The Makeup of a Design Leadership Team

A common oversight companies make when hiring a Design Executive is that they do so in a vacuum, and thus overload the role with responsibilities. They seek a Creative Leader with Executive Presence who can Scale an Organization, Build a Compelling Culture, drive Design-Lead Product Strategy, ensure High Quality, and Deliver Business Results. 

And it's not that you can't find an Executive who can do this. But they can't do this all at once, and they will have distinct areas of strength and weakness. But companies hold out for a Design Jesus, talking to countless candidates, and only after 6 months, 9 months, even a year, come to grips with reality and figure out what they actually need in that role.

Companies should instead think about how to establish a Design Leadership Team, a small group of senior design leaders who collaborate to ensure the effective practice and delivery of design. Every time I develop a profile for a Design Executive, I do so in the context of building a Design Leadership team, making clear that each member of that team has distinct emphases that, when combined, should lead to a whole greater than the sum of the parts. 

In The Makeup of a Design Executive, I listed the four components of that leadership makeup: Executive, Creative, People, Operational. This can help us navigate the makeup of the leadership team, as we place different emphases on the different roles.