Org Design for Design Orgs: Building and Managing In-House Design Teams

by Peter Merholz

Businesses and other organizations have realized that design, like sales, marketing, and information technology, must now be a core competency. Design has proven vital to business success, whether reducing costs and customer churn, or increasing revenue through creation of new value. This has driven companies to seriously invest in internal design capabilities.

Problem solving is only the tip of the iceberg for design. Beneath the surface, design is a powerful tool for problem framing, ensuring that what is being addressed is worth tackling. Go deeper still, and you discover that the core opportunity for design is to inject humanism into work. The best designed products and services don’t simply solve problems — they connect deeply with people.

Design can no longer be a specification that is handed off, built, and never seen again. It needs to be embedded within the strategy and development processes, and its practitioners must be deeply familiar with the company’s mission, vision, and practices.

The skills that made someone a great designer or creative director are almost wholly unrelated to the skills that make them a great manager and team leader. Instead, this design leader’s primary responsibilities will prove organizational, working with other executives to clear the path for design, and serving as a manager, mentor, team builder, and operator for the team itself, creating both a figurative and literal space where design can thrive.

If designers shield themselves in the cloak of “creatives” as a way not to engage with the business, they will lose impact and credibility. Designers need to understand how their work contributes to business success.

If a company has poor relationships with its own employees, how can it expect to have good ones with its customers?