Becoming a Changemaker by Leading with Design
Summary
Design and research-driven leaders have evolved from being responsible for executing design concepts to having a crucial role in driving change across organizations. This is welcome progress, but with greater responsibility comes new challenges, especially when it comes to championing change in organizations likely to resist it. As design and research-driven changemakers have risen in the ranks of business, they’ve “learned on the job,” experiencing both setbacks and victories. We captured many of these learnings by interviewing over 40 design leaders and incorporating their shared wisdom in our book, Changemakers: How Leaders Can Design Change in an Insanely Complex World. Whether these leaders worked at IBM and Google, a US government agency, or a small consulting firm, their insights and observations are applicable to all and well-worth considering. This presentation will offer an overview of what we learned. It will cover the top mistakes changemakers make as they navigate the messy processes and people issues involved in driving any type of change. You'll learn how to determine the ground conditions needed for success, how to find and align supporters, how to minimize detractors, and how to repurpose design tools, frameworks, and techniques to your advantage. Maria Giudice is the co-author of Changemakers: How Leaders Can Design Change in an Insanely Complex World.
Key Insights
-
•
The role of design leaders has evolved from product delivery to shaping organizational culture at scale.
-
•
Changemakers must assess 'ground conditions' like executive support and resources before accepting leadership roles.
-
•
Rushing into change without understanding the organization's history and culture ('coming in too hot') often generates resistance.
-
•
Building a shared vision requires inclusive collaboration where all stakeholders feel heard and represented.
-
•
Prioritization and focus on a few small wins prevent burnout and enable sustainable change.
-
•
Tools like the impact matrix help teams evaluate effort versus impact to choose projects wisely.
-
•
Vision without execution is futile; delivering tangible outcomes with prototyping and milestones is essential.
-
•
Failure is inevitable in change leadership; embracing mistakes with courage leads to growth and innovation.
-
•
Visual communication techniques enhance stakeholder understanding and trust during complex change efforts.
-
•
Changemakers don’t necessarily need formal design training but must adopt design as a mindset and problem-solving strategy.
Notable Quotes
"The best future leaders will embody the qualities and traits of a DEO — design executive officer — creative business leaders at the intersection of design and business."
"Change is fundamentally a design problem and therefore change can be designed."
"Before you accept a mission as a changemaker, ask yourself do you have a clear directive, champion support, and the right resources?"
"Coming in too hot means running into a burning building like a firefighter, ignoring past work, and rushing without listening."
"Nobody wants to be told to do your thing unless it’s clear that it helps their thing. It’s just human nature."
"Don’t boil the ocean. Get small wins before you go for the big change."
"You need maniacal focus to prioritize, but remain flexible as priorities will always change."
"Vision without execution is hallucination. You must make outcomes tangible and measurable."
"Failure sucks and hurts, but if you haven’t failed, you haven’t taken enough risks."
"When you hit the bottom, that’s where creativity flourishes and it’s time to iterate, evolve, and redesign."
Or choose a question:
More Videos
"Dark mode started off as an accessibility feature for visual challenges and eventually became mainstream because it’s so valuable for everyone."
Sam ProulxAccessibility: An Opportunity to Innovate
June 8, 2022
"If people are complaining about the present, it’s very difficult to imagine a future without addressing current challenges."
Robert Fabricant Sahibzada Mayed Nidhi Singh RathoreIndustry junctures: Paths forwards for UXR and the critical decisions that get us there [Advancing Research Community Workshop Series]
October 2, 2024
"Research participants doing research in their own communities can create safer, richer research conversations."
Matt Bernius Rachael Dietkus, LCSW Aditi Joshi Alba VillamilLearnings from Applying Trauma-Informed Principles to the Research Process
March 10, 2022
"Personalization of accessibility settings will be the next big shift, letting users avoid repeated microaggressions like repeatedly enabling captions."
Sheri Byrne-HaberThe Importance of Accessible Design Systems
January 8, 2024
"Users are building mental models of how to use AI while they’re using it."
Jonathan Fairman Kevin JohnsonIntegrating generative AI into enterprise products: A case study from dscout
June 5, 2024
"Curation is super important, but also super hard."
Matt DuignanAtomizing Research: Trend or Trap
March 30, 2020
"Instead of measuring productivity by hours or busyness, focus on quality of work."
Lavy Kumar Kat Temple Tara Jensen Jenn ChouFuture of Work
June 9, 2021
"There is no value in outsourcing the thinking of philosophy to AI; doing the thinking yourself is the point."
Cennydd BowlesExit Interview #2: Rediscovering the ethical heart of design
November 6, 2025
"Context is everything — providing AI with a folder of your company’s knowledge makes responses more detailed and useful."
Daniel KorczynskiWhy AI Is Bad at Research (and how to make it actually useful)
March 10, 2026
