscience
A workshop at the EuroIA Summit in Dublin on 28 September 2018: how to incorporate ethical, sustainable and inclusive thinking into the design process. I gave “Mostly Harmless” again at World IA Day Zürich in February 2019.
What people said
So much to reflect on after a great workshop about how to incorporate ethical, sustainable and inclusive thinking into the design process.
Just finished the first workshop, “Mostly Harmless”, and I have mixed feelings: existential crisis / motivational injection.
Amazing and incredibly cute tool to map the people you are excluding or hurting with your design.
A EuroIA highlight! He unpacked an overloaded term and shared with us practical tools to actually design ethically and inclusively.
Links
Skills
Publication
In 2025 I was part of Folkets AI-kommission, a newly formed network that wants citizens to have much more participation and influence over the ambitions to shape the future with new technology. On 4 June 2025 we submitted our consultation response to SOU 2025:12, the Swedish AI Commission’s “Roadmap for Sweden”.
As one of the writers, I naturally hold the ethics questions close to my heart. But there is also an overarching political responsibility to scrutinize: the message of urgency, which routinely overlooks the most vulnerable; large sums of money, without reported calculations or follow-up, used to paint a “truth” about big gains in the future; and systems that require enormous amounts of personal data, with huge consequences for privacy and security.
What I worry most about is a misanthropic view of humans. The view of human beings as collections of numbers to run calculations on, to determine their access to society.
Skills
Project
Videos (4)
UX lead in Inera’s program Första linjens digitala vård (first-line digital care), 2018–2022: design strategy, needs research and analysis, and visual explanations in images, films and prototypes – to help people find the right care, digitally, for their needs and urgency.
Skills
Podcast
My second podcast (2009), in Swedish: every Friday, a short interview with a topical, exciting person “in the bubble” – Swedish internet entrepreneurs, developers and thinkers. The follow-up to Webbtrender, and the step before UX Podcast.
Episodes (7)
Podcast · Episode
Sandra Wissting, lärare och e-utvecklare i Nacka kommun, om en-till-en: när varje elev i klassen har en egen bärbar dator.
Podcast · Episode
En spontan intervju med Klaus-Peter Beiersdorf, välkänd bland bloggarna och min gamla studiekamrat från Jönköping.
Podcast · Episode
Jonas Karlsson, en av entreprenörerna bakom Förstakapitlet.se, som gör första kapitlet ur böcker tillgängligt så att du kan avgöra om en bok är läsvärd.
Podcast · Episode
Jonathan Sulo från webbhotellet Binero, som en lyssnare på Bloggy tipsade om att jag skulle intervjua.
Podcast · Episode
Mediehistorikern Pelle Snickars om internet som fenomen, mitt under Pirate Bay-rättegången i Stockholm.
Podcast · Episode
Emil Stenström om Kundo, en svensk motsvarighet till Get Satisfaction: att vara entreprenör på kvällar och helger och att bygga en webbtjänst i ett distribuerat team.
Podcast · Episode
Första programmet: Jonas Lejon, entreprenören bakom mikrobloggen Bloggy, om den nära kontakten med användarna och nyttan med mikrobloggar.
Speaking
Original title
How to Build the Good and Responsible Thing
Keynote at Front Conference in Zürich on 26 August 2022: a practical, concrete introduction to digital ethics and responsible innovation for everyone who designs and builds digital products.
Links
Teaching
Shorter lectures and training sessions on digital media and tools.
Links
Template
A visual aid for discussions and learning about the impact of AI development on everything from individual to global to planetary wellbeing. Free to use in your own presentations, training and meetings, and to download as PDF in English, Swedish and French.
Skills
Template
A communication model for human-AI interaction: what shapes the input from a person, the output from the computer, and what the person then does with it. Useful in implementation planning, design decisions, communication and training. The diagram is free to download as PDF or PNG, and to use under CC BY-SA.
Skills
Template
A model for mapping everyone your design affects, not just the people you design for. Drawn as a panda face: participants, included, excluded, unwanted, and the people who are hurt despite your best intentions. Made for my ethics workshops and later part of the handbook Digital Compassion. Free to use, with credit.
Skills
Project
Videos (2)
More than ten healthcare projects for 1177 and Inera, including the e-service for online support and treatment (Stöd och behandling), Högkostnadsskydd, Tidbokning and, during the covid pandemic, self-sampling (Egen provhantering).
The assignments, in order: 2011–2012 for Stockholm County Council via Valtech: concept design, UX lead, focus groups, usability tests and interaction design for web health services, including a complete review of minavardkontakter.se with a Scrum team of about ten people. See its own card, Mina vårdkontakter and Virtuell Portal 2.0.
2013–2018 via Softronic, later Omegapoint: the national e-service for online support and treatment (Stöd och behandling), from the pre-study to strategic advisor after launch – see its own card.
