Summary
We believe cross-functional team collaboration delivers value faster for users and organizations. However, it’s not always obvious what exactly cross-functional collaboration actually looks like. What practices are necessary to the team’s success? How do you measure team performance? As a developer and a designer, we have direct experience working together and leading teams on truly cross-functional product design and delivery. In our talk, we’ll provide specific examples of what that kind of collaboration can look like, while sharing some of the values and principles that have motivated us.
Key Insights
-
•
Developers struggled to make trade-offs because they lacked understanding of the broader user context.
-
•
Product strategists became frustrated as their detailed user stories began resembling rigid specifications, yet still failed to meet developers' needs.
-
•
Designers held contextual knowledge valuable to the entire team but lacked a channel to share it effectively.
-
•
Using the BICEPS model helps identify and address team members' psychological needs: belonging, improvement, choice, equity, ability, and significance.
-
•
Reimagining biweekly showcases to visualize how individual work contributes to user outcomes dramatically improved team morale and motivation.
-
•
Pairing, modeled after driver-navigator roles, supports dynamic role exchanges that enhance problem solving and learning within cross-functional teams.
-
•
Empathy and trust grow through working closely together and are foundational for effective collaboration and pairing.
-
•
The roles and responsibilities exercise reveals pairing opportunities by matching what people offer with what they need.
-
•
Pairing is not limited to core roles like developers and designers; it can include quality analysts, product managers, customer support, or even informal interests to foster creativity.
-
•
Leadership must explicitly model and support psychological safety to enable honest conversations that break down barriers to collaboration.
Notable Quotes
"Developers were hungry for the bigger picture, but the only information available to them was a set of user stories."
"It felt like an assembly line where you don't really know what is happening before you or after you."
"The BICEPS model helps understand what our co-workers need to feel supported and purposeful."
"Seeing the dots connected so clearly reminded me why I was doing what I was doing."
"Designing as a team means centering all the humans involved, not just the users."
"Pairing is two people with different roles doing an activity together simultaneously, like a driver and a navigator."
"Empathy and trust develop through working together, not in isolation."
"If you have an unmet need, pairing can help address it by matching offers and needs within the team."
"Pairing isn't about taking away jobs; it's about amplifying everyone's expertise and breaking down hierarchy."
"Psychological safety comes from having hard conversations upfront and requires demonstration from leadership."
Or choose a question:
More Videos
"The future was already here. It’s just not evenly distributed."
Daniel J. RosenbergDesigning with and for Artificial Intelligence
August 11, 2022
"You have to know what the development roadmap is to ensure design system changes are properly integrated and prioritized."
Dan Mall“Ask Me Anything” with Dan Mall, Author of Upcoming Rosenfeld Title, Design that Scales
October 2, 2023
"Every few years consultants come in and tidy up our mess, but as soon as they leave, we mess it all up again."
Peter MorvilleThe Architecture of Understanding
May 13, 2015
"Buffalo is actually designed for incidents like this to happen."
Kyria Stephens Marlon KernerPower to Heal: Civic Design in the Aftermath of Tragedy
November 17, 2022
"Innovation in large companies often requires breaking rules and hiding what you’re doing from management."
Nathan ShedroffRedefining Value: Bridging the Innovation Culture Divide
May 14, 2015
"What does ‘best work’ mean? It’s different for everyone, so our solutions have to be flexible and meaningful."
Kim Fellman CohenMeasuring the Designer Experience
October 23, 2019
"Our behavior is implicit messaging; we need both explicit and implicit signals to support resilience on teams."
Bria Alexander Laura Gatewood Corey Long Daniel Orbach Laine Prokay Deanna SmithThe Big Question about Resilience: A panel discussion
September 23, 2024
"You will have full copies of everything that you experienced today and all the questions."
Bria Alexander Louis RosenfeldOpening Remarks Day 2
March 26, 2024
"The future belongs to designers who ask questions worth answering, not just answering questions already asked."
Changying (Z) ZhengPractical DesignOps: From Ideas to Tools That Teams Actually Use
September 25, 2025
