Principles & development
A design manager wears many hats but just like any other part of a business the manager has very clear goals:
Build a team that works well together
Support team members reaching their career goal and full potential
Create effective processes that reach business goals
These article series is my manifestation on how the people I manage should expect, from the very first meeting to fully established.
Principles
One of the best ways to make sure to communicate my leadership style is through below principles. These principles allow me to provide clear expectations while making sure it's consistent in any case.
Create a shared sense of purpose
Design is not just about making it pretty or easy to use. By empathizing with our users and crafting experiences with care, we create products and services that are meaningful, useful, and satisfying.
Provide clear goals and expectations
The average human being does not inherently dislike work. Depending upon controllable conditions, work may be a source of satisfaction, or a source of punishment. By providing clear achievable goals and expectations together with the employee, a clear vision and personal motivation is set.
Provide support and trust
People are social structure and as a manager you're managing people, make sure to always provide a culture of support and trust. People will exercise self-direction and self-control in the service of objectives to which they are committed. Make sure they know you're available for any type of support and that they can trust you as a manager.
Establish accountability
Make sure accountability is felt from manager to employee. Make accountability flourish by flat hierarchies, clear expectations, regular feedback, coaching and rewards. Great level of accountability in teams provide a "flowful" process and high effectiveness.
Delivery over perfection
In a fast-paced world, focusing on quality can be daunting. So, designers must balance "establish and uphold quality" with "delivery over perfection." This means recognizing that delivery is an ongoing process, and that perfection is elusive. By shipping frequently, designers can build confidence and deliver the best possible products to users. Ultimately, the best way to gauge quality is not some internal assessment, but use by real people.
Development
As with any other skill set in life, there is no such thing as perfection. The current state of this manifest is exactly this, a current state. Besides reflections, new experiences, I'm strongly committed to keep exploring better ways to become a better manager. If you're interested in the resources I have used and in the future use to keep discovering and improve my leadership style, please have a look in the resource section.