2018–2022 for Inera via HiQ: UX lead in the program for first-line digital care. Design strategy, the UX framework (UX-ramverket), needs research and analysis, visual explanations in images, films and prototypes, and workshop facilitation. Requirements for a chatbot, a new interface and new channels for the 1177 healthcare advice service, images and video in the advice line, and needs research for self-sampling (Egen provhantering).
Skills
Speaking
Original title
Manage misusability: design for digital with a conscience
A half-day workshop at Interaction 18, the Interaction Design Association’s conference in Lyon, on 5 February 2018: how to incorporate ethics thinking into your current design process in a very practical way – and feel immensely better about the work you do. More than half of it hands-on.
Links
Skills
Speaking
Original title
Digital omtanke: En mänsklig handling
In English: Digital compassion: a human act
A talk tailored for Internetdagarna 2019, in the track on digital ethics and morality, on the invitation of Social by default (Sarah Larsson Bernhardt and Niclas Strandh). It is the most emotionally powerful talk I have composed and given: about what happens when people stop questioning the systems they build – and what it takes to act as a human.
Speaking
Original title
AI och människor – teknikens fram- och baksidor
In English: AI and people: the upsides and downsides of the technology
A talk at Internetdagarna 2023, Sweden’s big internet conference, given on location at Internetstiftelsen and broadcast to the online audience, in the track “Get to know the most important tech trends”: how ordinary people are affected by AI, what tools like ChatGPT actually are, and how to avoid creating new problems while trying to solve others.
Links
Skills
Speaking
Original title
Digital omtanke
In English: Digital compassion
Talk at Internetdagarna on 25 November 2025, in the session “Digital transformation with new perspectives – power, art and caring innovation”, organized by Terese Raymond of Digidel, alongside Simon Lindgren and Anne Kaun and moderated by Johanna Koljonen. Starting from ego depletion, I used smart lamps to show how digitalization multiplies the micro-decisions and worries of everyday life – and how efficiency and simplicity often turn into their opposite.
Links
Skills
Project
Most visitors to Intrum Justitia’s Swedish website were people in debt. In 2008 I did the feasibility study for a new site just for them – about preventing debt, preparing for a loan and coping when in debt – and then supported the project until it launched as My Money (mymoney.intrum.se).
What people said
Per has deep knowledge about web technologies and how to use them to support our business.
Links
Skills
Speaking
Original title
Tame your Internet Superpowers – What’s happening on the Internet and why you must care
A talk on 28 October 2010 at IVA’s Royal Technology Forum “Innovative ICT – Networking in the Baltic region”, in the session on ICT and new media: the everyday superpowers the internet gives us – and the gap between people who have them and people who don’t.
Links
Teaching
Member of the advisory board for a master’s program in information architecture at Jönköping University – the university where I took my bachelor’s degree in media and communication studies in 1995, and later taught a course in digital communication (2010).
Related
Teaching
I planned, taught and examined a 7.5-credit course in digital communication, given in English to 120 students in the Media and Communication Science program. It was the first assignment for Axbom Innovation AB, the company I founded in 2010 – at the university where I took my own bachelor’s degree in 1995.
Project
A clickable prototype for Katalogadministration, which became a real tool: the view where a care unit – here Vivalla vårdcentral in Örebro – keeps its details up to date, fetching data from the national HSA directory and reporting information that is wrong or missing. In the film I explain the prototype myself (in Swedish, 8:43).
Skills
Speaking
Original title
Mostly Harmless: Design for digital with a conscience
A talk at the first Feira do Polo Digital de Manaus in November 2018, in the middle of the Amazon rainforest: on digital ethics, and why we must re-evaluate the maps we use if we want to get where we are going.
Skills
Template
A one-page flowchart for how organizations can assess and respond to posts and comments about them online – from trolls and smart alecks to unhappy customers. Published on my blog in January 2009, free to use. The diagram is in Swedish.
Teaching
Member of the steering committee (ledningsgrupp) for Nackademin’s vocational program for UX designers, 2016–2022 – helping shape what future UX designers learn. I also taught design ethics in the program from 2018 to 2025.
Related
Project
A pre-study for the Faculty of Science at Stockholm University, together with Lisa Norman at XLENT. Every year the faculty mailed its catalog Naturvetare to 33,000 upper secondary pupils, at a cost of 600,000 kronor – were there better ways to attract the right students?
Skills
Project
Pharmacia’s Swedish operations brought their printed and digital internal channels together in one shared information system, Phorum Cross Media. Together with the client, Lumano helped formulate the project, then start, staff, run and evaluate it.
What people said
The project was carried out extremely well. Both time and budget were kept according to plan.
Skills
Related
Template
Interactive card decks for critical thinking, free to use in work meetings, workshops and teaching: topics, challenges and questions that support better decisions in digital development. In English on cards.axbom.com and in Swedish on kort.axbom.se.
