Design leadership: Develop people and strengthen performance

Make expectations clear before evaluating performance

Stronger teams deliver better business outcomes when people understand their role, the decisions they own and how their contribution will be evaluated. That clarity is one of my responsibilities as a design leader. A designer should be able to explain what they are working towards, why it matters and where they can make decisions without waiting for permission.

I have built and led teams using OKR frameworks, KPIs, one-to-ones and personal development plans. Those practices work together: shared goals give the team direction, feedback helps people understand their progress, and mentorship gives them a practical way to improve. The leadership work is to make those connections useful in everyday delivery.

Connect OKRs and KPIs to work people can influence

I developed OKR frameworks and KPIs for my teams to connect design work to business priorities and make expectations explicit. Objectives and key results help frame the change we are working towards. KPIs help us follow the performance that matters over time. People need to understand both the goal and their influence on it.

A useful performance conversation also considers the conditions around the result. A designer can improve a journey, while its adoption depends on implementation, access and the wider product experience. I want accountability to match responsibility. That means making the contribution clear and discussing dependencies when assessing progress.

My approach is to use measures alongside professional judgment. Delivery speed, experience quality and team development deserve different kinds of evidence. Counting completed screens tells very little about whether a designer solved the right problem, helped colleagues make a better decision or prevented expensive rework.

Use one-to-ones for feedback and development

One-to-ones are part of how I lead. They create space to discuss progress, obstacles, feedback and the person’s development needs. The conversation should help me understand what is making their work difficult and help them understand where they are succeeding or need support.

I treat the relationship as mentorship. People need honest feedback they can use, a chance to explain their perspective and support that fits their level of experience. A developing designer and an emerging team lead may need very different guidance. The aim is to help each person become more confident and effective in the responsibilities they hold.

Build a personal development plan for each person

I develop individual plans around each team member’s skills and needs. A common team standard gives us a shared expectation of quality, while the development plan recognises that people arrive with different strengths and different gaps. Giving everyone the same growth assignment would miss that distinction.

The plan connects the skill a person needs to develop with a practical opportunity to practise it, feedback and a way to recognise progress. That could mean strengthening research judgment, presenting a design decision or learning to guide another designer. The priority depends on the person’s strengths, their next responsibilities and the support they need.

The plan should remain useful as the person and the work change. I want development to show up in greater confidence, sounder decisions and the ability to take on responsibility. Its value is in the growth it supports.

Give new designers a progressive route into the team

I applied gamification to onboarding in a company with 20+ products and five brands. A welcome buddy helped the designer settle into the team. Small first tasks in an existing master file introduced our grids, patterns and documentation, followed by more complex work and a view of the bigger goals ahead.

The sequence was tailored to the designer’s skills and role. It connected early contributions to future responsibility, and gave me a place to explain performance expectations and evaluation. That makes onboarding part of my mentorship approach: help the person understand the environment, experience progress and see where their development can lead.

I described the approach in my 2019 Medium article. The adapted gamified designer onboarding article develops that account for this site, connecting the original sequence to individual development and team leadership.

Develop leaders who can develop other people

I have developed leaders within my teams, including separate product-design and marketing-design leadership streams. At Dreamscape Networks, this was part of growing the UX function from four to sixteen people across three regions. The case study describes the wider change, including shared standards and bringing recurring agency work in-house.

Leadership development involves learning how to set direction, give feedback and support someone else’s growth. Strong design craft is a foundation, but leading a team also requires judgment about priorities, delegation and relationships. My mentorship-based approach helps people prepare for those responsibilities.

The result I look for is a team that can make good decisions in more places. Clear ownership and capable leaders give people support close to the work and allow the head of design to focus on the decisions that need broader organisational context.

Make Agile and Scrum serve the team’s delivery

I have used Agile and Scrum in leading design teams. For me, the useful connection is between priorities, collaboration and learning: what the team needs to achieve, what it can realistically take on and what should change after reviewing the work. Design needs room for discovery as well as a clear route into implementation.

I bring the same leadership questions into delivery planning: are responsibilities clear, are dependencies understood and does the team have what it needs to complete the work well? Shared standards and collaboration with development help keep design decisions connected to what can be built. The process needs to support that relationship.

Build trust through Fuck Up Nights

I implemented a Fuck Up Night culture as a way for the team to learn together. We gathered to discuss major failures in the industry and shared our own mistakes: what happened, how we addressed it and what we learned. I did not invent the format; I brought it into the way my teams developed their judgment.

The conversation matters because a mistake can reveal an assumption the whole team shares. Looking at how a problem developed and how it was fixed gives colleagues something useful to carry into their own work. Discussing our own failures also makes learning personal: everyone can contribute experience, including the leader.

I want those sessions to make it easier to speak openly and ask for help. The purpose is learning and responsibility. A memorable story becomes valuable when people can explain the lesson and use it in the next decision.

Use gamification to create space for creative energy

I also use gamification in team development, creating challenges outside normal project work. One example was an internal poster competition for a corporate event. Every designer created a poster with no mandatory creative requirements, then presented their work. People across the company judged the entries; the winner received a prize and the selected poster became part of the event.

That format gave designers freedom to explore a direction they chose and a reason to share it with others. It brought the wider company into the creative process and gave the team a visible contribution to a shared occasion. The challenge combined individual expression, presentation and participation.

The leadership value is in the energy and connection around the challenge: a chance to try something different, explain a creative choice and involve colleagues in the result. It gives people an opportunity to practise outside the constraints of a delivery brief.

Treat team chemistry as part of the work

Team building, mentorship and shared learning support the relationships a team relies on when delivery becomes difficult. People need to be able to challenge an idea, ask a colleague for help and understand one another’s strengths. A clear goal helps them work towards the same result; trust helps them handle disagreement along the way.

I connect those cultural practices to the team’s operating structure. Roles and goals make responsibility visible. One-to-ones and development plans support the individual. Shared learning and creative challenges give people reasons to engage with one another. Together, they describe how I build a team as well as how I manage its work.

Connect people development to business performance

The business needs a design function that can deliver, adapt and make responsible decisions. Developing people contributes to that capacity: stronger judgment helps teams choose an approach, clear ownership helps work move forward and leaders who mentor others support growth across the function.

My approach to design leadership combines direction, performance frameworks, mentorship and team culture. I want people to know what is expected, how they can grow and how their work contributes to the business. That is the foundation I bring to stronger teams and better business outcomes.