building a world class design team
TRANSCRIPT
Building a World ClassDesign Team
@andybudd
Previously on…THE NEXT WEB
There is nothing special about your tech platform that couldn’t be copied in a matter of weeks.
Feature ParityIs just around the corner
Brand Experience
User Experience&
Good design is…
Difficult to achieve& hard to replicate.
DNADesign is the
of your product
Most founders claim theyunderstand & value design.
And yet we continue to hire stylists.
The DribbblisationOf Design
by the time you’ve reached
Product-Market Fit
the holy grail of
You’ve hit the end of the runway.
Or somebody beat you to it!
“The technology Deadpool is littered with the graves of startups that failed to reach Product-Market fit by mistaking it for an engineering problem.”
Product market fitis delivered by yourDESIGN TEAM.
I’m too poor…
To afford cheap.
Startups aretoo poor to affordcheap design.
Design IS the product!You better get good, or go home.
You can’t claim to GET designif you have one designer for every ten or twenty developers.
Designers can’t design in this environment.
All they can do is…
Fire Fight.
Design is happening somewhere in your organisation, whether you
have enough designers or not.
Design may be aTeam Sport
Don’t let design become accidental.
If design is everybody's responsibility,it’s nobodies responsibility.
TWO PIZZA TEAM.You need at least one designer(and preferably more) in your
TWO PIZZA TEAM.Designers are the side-salad of your
Highly effective design teamshave one designer for every3-6 developers.
How do you make your company more
DESIGNFUL?
This is what a conference in FINLAND looks like.
I shared an UBER to the airport with a typical startup founder.
The drive to the airport turned into a founder design mentoring session.
The product was fairly poor and needed redesigning from the ground up.
Their design team were under resourced, lacking in leadership and organisational support.
The good designers sensed the company didn’t value design and went somewhere else.
The head of product fancied themselves as a bit of a designer. I mean, how hard can it be if you have an MBA?
DESIGN TEAM.BUILDING A WORLD CLASSMy advice on
WARNING Common sense advice ahead.
If you were doing this stuff already you’d be next door listening to Gary Vaynerchuk tell you how awesome he is.
Knowing what to do is easy…Doing it is thedifficult bit.
STEP 1:COMMIT TO A VISION DESIGNERS CAN GET BEHIND
STEP 2:HIRE GREAT DESIGN LEADERS
STEP 2:HIRE GREAT DESIGN LEADERS
STEP 3:DEMONSTRATE THIS VISION THROUGH EXEMPLAR PROJECTS
STEP 3:DEMONSTRATE THIS VISION THROUGH EXEMPLAR PROJECTS
STEP 4:PUT CUSTOMER NEEDS AT THE HEART OF THE PROCESS
STEP 5:WEAVE DESIGN INTO THE FABRIC OF THE BUSINESS
STEP 6:CREATE A CULTURE OF COLLABORATION
STEP 7:INVEST IN QUALITY
STEP 8:GROW YOUR TEAM FROM THE INSIDE
STEP 8:GROW YOUR TEAM FROM THE INSIDE
STEP 9:OPERATIONALISE DESIGN
Thanks for your time.
@andybudd
Any questions?
@andybudd