Skills
Podcast
Episode
AI-bias
In English: AI bias
A Swedish conversation about bias in generative AI: why AI is so often seen as objective, how it reinforces and recreates prejudice, and how we can stay critical of the AI that increasingly affects important decisions.
Skills
Podcast
Episode
242. Digital etik | Per Axbom, rådgivare digital etik | Möjligheter och risker med AI
In English: 242. Digital ethics | Per Axbom, digital ethics advisor | Opportunities and risks with AI
A Swedish conversation about digital ethics at a time when everything spins faster: exploitation as the basis of the technology, copyright as a coming battleground, and why AI is more than just a hammer.
Skills
Podcast
Episode
#69 – Digital etik och UX
In English: #69 – Digital ethics and UX
A Swedish conversation about digital ethics in design and UX: the risks of completely frictionless services, built in companies’ hunt for as many conversions as possible, and how to create more inclusive services.
Skills
Related
Podcast
Episode
#210 – Vi behöver mer digital omtanke
In English: #210 – We need more digital compassion
A Swedish conversation about digital compassion, the idea behind my book Digital omtanke: taking responsibility for what you create by understanding everyone it affects, not only the intended users.
Skills
Podcast
Episode
078 Per Axbom and the ethical tech development
An interview for the Slovenian podcast Citizen D, about ethical tech development and promoting design ethics. Citizen D features experts on pressing topics in the information society and media.
Related
Podcast
Episode
#30 Uncut: ”Vi skulle egentligen behöva pausa”. Per Axbom om ansvar och etik inom digital utveckling
In English: #30 Uncut: “We should really pause”. Per Axbom on responsibility and ethics in digital development
A Swedish conversation about responsibility and ethics in digital development: who is responsible when something goes wrong, the people who built it or the people using it? And how can those of us in UX, often first to notice, raise it in a team or organization?
Skills
Related
Podcast
Episode
#77 – Vad är problemet med Chat GPT?
In English: #77 – What is the problem with ChatGPT?
A Swedish conversation, just as the whole country went ChatGPT-crazy, about what the problem with ChatGPT really is: an AI bot that talks to you like a human and can write anything from business plans to school essays.
Skills
Podcast
Episode
Per Axbom on Compassion and Digital Ethics
Lisa Welchman and Andy Vitale talk with me about my research and work in design ethics, my first computer, and my experiences on Clubhouse, one of the newer social media platforms at the time.
Related
Podcast
Episode
Making Friends With… Per Axbom at UX Copenhagen 2020
A conversation about the complexity of ethics in design, recorded when UX Copenhagen 2020 moved online. The first in Tech for Good Live’s “Making Friends With…” series with the conference’s speakers.
Related
Podcast
Episode
#200 Retrospective with James Royal-Lawson & Per Axbom
For UX Podcast’s 200th episode the tables were turned: Lisa Welchman and Anna Dahlström hosted, and my co-host James Royal-Lawson and I were the guests. Almost five days of podcast content, recorded over seven and a half years.
Related
Teaching
Original title
Postmortem Design
A 90-minute interactive guest lecture at Berghs School of Communication, in Joe Macleod’s course End Design, built around his concept Endineering. He asked me to talk about data, privacy and the importance of deletion and endings. I focused on designing for the fact that users die: how information can be managed, accessed and treated with care after someone passes away, how people can get more control over their content, and how the needs of close relatives can be met.
Project
Expert review, new interaction design and an action plan for Prosocyal, a web tool companies used to monitor and manage their social media.
Skills
Template
Captions: Swedish and English
My own initiative: a solution for making QR-code login (BankID, Freja eID) work for people with visual impairments. In a film I show the problems and a possible solution, with a clickable demo – the idea can be put to use today. Since then, variants of the solution have been put to use on several sites, including 1177.
Links
Skills
Speaking
Original title
What does AI have to do with Human Rights?
The first speaker in Raoul Wallenberg Talks, a lecture series on human rights at the new Stadshallen in Lund, on 20 January 2022. Technology is often the driving force that keeps society moving – so what does it have to do with human rights, and how is it being used to hold human rights back?
Skills
Project
Shorter assignments from around the start of my own company, Axbom Innovation AB (founded 2010): expert reviews, interaction design, workshops and support when buying web services.
Skills
Project
Reviews, user tests, focus groups and structure work for a long list of organizations in the early 2000s, usually ending in a concrete action plan.
Links
Skills
Project
My first assignment for Riksidrottsförbundet, from autumn 2023: the overall strategy for a new operations system for the sports movement, and specifically a plan for the future of grant management (Ekonomiska stöd) – how federations, districts and clubs apply for, receive and report on grants.
