Business in the context of design is the ability to understand the market, contribute to business goals to solve problems and create tools to improve the design lifecycle.
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Support
Familiar with the market and company strategy.
Reading and sharing analyst and industry reports
Can support the design strategy for one project/product
Build
Can build the design strategy for one project/product
Lead
Relevant industry experience
Can coordinate the design strategy for all products in the company
Produces company wide design decisions
Find solutions to big picture challenges. Can envision design solutions taking into account the product environment, influence from other company products, and competitors.
Strategize
Can envision the design strategy for all products in the company
Connects dots from existing products to envisioned products.
Discover new markets
Proto-persona: Alen Fjalic, Bobby Ghoshal
Architect
You are a recognized industry expert in Design Strategy.
Demonstrated success in the market.
Generating significant business value for the company in terms of new verticals, new sources of revenue, etc.
Designer-founders: Tom Kelly, Clark Valberg, Des Traynor, Brian Chesky
Research
User research focuses on understanding user behaviors, needs, and motivations through observation techniques, task analysis, and other feedback methodologies.
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Support
Maintaining Participant Pool, communicating with participants
Develop and scope clear research proposals and projects
Basic research tasks like user testing, recruiting, simple reporting, and interview note-taking
Quantitative data collection and analysis, contributing to research database
Synthesizing findings in various artifacts such as personas, journey maps, mental models, usability reports
Starts with prepackaged questions or predefined methods and executes on defined units of work.
Build
Lead Interview debrief
Observation
Quantitative data collection and analysis (use of mathematical models)
Executing the prescribed research methods to grasp the outcomes each method yields with minimal supervision. Objectively report and share their evidence based recommendations.
Workshop facilitation
Sell to internal stakeholders
Lead
Work with product managers (and other stakeholders) and take ownership of product direction. What do we need to know? Why is this important to us? When should we execute?
Report findings and actionable insights. Drive the direction of the product based on evidence.
Data collection (Quantitative and Qualitative)
Complex reporting
Workshop facilitation to align understanding of customer data
Synthesizing findings in various artifacts such as personas, journey maps, mental models, usability reports
Present research insights in a digestible story at different levels of depth depending on the audience
Framing research findings in greater context, leverage storytelling to create buy-in
Foster adoption of research db
Strategize
Disseminating knowledge and alignment are your top priorities.
Coordinate centralizing user research in to a database
Wide audience communication
Foster adoption of research db
Product roadmap planning
Program Design
Laura Kalbag
Architect
Bill Buxton, Erika Hall
Interaction
Interaction Design combines Usability, Information Architecture, and other disciplines to deliver easy to use products.
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Support
Know and use of Design System
Able to differentiate web from mobile and the different requirements for each, including the review of platform guidelines.
Knows what accessibility is about but hasn’t yet started to care about it.
Explore best practices for common design problems; solutions are solid, though not novel
Solve specific function-level problems (e.g., "add to shopping cart")
Build
An established performer with strong communication skills who proactively builds relationships
Able to contribute on shipped projects
Able to contribute to Design System
Ability to analyse and solve accessibility problems.
Emerging recognition that it's not all about design, but how design contributes to a broader goal; recognizes business goals and technical constraints
Strong and capable engagement in standard design processes
Confident in applying best practices to common design problems; solutions are solid, not novel
Given specific product capabilities that need to be solved (e.g., Checkout process)
Lead
A high-level performer with strong relationships and the ability to lead projects
Expertise, process, explain the rationale, cross-functional
Contributed to multiple shipped products
Develops the process/approach for tackling a design problem, using known methods; anticipates problems
Begins going beyond best practices
Clarifies success metrics and ties efforts toward delivering business value
Leads the solution of a product area; connects that to broader product vision (e.g, product page and purchase experience)
Strategize
An organized leader and performer who pushes convention and drives change
Leads the delivery of shipped products; Delivered successful work at the scope of product areas
Develops the process/approach for tackling a design problem, using known methods; anticipates problems; develops facilitation skills to engage cross-functional teams
Begins to realize the power of problem-framing, establishing new starting points that lead to new kinds of solutions
Leading the solution of undefined problem spaces (e.g. “How do people complete a transaction?”)
Uses understanding of impact and success metrics to focus and re-prioritize their and their team's efforts; Emerging understanding of broader organizational context and goals;
Architect
You are a recognized industry expert in Interaction Design.
Frames and solves hard problems; has driven innovative efforts that uncovered new value with new kinds of experiences; presents company as an industry leader in design
Working with partners and stakeholders, begins making real change in how the company approaches its business; Articulates vision for the team that excites and inspires leaders and partners
Reframes company-wide "problems" to suggest new approaches for solving them.
The Big Picture of an entire company's offerings, and how they integrate and coordinate
Luke Wroblewski, Jared Spool
Visual
Visual design shapes the product experience through artifacts like illustrations, photography, typography, color and more to improve the usability of products.
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Support
Strong graphic design foundation: grid, typography, color theory
Have a strong visual background in print or digital media, advertising, illustration, fine arts, architecture, motion, film, etc
Becoming familiar with the limitations and requirements of designing in products and digital scenarios, knowledge and familiarity of designing within systems
Creating visual elements (motion, icons, illustration, etc) within an established system
Creation of libraries; Icons, Illustrations, Style guide (Visual kit).
Applying the visual layer for products or projects
Build
Designing the complete visual layer at an individual project or product level
Strong understanding of interaction principles (accessibility, usability) and able to thrive within those constraints
Deep understanding of brand and applying in a product
Able to synthesize business strategy with a visual direction
Creating and defining new brands for products or projects
Lead
Coordinating visual strategy for all products
Leading the visual direction for products across multiple teams
Strategize
Leading visuals at an organizational level
Architect
You are a recognized, industry expert in Visual Design.
Design Architect with successful products in the market, creating and leading the visual standard, creating trends
Tobias Van Schneider, Mike (Creative Mints)
Engineering
Engineering in the context of design is the ability to understand and contribute to the various technologies and frameworks that are used in the designer’s context.
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Support
Understands and has experience in the engineering lifecycle of a product from ideation to market launch.
Understands a basic language / framework (HTML/Bootstrap)
Knows design tokens
Understands accessibility related things to implementation
Build
Builds html prototypes, webpages
Optimizes and helps others review their code
Understands more complex languages / frameworks (Python, React)
Uses components and APIs
Develops with accessibility in mind
Lead
Create components
Code review (not only structure but accessibility)
Develops standalone sites and apps
Teaches frameworks or advanced languages (angular/html/etc) to others
Strategize
Proven track record
Create APIs
Platform & technologies
Create design systems
Architect
You are a recognized, industry expert in Engineering.
Ideate Successful APIs
Have successful, robust design systems used in the market
Industry leader at the intersection of Design and Technology