Summary
As AI and emerging technologies accelerate our teams’ ability to ship product, Design Ops practitioners are experiencing a fundamental identity shift that challenges traditional role boundaries. This talk explores how Design Ops practitioners are evolving beyond conventional program management into expansive, cross-functional roles that drive systemic change at enterprise scale. Through real-world case studies from Microsoft and Zapier, attendees will discover practical strategies for managing large-scale workflow transformations, building compelling business cases for significant tooling investments, and leveraging AI automation to amplify operational impact. The presentation addresses Design Ops leaders, managers, and practitioners who are navigating the tension between speed and scale while redefining their professional identities in an AI-driven landscape. Key learnings include strategies for piloting “minimum unviable products,” the importance of data hygiene for AI integration, and actionable approaches for growing “builder culture”.
Key Insights
-
•
AI is dissolving traditional boundaries between designers, product managers, and developers, requiring new blended identities.
-
•
Design ops, product ops, and engineering ops are converging from separate silos toward more integrated collaboration.
-
•
Athia's career evolution shifted from championing dedicated design ops to adopting a product-first ops mindset with broader impact.
-
•
Zapier’s automation of product planning across 27 squads using Coda dramatically improved visibility and coordination of inter-team dependencies.
-
•
Async feedback mechanisms paired with push notifications accelerated executive reviews and team alignment at Zapier.
-
•
At Microsoft, introducing a new design-to-code process cut front-end development time by 2–10 hours weekly while improving product quality for 91% of participants.
-
•
Large legacy organizations face cultural and regulatory challenges in adopting new workflows but have strong appetite for piloting incremental change.
-
•
Minimum viable products and clear data-driven metrics (e.g., speed and quality) are critical to proving impact and securing leadership buy-in.
-
•
The future of design ops involves architecting infrastructure-like processes and leading cultural change at scale rather than merely managing existing workflows.
-
•
A growth mindset and builder culture are crucial for navigating evolving roles and uncertainties brought by AI and organizational shifts.
Notable Quotes
"If the choice is adapting or dying, what would it look like if we adapted?"
"Who do builders become in this new future AI universe and how do we play together?"
"Ego death is a painful, almost burial-like process of letting go of aspects that have become our identity over decades."
"AI and automation have meaningfully raised the bar for how I operate as an ops."
"It’s the art of architecting friction out of a process."
"Sometimes business context points us to a direction where we no longer have the safety of our identity constructs."
"Minimum unviable products don’t need to be perfect or scalable to start, just enough to prove demand."
"Data is power; find your eigen metric, the one or two things that prove your hypothesis."
"Change is a team sport; meaningful systemic change requires partnerships and advocacy from bottom to top."
"Our edge isn’t in managing what exists; it’s in architecting new meaning at scale where process becomes infrastructure."
Or choose a question:
More Videos
"Product managers often see design work as a black box and want transparency and accountability."
Aurobinda Pradhan Shashank DeshpandeIntroduction to Collaborative DesignOps using Cubyts
September 9, 2022
"If someone says hell no, don’t stop, keep going."
Juhan SoninDesign Now! The Agenda for Action
September 4, 2025
"It is impossible to survive in this industry by pushing against the current all the time; you must put yourself in positions to leverage the current."
John CutlerOxbows, Rivers, and Estuaries: How to navigate the currents of change (without burning out)
December 3, 2024
"We are problem-finders and problem-solvers, but if we’re not very careful, we can also become problem-creators."
Mariah HayEthics in Tech Education: Designing to Provide Opportunity for All
June 14, 2018
"Participatory sessions provide a unique chance to connect with users who might otherwise be hard to reach."
Nidhi Singh Rathore Amber DavisEmbracing participation to unlock deeper truths in commercial research
March 12, 2025
"I believed we could do more — more for the company, customers, stakeholders, and ourselves if we had more agency."
Nalini KotamrajuResearch After UX
March 25, 2024
"Product and UX ought to be allies presenting a united front at the table, not competing for supremacy."
Aditi Ruiz Christian Crumlish Farid SabitovPulse Check: Empathy Mapping Your Product Manager, Pt. 2
December 6, 2022
"Careers here are jungle gyms, not ladders; you can move laterally and explore many paths."
Louis Rosenfeld Lashanda Hodge Senongo Akpem Chris HodowanecBecoming a Civic Designer: Making the Move from Private to Public Sector
November 17, 2022
"There are almost two languages in organizations: what we say and what we really mean."
Sofia QuinteroBeyond Tools: The Messy Business of Implementing Research Repositories
March 10, 2022