Skills
Related
Project
Videos (2)
UX strategy and design for Idrottsarenan, the Swedish sports movement’s new operations system, which replaces IdrottOnline. It brings together member and organization data, popular education, analysis and financial grants for 72 national sports federations, 19 districts and around 18,000 clubs with some 3.1 million members.
Skills
Speaking
Original title
Ace your website. Awe your users. 7 steps to master UX.
A talk on 16 April 2012 in the new track on usability and interaction design at Scandinavian Developer Conference: getting into the mindset of pleasing the user, so a digital service can become “the beginning of a beautiful friendship”. Built on the AceAwe experience model – six steps and one more – with plenty of web forms as examples.
Skills
Project
Making companies findable at a time when search engines were still new territory.
What people said
You have been very skilled and handled the relationship in a humble and professional way that you don’t see in many companies. I look forward to working with you on more projects!
Lumano carried out the assignment professionally, with great commitment and punctuality. That they are also a pleasant and competent bunch makes them a possible consultant in our web projects in the future too.
Links
Award
Won SEB Innovation Awards in October 2012 – the bank’s yearly award since 2010 for an idea that can develop customer experience in banking. My idea: “a robot friend that keeps track for you” – solve everyday money problems that cause stress, using information the bank already has.
Skills
Project
From 2012 to 2019 I drew sketchnotes live at conferences – usually one talk per iPad screen, published straight after the session. The first set, from UXLx 2012, had more than 34,000 views on SlideShare by February 2013. My favorites are the most recent, from UXLx 2019.
For years I was stuck in the usual, crazy belief that I couldn’t draw – that you needed training, and that an adult can’t learn to draw comics. The comic xkcd showed me that stick figures are enough to get intricate messages across.
The turning point came when I started my own business and finally read Dan Roam’s The Back of the Napkin. It changed how I take notes in meetings and at talks and how I sketch experience maps – and pictures, I found, created an engagement none of my classic reports had come close to. In my workshops, everyone draws.
At UXLx 2012, with the new Paper app on my iPad, I sketched my way through all three days and posted each drawing on Flickr as soon as the talk ended. The response kept me going.
My method, as I described it in a 2013 interview: spend the first three or four minutes drawing the speaker while listening; let the audience choose the key points – whatever gets the most murmurs, whispers or laughter goes in; don’t hesitate, and dare to erase. Much of what looks like drawing is text, in color and hand-drawn letters. A sketch doesn’t say more than a thousand words – it makes the words understandable and interesting.
For me as a freelancer, sketching became marketing, a competitive advantage and a source of income.
Links
Skills
Related
Project
SKL’s web team ran usability tests, but often ad hoc, spending a lot of time working out how. They asked me for a simple manual or checklist to get started quickly. I created a guide to user insights, built as a website: a reference for choosing the right way to gather information for design decisions, hypotheses and evaluations, which could be shared with everyone running digital initiatives in the organization.
Skills
Project
Wireframes and a prototype for SKL’s new public website, with usability tests, idea sessions and workshops. The new skl.se was named Sweden’s best public website at the Sitevision Days on 7 October 2014.
Skills
Project
A usability study and interaction design of Stockholm public transport’s journey planner, both on the web and on mobile, and interaction design and coding of the web-based planner used by customer service.
Links
Project
I built the first website for Stockholms Studenters Idrottsförening, the sports association for students in the Stockholm area – on ssif.su.se, with information for 30,000 students, from registering the address to building contact forms and training the people who would publish.
Skills
Speaking
Original title
Don't feed the designers after midnight
A talk at the first STHLM Xperience Conference, on World Usability Day 2018 and its theme “Design for Good or Evil”. Told with a Gremlins theme – Gizmo and Stripe, which I drew myself in Keynote with the path tool.
Skills
Related
Award
STIMDI, the Swedish interdisciplinary society for human–computer interaction, has awarded its Grand Prize since 1997 – earlier recipients include Jonas Löwgren, Kia Höök and Jan Gulliksen. I received it on World Usability Day, 10 November 2016, two minutes after stepping off stage from a talk on ethics.
Links
Skills
Project
Strategist and experience designer for the Faculty of Science, on its printed catalog and on recruiting new students through other channels: I mapped the whole journey of future science students, from fifth grade to admission, and turned it into a strategy and new digital services.
Skills
Project
Videos (3)
Five years on the national e-service for online support and treatment (Stöd och behandling), from the pre-study in 2013 to launch: a platform where healthcare providers build support and treatment programs, such as internet-based CBT and psychoeducation courses, for their patients. The project that steered me toward digital ethics.
Skills
Publication
My reply on SvD Debatt on 9 July 2023 to Mathias Sundin’s “Vi behöver inte någon AI-paus” (“We don’t need an AI pause”): it is not written in stone that the benefits of AI will outweigh the drawbacks. That is why we need regulation – to set a direction that mitigates harm and creates value for the many, not the few.
