Design Leadership

The Truth About Strategy

Most people massively over complicate the concept of “strategy”. Ultimately a strategy is the general approach you are going to take in order to deliver your company mission/goals. Having a clear strategy is important as it allows people to decide between competing approaches, markets, customer segments, activities and product features. As such your strategy is the thing that informs and connects what the company is trying to do and how it is trying to do it, with the people who are responsible for delivering it.

Design Leadership

Why Design Leads are the Most Important Role in Highly Effective Design Orgs

I’ve long believed that, rather than Heads, Directors and VPs of design being the pivotal team role, we actually need to focus on hiring more Lead Designers. In this article I attempt to explain what a Lead Designer is, what they do, and why they play such an important role in high performing teams.

Design Leadership

Why I Chose to Spend 6-Months at a VC Fund

If you know me, then you'll know that I'm all about increasing the impact design can have on the world. For the past 20 years I’ve focused on using design to solve meaningful problems, remove frustrations, and make people's lives that tiny bit better.

Design Leadership

Dealing With Conflict Using the PLEASE Framework

In my previous post I shared the idea that high functioning teams are comfortable with high levels of conflict, as long as it’s the right type of conflict— namely constructive conflict around “things” rather than judgemental conflict around “people”. This idea is sometimes described as “task conflict” versus “personality conflict”.

Design Leadership

Cultivating the Right Kind of Conflict

The ability to share conflicting views about a situation or problem and still get on is a vital component of any high functioning team. It allows us to broaden our range of possible solutions, spot weaknesses in our arguments, and test our assumptions—usually in the pursuit of a better outcome. As a result, productive conflict is generally focussed on things—be they ideas, features or solutions—rather than individuals. “I don’t agree with this” rather than “I don’t agree with you”.

Speaking & Events

Using your status as a speaker to promote others

Being invited to speak at an event confers some benefits. For newer speakers, the most obvious benefit of speaking is to advance your career. Speaking at an event confers a certain amount of legitimacy and status. The fact that you’re on stage and other people are listening to you implies that you’re somebody who deserves to be listened to; that your ideas hold value that the other people in the audience will benefit from them. This is a great thing to have in your back pocket at interviews, and is sure to impress the person doing the interviewing.