I recently completed rewatching The West Wing for the third or fourth time within the last few years. For those unfamiliar, the show delves into the inner workings of the daily activities of senior White House staff members. To me, this series exemplified what good politics and governance should resemble, which is why I tend to rewatch it almost annually.
In an early episode of the series, Toby Ziegler, one of the staff members mentioned earlier, is speaking with a woman at a bar about his career in politics. She asks if he believes he's good at his job, to which Toby asserts that he is very good at his job. Her follow-up question: "How many elections have you won?"
His response? Zero.
Despite working for several political candidates, none of them were what anyone would deem “successful.” Eventually, he becomes part of a team that secures a president's election. However, until that point, his experience was extensive but not particularly full of tangible achievements.
This story serves as an analogy to my own career. I've been an employee in the design industry for nine years. During this time, I've had the opportunity to collaborate with three successful agencies serving various clients across different sectors: from big-name companies to small businesses, startups, enterprises, and non-profits.
However, akin to Toby, my career lacks significant "wins." Most of my work has occurred behind the scenes, with my primary contributions centered on facilitation and orchestration. In fact, some of my favorite projects were never launched. This is why I've tended to hide under titles such as "strategist" or "consultant," often feeling as though I haven't truly earned the designation of a "designer."
I also need to try and be fair to myself when reflecting upon my work. I recognize that some good has emerged from my efforts. I've assisted companies in prototyping and testing services and experiences, linked design research to practical solutions, and produced design work resulting in tangible artifacts.
As I evaluate my past successes and prepare for the next phase of my career, I often discuss and ponder the following:
Business Impact: What change am I affecting within the organization? If my work ceased within the company, what would be its ramifications? I consider these questions when taking on new projects, aiming to positively influence the organizations I serve. Consequently, I've crusaded to advocate for elevating design maturity and service/experience design practices within every company I’ve worked for, even if it involves creating blueprints or workshops that are not explicitly requested.
Human Impact: Most of us enter the field of design with the intention of making things a bit better or at least more user-friendly. I deliberately use the phrase "a little" because while designers often aim for significant global changes, I believe that success and impact can stem from the smallest experiences and interactions.
Problem Solving: What problem are we addressing? This question remains a design trope for good reason—designers thrive on solving problems within constraints. At my current company, I actively seek and eagerly tackle problems, understanding that my performance is subpar when working on issues without a clear problem statement. It's essential to discern the scale of the problem; while addressing "smaller problems" is acceptable, investing excessive time and resources in trivial issues or confronting mammoth challenges may not yield significant progress.
My general success formula for any project involves:
Business impact + human impact + solving a problem
While the magnitude of business or human impact might differ, I strive to ensure both aspects are present in every project. Designers excel and the success of design projects occurs when they surface and reframe problems to find suitable solutions.
There's another way I liken my career to Toby's. In the show, Toby is a political advocate, passionately advocating for real change through politics. I've found success in a similar vein within my design career. I've consistently endeavored to use design as a catalyst for change, advocating its power to those I work with. Being an outspoken advocate for design and fostering an environment for good design to flourish holds value and success. If all I do is get people to think of design in a different way than how they’ve thought about it before then I feel I am creating some success for my organization.
At times, I yearn for more "wins" in the design space—more designs in the public domain or awards on my shelf. However, my career hasn't developed in that way. This fact occasionally causes anxiety or a lack of confidence in my abilities. Nevertheless, I've introduced design processes, promoted design advocacy, and enhanced design maturity in the organizations I've collaborated with. My commitment to creating genuine impact and problem-solving has improved situations for the designers I've worked with and, more importantly, for the people and businesses I strive to serve. That commitment is what I rely on most when telling my career story and it is what I focus on the most when paving the current career road that I walk.
If there's one takeaway from this article, I hope it encourages you to perceive your career from a different perspective, especially if, like me, you're often overly critical of yourself. I believe that almost any designer or design professional can discover a positive impact in their work, sometimes requiring a bit more effort to identify. If I can find it, I'm confident you can too.
My favorite things from last week
Robert Meza is an expert in behavioral science and design and he has recently been very generous with his work and content. He recently shared a list of psychology courses designers should take. Needless to say, I will be taking at least a few of these in the near future.
Tobias Van Schneider wrote a short article on the value of patience as a skill. Patience is something I definitely struggle with so this was a very helpful read for me as I approached the last work week.
While this article might be slightly dated, I found it relevant, especially with the current negative attention surrounding design thinking, largely triggered by the recent IDEO layoffs. In light of this, I wanted to present a different perspective on design thinking by sharing insights from Cameron Tonkinwise, a design authority whom I deeply respect. I believe this article offers readers an opportunity to reconsider design thinking through a more nuanced lens—beyond the dichotomy of it being either entirely flawed or unequivocally exceptional. In particular, I enjoy how he closes the article with what could be possible if design thinking evolves as it should.
I enjoyed reading this article on service truths by Marzia Arico. One of the truths stated by Arico is that “you will mess up the service at one point… and that’s okay.” As someone who occasionally avoids messing up or failing like the plague this truth was a good reminder to myself and my clients that no service can be perfect but how we respond and recover from service incidents or breakdowns can create a huge impact on how a service is experienced and perceived.
And finally, I am going to get encouraged anytime I stumble across something that is attempting to govern the implementation and usage of AI. Therefore I was pleased to see this fact sheet by the current US presidential administration on its executive order on artificial intelligence.