Regulation isn’t driven by fear of an AI that wants to wipe us out, but by harm that is already happening: artists whose work is used without consent, innocent people held in custody because of facial recognition, applicants screened out by recruitment tools, patients given the wrong treatment – and the systems’ use of energy and water. That is what the EU AI Act addresses. Considerate innovation benefits from clear frameworks.
Links
Skills
Project
Advisor and subject expert, through my own company Axbom Innovation AB, in recurring workshops and working meetings, supporting web development projects and web strategy decisions.
Project
Part of Första linjens digitala vård: a digital symptom guide where people describe their symptoms to a chatbot and are guided to the right level of care – from self-care to 112. In 2019 a first proof of concept was built and tested with people across Sweden.
Skills
Teaching
Talks, lectures and training sessions for companies, agencies and schools – from podcasting and design thinking to accessibility, inclusive design and the ethics of AI. The larger conference talks have their own cards.
Links
Skills
Testimonial
At the time my company needed expert consultation on web design of a new Journey Planner system, Per gave advice that helped us to launch an excellent interface to our customers. We believe that his work was the key to the success of the new service.
— Åke Lindström, SL
Related
Testimonial
Per has an enormous knowledge of usability. When we were rebuilding our web tool, Per’s input was decisive in creating an easy-to-use experience. If simplicity and intuitive interfaces matter to you, hire Axbom Innovation!
— Andreas Ahrens, Prosocyal AB
Translated from Swedish
Original wording
Per har ett enormt kunnande inom användbarhet. När vi skulle göra om vårt webbverktyg var Pers input avgörande för att skapa en lättanvänd upplevelse. Är enkelhet och intuitiva gränssnitt viktigt för er, anlita Axbom Innovation!Related
Testimonial
Last show was probably (one of the) best in show. Thanks for the book! Will be beside my bed for keeping nightmares away.
— Bettina Braesch, after Scandinavian Developer Conference, April 2012
Testimonial
Per Axbom has a rare and valuable combination: he can talk to techies in their own language while capturing, understanding, translating and conveying the communicators’ perspective. Worth its weight in gold! He is also curious about everything – a cool, decent and competent guy!
— Eva Stattin, Vattenfall AB and Universum Communication AB (has hired me several times)
Translated from Swedish
Original wording
Per Axbom har en sällsynt värdefull kombo i att kunna tala med teckisar på teckisarsvis samtidigt som han fångar, förstår, översätter och förmedlar från kommunikatörernas perspektiv. Guld värt! Dessutom är han nyfiken på allt – en cool, schysst och kompetent kille!Related
Testimonial
Personal, knowledgeable and engaging. You can always rely on Per, and every time we have worked with him he has delivered beyond expectations.
— Funda Denizhan, Manager User Experience, Valtech
Translated from Swedish
Original wording
Personlig, kunnig och engagerande. Per kan man alltid lita på och de gånger vi har jobbat med honom har han levererat över förväntan.Related
Testimonial
You can’t ask for a better outside perspective than you get from Per Axbom. He’s been extraordinarily helpful to me in providing the type of insight that only someone with his particular mix of real-world experience and natural inquisitiveness can.
— Jason Kirst, coaching client
Related
Testimonial
As a consultant, Axbom has brought key expertise to several web projects in recent years. He has supported and guided development projects and acted as advisor on various web strategy questions.
— Jonas Berg, Product Manager, Svensk Byggtjänst
Translated from Swedish
Original wording
Axbom har som konsult tillfört nyckelkompetens i olika webbprojekt de senaste åren. Han har suttit med som stöd och vägledare i utvecklingsprojekt samt agerat rådgivare i olika webbstrategiska frågor.Related
Testimonial
Over the past year Per Axbom has helped us develop services that make sure people who have been victims of crime get information about their rights. In this work Per has been not only knowledgeable and creative but also deeply committed. We are very happy with his work and warmly recommend him!
— Magnus Lindgren, Secretary General, Stiftelsen Tryggare Sverige
Translated from Swedish
Original wording
Per Axbom har under det senaste året hjälpt oss att utveckla olika tjänster för att säkerställa att personer som utsatts för brott får information om sina rättigheter. Per har i detta arbete inte bara varit kunnig och kreativ utan även djupt engagerad. Vi är mycket nöjda med hans arbete och kan varmt rekommendera honom!Related
Testimonial
We hired Per to review our web structure and recommend improvements in usability, navigation and clarity. Per was an enormously knowledgeable and efficient resource and delivered input of the very highest quality, which has been of the greatest value in our work for change.
— Magnus Nylander, CEO, Vroom Stockholm AB
Translated from Swedish
Original wording
Vi anlitade Per för en översyn av vår webstruktur samt rekommendationer avseende förbättringar med avseende på användarvänlighet, navigation och tydlighet. Per var en enormt kunnig och effektiv resurs och levererade input av allra högsta kvalitet som varit av högsta värde i vårt förändringsarbete.Related
Testimonial
Per got “top marks” from the university’s web editors and social media editors at an internal training within Stockholm University’s communication network.
