Design and leadership

Some great tips from the usability maestro Jared Spool. Again not about the tech, not about the design. It's about the people, the culture, and leading change.

Design, for non-designers, seems like a scary, mysterious thing. Smart leaders make it safe by letting their new-to-design collaborators take the credit when things go well, but absorb the blame when the project doesn’t work as planned.

What we’re seeing from this newest crop of successful design leaders is less about design. It’s all about leadership. What they do is influence the entire organization through a solid practice of providing sound user research, communicating effectively, being open and transparent, and making it safe to push the boundaries.

In large organizations, change rarely happens quickly. However, everyone we talked to at these organizations was excited by how quickly an attitude of great design seems to have taken hold. They credited that shift to the solid leadership of these folks.

Source: The new design leader emphasizes leadership | Medium | Jared M. Spool, Jul. 2015