The Big Question about Resilience: A panel discussion
Bria Alexander
DesignOps Curator
Laura Gatewood
Lead Design Program Manager, Central DesignOps, Salesforce
Corey Long
Senior Manager, Design Operations, Adobe
Daniel Orbach
Executive Director of Design, Small Business Credit Card, JP Morgan Chase
Laine Prokay
Principal Design Program Manager, Salesforce
Deanna Smith
Design Program Manager, Adobe Design
Summary
Key Insights
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Resilience in design ops hinges on a flexible mindset and excellent communication within teams (Danielle).
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Kindness and a focus on the experience of people keep teams adaptable and less 'dried out' in changing environments (Laura).
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Influence, built through empathy and demonstrating benefits, is key to design ops success, especially in small teams (Corey).
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Energy management is more critical than time management for sustaining wellness and productivity (Lane).
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Viewing feedback as objective data rather than personal criticism aids resilience and continuous improvement (Deanna).
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Explicit behavioral modeling and communication of norms support personal and professional resilience in teams (Charlotte and Daniel).
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Balancing energizing tasks with tedious ones and knowing when to say no helps preserve wellbeing (Corey).
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Neurodiversity and personality diversity within teams are essential to support different working styles and prevent burnout (Daniel).
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Allowing asynchronous and varied engagement methods in workshops gathers richer input from different personality types (Lane).
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AI is becoming a powerful tool for design ops work by aiding ideation, message drafting, data interpretation, and even team facilitation (panelists).
Notable Quotes
"When I think about resilience, I think about flexibility, like trees that bend in strong winds instead of breaking — that starts with mindset and communication."
"Always approach from a place of kindness and think about the experience you want people to have as the water that keeps trees bendable."
"A lot of design ops impact comes from influence, and influence comes from empathy and showing the benefit of what you are putting out."
"It’s energy management, not time management — listen to yourself rather than comparing your output to others."
"Feedback is data, not personal — once you view it that way, it feels less like criticism and more like improvement information."
"Our behavior is implicit messaging; we need both explicit and implicit signals to support resilience on teams."
"Managing to outcome, not output, lets people own their way of working and leverages their best strengths."
"Supporting different ways people prefer to engage—like asynchronous workshops or prep time—helps introverts and extroverts contribute equally."
"What if we had AI teammates who were on every call and could help moderate, recap, and track time? That future is likely."
"AI is a great tool for drafting and summarizing, but you have to keep your unique voice because that’s what differentiates you."
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