— Marie Jackalin, Content Manager for su.se, Stockholm University
Translated from Swedish
Original wording
Per fick ”högsta betyg” av universitetets webbredaktörer och redaktörer för sociala medier vid en internutbildning som gavs inom Stockholms universitets kommunikationsnätverk.Related
Testimonial
Per has a fantastic ability to think interactively. To turn ideas into usable solutions online, and into modern ways of communicating through the noise.
— Mikael Hägglund, CEO, Compatec AB
Translated from Swedish
Original wording
Per har en fantastisk förmåga att tänka interaktivt. Omsätta idéer till användbara lösningar på nätet och moderna sätt att kommunicera på i bruset.Related
Testimonial
I was Per’s manager at Ericsson while he was a consultant within web and intranet. Per had deep knowledge in his subject area. After a while I made him team leader. Just before I left Ericsson I made a leadership assessment of Per and recommended him to the Ericsson Management Planning Programme, ready for next level, with outstanding “power of initiative”.
— Stefan Pettersson, Manager of the Consultant Department, Ericsson Business Consulting
Stefan Pettersson later hired me at Lumano, where he was CEO. In my employment reference when I left in 2006, he wrote that my work had included sales, account management, project management, advice and delivery, and ended: “When I hired Per to Lumano I had been his manager at Ericsson a few years earlier. If I get the chance, I will hire Per again.” (translated from Swedish)
Related
Testimonial
Easy and uncomplicated to do business with. Committed, reliable and conscientious. Creative, innovative and healthily questioning.
— Tobias Bergdahl, Managing Partner, XLENT Strategy
Translated from Swedish
Original wording
Enkel och okomplicerad att göra affärer med. Engagerad, pålitlig och plikttrogen. Kreativ, nytänkande och sunt ifrågasättande.Related
Testimonial
I have engaged Per several times as a subject expert when our networks for owner-managers have taken on social media and communication strategy. Per’s strength is that he listens, reflects and shares his knowledge in a matter-of-fact way. That he does it with a humble manner makes him all the more credible in conveying value.
— Ulf Mattebo, CEO, ÄgarLedare
Translated from Swedish
Original wording
Jag har anlitat Per vid ett flertal tillfällen som sakkunnig, när vi i våra nätverk för ägarledare har berört social media och kommunikationsstrategi som temafrågor. Pers styrka och förmåga är att han lyssnar, reflekterar och sakligt delar med sig av sin kunskap. Att han dessutom gör det med en ödmjuk framtoning ökar hans trovärdighet att förmedla värde.Related
Quote
The power we wield as digital creators is significant, as is the potential for harm. By taking responsibility for our power we can not only mitigate negative impact but also build knowledge for advancing our digital services in novel and caring ways.
— Per Axbom, education material
Links
Related
Template
Asking the right questions for moral management at each stage of the design process. The Trouble Diamond makes ethics assessment a natural part of the Double Diamond, with one question per stage. Download it as a PDF or high-resolution image, and put it up on the wall.
Skills
Project
Videos (2)
A new website, new social media channels and training for the team, followed by responsibility for all digital media during the Almedalen political week.
Skills
Teaching
Hired as the external lecturer when Universum wanted to develop how the whole organization worked with search engine optimization and writing for the web: training for about 40 people, on site in Sweden and by video link to the other markets.
Project
Training material, inspirational talks and strategies for digital accessibility work across the municipality.
Links
Skills
Project
First user tests of the media library at Utbildningsradion (UR), the Swedish educational broadcaster – and then project manager when UR rebuilt the search based on the results.
Skills
Speaking
Original title
First, Design No Harm (What Design Can Learn From Medical Ethics)
An emotional talk at UX Copenhagen 2020, held online because of covid. It starts with a story of abuse – hazing at a boarding school – and the systems that support it. As designers we have the power to abuse; how aware are we of when it happens? And what can design learn from medical ethics?
Links
Speaking
Original title
Det osynliga problemet med sagolika användarupplevelser
In English: The invisible problem with fairy tale user experiences
A lightning talk at UX Open, an unconference for the UX community in Stockholm, on 16 October 2015 – one of 16 lightning talks in front of 180+ participants. The start of the fairy-tale talk: when we design away every barrier, we may stop helping people choose what’s best for them.
Links
Podcast
Co-founder, producer and co-host of UX Podcast with James Royal-Lawson, 2011–2025. 339 episodes and more than 3 million downloads, with interviews with many of digital design’s most interesting minds.
