[TMA] Design Leadership Themes, and upcoming event
I spent this past week in London, England, attending the the “Design Leaders+” conference and teaching my Design Leadership Fundamentals masterclass.
A few themes emerged across some conference presentations, which provide some common wisdom about design leadership.
The meta-work is the work.
This line came from Andy Polaine’s opening keynote, and was reinforced throughout, including by me. Much (most?) of design leaders’ time is spent in understanding context, conversations with peers, and politicking. And to complain about that is to miss the point that those activities are the work.
Design at the speed of trust.
This poetic notion came from Mario van der Meulen, which I also echoed in my talk. Regardless of how good your designs are, your impact will be enabled (or constrained) by how you build trust with peers and senior leaders.
Take care of yourself before taking care of others.
Design leaders often operate in a kind of servant leadership that puts the needs of their team before themselves. While noble in intent, if not moderated this can lead to burnout, with the attendant irony of over-serving others ending up serving no one.
Leadership is consequential.
This phrase, from Trisha Doyle, highlights the responsibility we have as leaders, in that our actions have outsized impacts on those we lead. Birgit Geiberger reinforced this, citing research that shows managers have greater impact on mental health than doctors and therapists, and about the same as spouses.
A Product Manager’s View of UX Metrics.
In my leadership masterclass a question was asked about how to isolate UX/Design’s contribution to business value. A Product Lead in attendance shared that she believes UX/Design types were overdoing it in their attempts at such specificity. She pointed out that if a product is successful, the Product Manager gets credit for all the contributions from the team (whether Engineering, Design, Data, whatever), even though they didn’t ‘do’ any of them. UX/Designers just need to clarify how the work they did enabled success, not twist themselves into knots seeking that which only they own.
Design Leadership Summit, Toronto, January 29-30
I’m only aware of one sizable gathering of design leaders in North America in 2025, and that’s the Design Leadership Summit, happening January 29-30 in Toronto. I’m helping with programming, and you’ll see we’ve announced our initial speakers, with more great folks to come. Also, on January 28, I’ll be teaching my Design Leadership Fundamentals masterclass.
If you know of others who would benefit from my UX/Design leadership and organizational design insights, please forward this along to them!
—peter