in design organizations

9 Principles for Superlative Design Teams

For the book I’m writing on building in-house teams, I was wondering if it was possible to articulate the Ideal Design Team, in order to have a frame of reference, of comparison, against which to judge any team. A quick chat on Twitter made it clear that this was a foolish proposition, but Leisa Reichelt suggested a developing a set of principles that could work regardless of organization.

I’ve spent the day noodling on this, and arrived at the following. I’ve tried to articulate them the way I would experience principles for a client — brief statements, hopefully memorable, that help drive decision making when thinking about establishing your team.

  1. Shared sense of purpose
  2. Dedicated, focused leadership
  3. Authentic user empathy
  4. Render the entire journey
  5. Deliver at all levels of scale
  6. Assert quality
  7. Real artists ship
  8. Nurture team members
  9. Manage operations effectively

After I posted these to Twitter, Jess McMullin suggested: “10. Understand, articulate, and create value (for both business & users),” which I don’t think I can argue with.

For the book, I’ll dig into each of these. I’d love to hear y’all’s take on them, any glaring holes, or what you find most resonant.