Becoming a Changemaker by Leading with Design
Summary
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
"These questions haven’t gone away as I speak and do workshops and things like that around the book."
Christian CrumlishIntroduction by our Conference Chair
December 6, 2022
"Upskilling customer success managers and others to help with testing meant we could do far more research than I alone could manage."
Dr Chloe SharpUsing Evidence and Collaboration for Setting and Defending Priorities
November 29, 2023
"Be compassionate with yourself and others. Not everyone likes high fives, and that's okay."
Reginé GilbertAsking the Right Questions: Life, Hope and Moving Forward During the Pandemic
June 10, 2022
"You want to outline the tasks or steps in detail, define personas, give examples, set constraints, and refine iteratively when prompting AI."
Kelly DernAI as a Design Partner: How to Get the Most Out of AI Tools to Scale Your Process
October 3, 2023
"You need to prototype with real or believable data so the data doesn’t change the context of use."
Brian T. O’Neill Maria Cipollone Luis Colin Manuel Dahm Mike OrenDoes Designing and Researching Data Products Powered by ML/AI and Analytics Call for New UX Methods?
February 18, 2022
"Saying no with intentionality and clear guidelines creates clarity and focus."
Deanna Washington Bria Alexander Jon Fukuda Saara Kamppari-Miller Farid SabitovConnecting the Ops: Plenary Panel and Closing Circle
September 9, 2022
"Our conference recordings include decks, notes, transcripts, reading lists, and more."
Louis RosenfeldAbout the Rosenverse
March 15, 2026
"Eye tracking can show you what people see, in what order, for how long, and crucially, what they don't see."
Jeff Ephraim Bander Ariane Rahn Philipp ReiterEye Tracking Gamechanger: Why Smartphone Eye Tracking will Revolutionize Your UX Research
March 11, 2022
"The new challenge of adulthood is keeping your cool in the face of broken technology as demands are placed upon you to perform very well."
Fredrik MathesonFirst-time users, longtime strategies: Why Parkinson’s Law is making you less effective at work – and how to design a fix.
June 8, 2016
