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Navigating the Design Leadership Dip - Product ...

Andy Polaine
November 21, 2024

Navigating the Design Leadership Dip - Product Design Week Design Leaders+ Conference 2024

As we move into management and leadership, we unweave one identity as a designer and a person who makes things for a living, and start weaving a new one as a person who enables others to make things. There is often a moment where you lose confidence in your craft and have not gained confidence in the leadership role. I call this the Leadership Dip and it comes at a time when you're supposed to be at the top of your game. It can trigger quite an existential crisis and much of what I do in my Design Leadership coaching practice is help people navigate this.

These are the slides from my talk on the topic at the Product Design Week Design Leaders+ Conference in London, 2024.

Andy Polaine

November 21, 2024
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  1. Navigating the Design Leadership Dip ©2024 Andrew Polaine PDW Design

    Leaders+ 2024 Andy Polaine Photo by Simple on Unsplash Image: S W on Pexels Find me here:
  2. ©2024 Andrew Polaine The worst thing about growing up is

    realising adults don’t have all the answers.
  3. ©2024 Andrew Polaine Companies aren’t real. They’re just an idea.

    Companies are really… Photo by Jethro C on Pexels
  4. ©2024 Andrew Polaine Photo by James Wainscoat on Unsplash A

    group of people briefly coming together
  5. ©2024 Andrew Polaine Projects are 90% conversations. Most of the

    difficulties are people problems, not design problems. Photo by Samuel Scrimshaw on Unsplash
  6. ©2024 Andrew Polaine reading the room invited included excluded power

    structures tools methods spaces food cadence engaged disengaged divergence convergence closure structure crazy together apart mystery reveal purpose clarity pathways questions direction energy errors corrections improvisation
  7. ©2024 Andrew Polaine The Dip v2.0 – more like a

    rollercoaster Con fi dence in skills Time Young Gun Senior IC Beginner Leader/ Manager Competent Leader Con fi dent Leader
  8. ©2024 Andrew Polaine “Enabler” is a better mental model than

    “leader” Photo by Neil Thomas on Unsplash
  9. ©2024 Andrew Polaine Servant leadership is not martyrdom. Photo by

    Luis Villasmil on Unsplash Fill your cup first.
  10. ©2024 Andrew Polaine Photo: CC BY-SA 2.0 - Pavilhão Atlântico

    Find what gives you confidence on the “stage”
  11. ©2024 Andrew Polaine Improvise Everybody else is making it up,

    too ©2022 Andrew Polaine Photo by Sam Browne on Unsplash