Lately, as I've been giving or forming new industry talks, continuing to coach folks, and interviewing at various orgs, I’ve been chatting with UX and Product Designers across the board: individual contributors, leads, heads of design. The whole gamut!
There’s a pattern emerging.
Common struggles I keep hearing:
- Product decisions made without user input (or worse, post-launch justification only).
- The classic design being seen as “making things pretty,” not solving measurable problems.
- Legacy tech stacks blocking modern design systems, UX, and UI evolution.
- Being asked to “keep parity” with engineering with high-fidelity prototypes and mock-ups, whether Eng needs them or not, instead of solving important problems and being a strategic partner.
- Understaffed teams stretched thin across research, UX, motion, content, and visual.
Do not fret. The vast majority of us in the industry have been there.
Here’s what helps:
- This first one is imperative: Regularly align design outcomes to business metrics. Speak the language. Make for what matters.
- Educate upward: help leaders understand that design is a science -and- an art. But that science part, the empathy and understanding, must come first or its all for naught.
- Prioritize ruthlessly. "Everything is a priority" means nothing gets done well.
- Build allies in product and engineering. System-level change requires systems thinking. We should all know when to champion each other. Eng shouldn't be silent while Design champions a design system that will aid scalability.
- Advocate for design ops early. Design ops is the backbone of scalable craft.
Good news!
I’m seeing more and more designers embrace strategic influence, business fluency, and systems thinking than ever before. 10 years ago, when having similar talks, I had way more questions and surprise from people, but now they're catching on faster.
Design maturity takes time, but the trend is upward.
And that gives me hope.