Episodes (8)
#316 Designer accountability with Kim Goodwin
#293 Designing for stress with Katie Swindler
#270 Design for safety with Eva PenzeyMoog
#247 Civic tech with Cyd Harrell
#232 Design psychology with Amy Bucher
#195 Infused design with Jared Spool
#192 Values are the experience with Kim Goodwin
#150 Dark Patterns with Harry BrignullLinks
Skills
Podcast · Episode
Kim Goodwin on lessons from many years of healthcare design: design principles that carry across industries, and why designers should be more accountable.
Podcast · Episode
Sometimes we knowingly design for stressful situations, and sometimes our designs are used by people under stress without us expecting it. Katie Swindler, author of Life and Death Design, joins us.
Podcast · Episode
People will abuse our products to hurt, control and stalk others. It’s not an “if”. Eva PenzeyMoog on designing for safety, preventing harm before it happens and helping survivors.
Podcast · Episode
Cyd Harrell on her book A Civic Technologist’s Practice Guide: the projects, partnerships and people of civic tech, why the way to succeed there is a way we all ought to work – even in the private sector – and recognising and managing your own privilege.
Podcast · Episode
Amy Bucher, author of Engaged – designing for behavior change, on how psychology influences the design of digital products: behaviours and attitudes, motivation and goals, persuasion, moments and journeys – and why a moment of reflection is sometimes important.
Podcast · Episode
Imagine drawing a concept on a whiteboard and everyone just gets it: that’s a design-infused organization. Jared Spool on the growth stages of UX in organizations.
Podcast · Episode
Organisational culture, or values, is our design medium rather than pixels or code. Kim Goodwin, after her UXLx 2018 talk “Values are the experience”, on how organizations can make the decisions that let great UX happen.
Podcast · Episode
Harry Brignull, who coined the term “dark patterns” in 2010 for design that deliberately tricks people into doing things they didn’t mean to.
Speaking
Original title
Eliminate Design – a rant about the responsibility of UX professionals
A lightning talk at User Experience Lisbon in May 2013: jumping head first into sketching wireframes makes us fail the user and lose sight of the real problem. The screen should not be singled out as the primary medium for human-centered design – and it is the UX lead’s job to make sure it isn’t. Recorded on an iPhone from the audience.
Skills
Related
Speaking
Original title
The Invisible Problem with Fairy Tale Experiences
A talk at UXLx in Lisbon on 26 May 2016, the English version of a talk that began as a lightning talk at UX Open in Stockholm: when we remove every barrier and design the fairy-tale experience, we may abandon our promise to help people choose what’s best for them.
What people said
This talk was so good! Make sure you look at the slides.
Your talk was my favorite. Try to catch up more of your fresh thoughts in the future.
Thanks for the awesome reminder that friction is not always bad!
Links
Speaking
Original title
AI and Humans: The Human Rights Perspective
An online talk for Vattenfall on 14 November 2023, through my own company – back with the energy company where I had worked as a consultant from 2005 to 2010. The human rights perspective on AI: what can go wrong, who is responsible, and how to ensure safe and beneficial use.
Skills
Project
Five years with one of Europe’s largest energy companies: usability and accessibility for vattenfall.com and vattenfall.se, then advisor to Group Communications on web strategy and social media.
What people said
Per is an easy-to-work-with “Jack-of-all-trades” within web content management. He comes from a communications background based on usability and accessibility and has a good set of skills within IT as well. The future is yours, Per!
Skills
Project
From 2011, via Valtech: a complete review of minavardkontakter.se – the e-services where people log in to contact their healthcare – as part of Virtuell Portal 2.0, the next version of 1177 Vårdguiden’s e-services: the start page, booking appointments, logging in, and acting on someone else’s behalf.
Skills
Template
Drawing to understand, and to help others understand: systems maps, mindmaps and models I have made and shared freely – from the complexity of managing a pandemic to the many branches of the Fediverse. More of them have their own cards.
Links
Skills
Project
A new interface for the digital tool that most car salespeople in Sweden used to map customer needs and send out campaigns.
Skills
Related
Teaching
From 2010 to 2011 I was responsible for Webbcopy 2.0, a two-day course in writing for the web given twice a year by the training company Ability Partner. The course was in Swedish.
What people said
I have engaged Per as course leader and workshop lead on several occasions at our conferences and courses in the web field. Per is genuinely interested in how the web develops and how different platforms and technologies can be put to practical use to communicate digitally – something that we and the course participants have greatly benefited from and enjoyed. It is a true pleasure to work with Per, and I give him my warmest recommendations for similar assignments.
Speaking
Around 2009–2012 web forms were one of my specialties: the part of a website where a visitor goes from window-shopping to actually doing something – buying, booking, getting in touch. I wrote about them, redesigned them and gave talks on how to design forms so more people fill them in and send them.
