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

by Peter Merholz

There are many ways for people to grow, and a good design manager is sensitive to the particulars of each individual on their team. To better understand those particulars, we use a tool called the Personal Professional Mission. Ask each team member just what it is that motivates them. Why, in a universe of opportunities, did they make the choices that landed them in the role they have? It’s a big idea that most people have never been asked about, and haven’t considered deeply. It may require some time, and repeated conversations, to develop an answer. The Personal Professional Mission is key to understanding how the person will want to grow, and form the foundation of the relationship between a manager and an employee. This foundation will shape what is expected of that team member, and drive the charting of that employee’s career path. As an example of a Personal Professional Mission, Peter’s is to make the world safe for great user experiences. This has pretty much been his animating principle since he first started blogging in 1998, and was perhaps most fully realized in the creation and development of Adaptive Path, a design consulting firm dedicated to advance the field of user experience. It also spurred his departure from Adaptive Path, because Peter felt that he could best tackle this mission from inside the enterprise. User experience no longer needed a laboratory for development, but instead required operationalizing in-house in order to deliver on the promise. I...