jesús gorriti, "managing a design team"
DESCRIPTION
Jesús will share some of the most popular myths and misconceptions on how design teams can be managed: * designers are creative people who need to be left alone, * designers are too wild to work in a normal work environment, * designers need to be kept in a short leash. Well, these myths were probably created by mediocre managers. And that probably fuelled the first misconception that managers and designers don't get along very well. While Jesús does not claim to hold the ultimate truth on this topic, he will provide an interesting (and international) viewpoint on how managing a design team can work. Jesús has worked with creative teams in 6 different countries and managed over a hundred designers. This session will explore how a design team can be set up, grown, scaled and motivated.TRANSCRIPT
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Managing a Design Team
Knowledge Delegation Language Isolation Surfaces Craft Structure Managing Value
DiApologies
!
What is our value?
value = benefit
cost
Knowledge doesn’t equal leadership
Di
Di Stefano Maradona
Beckenbauer Pelé
Cruyff
Di
Di Stefano Maradona
Beckenbauer Pelé
Cruyff
Your best designers are not necessarily your best leaders
Letting go, a.k.a. delegate
Your team will never behave how you expect them to
Language, that thing
house
wireframe vs prototype
Your team doesn’t exist in isolation
understand what external factors are modifying your team’s behaviour and motivations
The curse of surfaces
We are constantly trying to describe a future state with a limited set of artefacts to a semi-known audience that
doesn’t necessarily share our own set of cultural references
Craft is not design
remember, design is not just about how it looks, but how it works, and
that applies to your team too
You are as good as your structure is
Craft Lead
Project Lead
Line Manager
41
Designer
some sort of management layer
Craft Lead
Project Lead
Line Manager
42
Designer
Design Director
Technical Short Term
Project Short Term
43
Designer
Anything Else
Career Long Term
a team is not an inmutable artefact, but a system that evolves, changes
and adapts, why should your structure exist in only one moment
in time?
Managing is not evident
Managing is mostly about narrative, and you have to be your own editor
!
What is our value?
!
our culture
“culture eats strategy for breakfast, technology for lunch, and products
for dinner, and soon thereafter everything else too” - Peter Drucker
“People don’t leave companies, they leave bad managers.” - Unknown
5 years 76 designers
12 people fired 15 people left on their own
SBS DISCOVERY MEDIA FEBRUARY 2014 PROPOSAL VERSION 1
“Quien no tiene coraje suficiente para arriesgar nunca conseguirá nada en esta vida” !— Muhammad Ali
Gracias