Links
Skills
Speaking
Original title
Det osynliga problemet med sagolika användarupplevelser
In English: The invisible problem with fairy tale user experiences
A talk at WSA-dagen, the Web Service Award day, on 31 January 2018: inspired by behavioral science, digital designers have become ever more focused on steering people to act as we want them to. But when we remove every barrier and deliver the fairy-tale experience that takes minimal brain power to move forward, we abandon our promise to help people choose what’s best for them.
Links
Speaking
Original title
Enklast vinner! Från höstack till syskrin på skl.se i 3 steg
In English: The simplest wins! From haystack to sewing box on skl.se in 3 steps
On 27 November 2014, Tomas Johansson Haavik, web strategist at SKL, and I presented the new skl.se, which I was lead designer for, and how we worked strategically with content and design to give users what they need. Sitevision gave us the speaking slot after skl.se was named Best public website at the Sitevision Days. The talk was in Swedish.
Links
Skills
Speaking
Original title
En nationell vårdplattform. Utmaningar & konkreta tips för framgång i stora projekt
In English: A national care platform. Challenges & concrete tips for success in big projects
Starting from the development of the new national care platform Stöd och behandling, in October 2016 I shared experiences and tips on how to make big projects work over time and become truly user-centered. The talk was in Swedish.
Skills
Speaking
Original title
Innehåll först med innehållsprototyper
In English: Content first with content prototypes
On the problem of producing visual design before the content is ready, so the content has to be squeezed into an ill-fitting suit. The solution: start with a content prototype that gives the visual form something to build on. In September 2016 I showed how far you can get by working with text alone as design material, together with all the stakeholders. The talk was in Swedish.
Links
Skills
Podcast
My first podcast (2007–2008), in Swedish: interviews with internet and design profiles about building better experiences on the web, produced and mixed by me.
Episodes (6)
Podcast · Episode
Höstens första program: en intervju med Ted Valentin, webbutvecklaren bakom alla fräcka community-kartor. Hur gör han, vad driver honom och varför?
Podcast · Episode
En intervju med Don Norman, professorn, företagaren och författaren som myntade begreppet user experience, inför hans keynote på Business to Buttons i Malmö. Jag avbröt ett kundmöte för att hinna ringa Chicago.
Podcast · Episode
Efter min omdebatterade artikel om sökmotoroptimering i Computer Sweden: ett samtal med Simon Sundén om sökmotoroptimeringens utveckling och hur den förhåller sig till resten av branschen.
Podcast · Episode
Ett samtal med Niclas Bergström, vd på ReadSpeaker, med många exempel på hur uppläsningstjänsten används till nyttiga saker som varit svåra att förutse.
Podcast · Episode
Om konferensen From Business to Buttons, Slayerments 12 steg till en Webb 2.0-webb och en intervju med Jonas Hombert om videocommunityn JayCut. Tillsammans med Anna Simon.
Podcast · Episode
Det allra första programmet: en intervju med Brandon Schauer från Adaptive Path.
Comic
A free, independent comic I drew and self-hosted from May 2022 to June 2023: Pala the impala and Ellie the elephant talking about technology, while Vlad the vulture watches from a tree. Eight four-panel strips – each with a full image description – about surveillance, crypto, facial recognition, “autonomous” devices, the bird site and AI.
Four panels. An impala (African antelope) speaking with an elephant.
Panel 1. Impala: How did Vlad see my chat conversation? It was peer-to-peer encrypted.
Panel 2. Elephant: Did anyone take a screenshot of the conversation?
Panel 3. Impala: It was peer-to-peer encrypted…
Panel 4. A vulture is revealed to be sitting above them in a tree, controlling a camera on a tripod. The impala looks straight at the reader. The vulture says: Dude…
Skills
Speaking
Original title
So… you think you’re a good person
Two days at World IA Day Switzerland, 22–23 February 2019, on the global theme “Design for Difference”: the midday keynote “So… you think you’re a good person” at Zürcher Hochschule der Künste, and the half-day workshop “Mostly Harmless: Design for Digital with a Conscience” the day before. Alongside Sarah Barrett and Jorge Arango, who gave the other keynotes.
What people said
Thanks for reminding me why I chose this job.
Fantastic workshop today with Per Axbom. Thanks!
Links
Skills
Speaking
Original title
Design som lyssnar till hela människan
In English: Design that listens to the whole human
A talk – or rather a rant – on ethics at STIMDI’s World Usability Day evening in Stockholm on 10 November 2016, about the ethical responsibility of the people doing UX work. Two minutes after I stepped off stage I was awarded STIMDI’s Grand Prize.
Project
Consultant at XLENT from 2006 to 2010, then hired back as an independent consultant for the strategy and interaction design of the group’s new website (2011).
What people said
Per is very well known and much respected in his field. I have heard of Per years before I ever met him. Per is the rare combination of academic skills and hands-on problem solver. I deeply enjoy working with Per, which I do every time I get the chance. I can strongly recommend Per in any web or strategy related project. It is truly a pleasure working with Per.
Links
Skills
