The Role of Leadership in Design Team Success

I am part of building up a new cross-disciplinary design team in an area of the business that has traditionally not worked with design. I found several of Nizar Saqqar's points in his recent interview with Steve Portigal applicable and valuable to the current struggles I'm dealing with: 1. Know your team's success criteria: When a leader opens headcount, they have an idea of what they are looking for or hoping to achieve. My new team is funded by the business MVP. I realized that although I knew he wanted his teams to work more customer-back, I really needed to be closer to his idea of design's success criteria -- and recently asked that it explicitly addressed in our next meeting.   2. Path of least resistance: As a new team, there is some leeway in the projects we go after. It's not just finding the right problem to solve for, but finding our sidekicks and champions. "If there was a huge problem where the path of resistance is pretty significant, the question that I need to ask myself is, is this where I want to continue proceeding? Should I continue butting heads to be included there, or should I go find that place that is a bit more welcoming to changing their processes and their approach?" 3. Growth through embed model: It's relatively straightforward to work in a service model when you're three people serving a huge org. But what if we embedded in a critically important team with high leverage questions? How could we build trust and success that would convince the business leadership to invest further? "That kind of starts it off with setting up the researcher for success and empowering them as a core member of the team, challenging the notion that they’re there to take requests or answer questions and have them be able to actively predict where there will be blockers... you start replicating that model with different teams for areas that also are strategic to the company and have a lot of ambiguity, and that kind of becomes the framing in terms of unblocking, creating alignment, efficiency, and how we can just continue to scale from there." https://lnkd.in/eGBzb2BT

Recently I was so inspired by a conversation between Dart Lindsley and Perry Timms on our Built for People stream. Inverting the organizational design as approach in modelling servent leadership. It places leaders not at the top, but at the bottom, fundamentally shifting their role from commanding to facilitating, from dictating to empowering. 🔄 👥 In this model, leaders become enablers, actively supporting their teams. They focus on removing obstacles, providing resources, and empowering employees to make decisions. This approach is beautifully summarized by Robert Greenleaf in his concept of 'servant leadership,' which emphasizes the leader’s role as a caretaker who helps employees grow and develop. Key benefits of this inverted pyramid approach include: 🌟 Faster Decision-Making: With empowerment, decisions are made quicker and closer to the action, speeding up response times. 🌟 Better Innovation: Empowered teams are more likely to experiment and propose creative solutions. 🌟 Stronger Trust and Communication: This approach fosters a culture of trust and open communication, essential for any thriving organization. 🌟 A Less Parental, More Autonomous Culture: People are trusted to do great work, and will rise to the challenge. Ultimately most people want to be successful and autonomous, by moving leadership to a supporting role, we show people that we're expecting them to rise to fill their potential. 🔍 Want to read more? The Greenleaf Center for Servant Leadership provides more insights into this philosophy. https://www.greenleaf.org/ Have you experienced this leadership model in your team? What impact did it have on team dynamics and overall performance?

I recently heard from someone who faced a very tough situation. They hired a UX designer to "think big and plan ahead" (what we call "strategic design"). But their leadership? The leadership just wanted a designer for the "here and now" ("tactical design"). Sadly, standing up for that strategic approach led to some tension, and the person was shown the door. It got me thinking, how can we help our leaders see the big picture while also giving them what they want now? Here's how I would recommend bridging the two ↴ 1. Educate & advocate:    Highlight the impact strategic design can produce.    Use real-life examples leaders can relate to.     2. Workshops:    Mix "now" and "future" thinkers in a brainstorm.    They might just rub off on each other.     3. Feedback loops:    Make a habit of checking in and sharing ideas.    It'll help everyone to stay on the same page.     4. Speak their language:    Talk to the leaders in terms they care about.    Translate the benefits of strategic design into profits.    Or, other tangible business outcomes. Final Thought: It's great to champion what you believe in, but we need to pick our battles wisely. It's crucial to understand the org culture and the communication style of our leaders. In the end of the day, advocacy is about finding the common ground. 🚨 I'd love to hear your insights and experiences on this. How have you managed to find a balance between tactical and strategic perspectives in your organization?

Great design doesn’t scale without great people DesignOps is at the heart of engaged teams Too often, we focus on systems, tools, and outcomes We cannot forget that people are the true engine of creative excellence. As a design leader, I’ve learned this the hard way: You can have the best processes and vision, but if your team isn’t engaged, supported, and growing, the outcomes will fall short or burn people out. We need to invest in DesignOps DesignOps is foundational to building: ➡️ A culture of trust, safety, and inclusion ➡️ Clear career paths that support growth and mobility ➡️ Equitable systems of recognition and feedback ➡️ Healthy teams that can consistently deliver great work   DesignOps isn’t just about efficiency DesignOps is about enabling excellence DesignOps helps leaders create the space for design When people are empowered and supported, they perform at their best, and the business grows stronger as a result. Is your design org built for execution & output or excellence at scale? #DesignOps #Design #Leadersip #Culture