10 character traits of an effective design leader

When the management-level role was thrust upon me, I felt the impending weight of responsibility. I always had a manager who I reported to over the years, but they were never in my domain of design. They weren’t a design leader.

That’s fine and all, but I was at the start of building a design team. I would have the opportunity to get geeky with the craft, but more importantly I would be able to relate to them in terms of the greater design struggles in a business environment.

I found there are universal character traits that make for an effective leader. When you flavor these with the empathy of having been a designer you magnify the effect.

As the team grew, it worked exceptionally well. There’s a big difference between leadership theory and the everyday lab. A person leading a design team who knows Design is going to connect with team members on the nuances of the job. Likely because they also lived through the same struggles and successes.

For those who aren’t leading a design team, you can become this person in how you step up in the day to day product team work. Future design leaders are those who develop these traits years before they step into the role.

An overview of three character traits

Here are three, but you can get all 10 below. I also walked through these three in detail in Episode 9 of The Daily Sprint podcast.

Number 4 / Make requests clear

So often those requests go unanswered, unfulfilled, or simply take forever. It need not be that way. The simple template is this:

• Make a one or two sentence introduction.
• Then make your request in three parts:
  • Start the request with the phrase, “Would you…”
  • Be specific with what you’re requesting
  • End with a time frame of the request

End the message with this question, and don’t add any other comments or questions. This way, it keeps their focus and naturally leads them to address it directly in their response.

Number 6 / Grow good things, heal broken relationships

There are so many reasons why this works, but it’s something we were made to understand intuitively. It’s relevant for every relationship we have.

Make a note when you see team members doing good things. Whether it’s treating a difficult stakeholder kindly, or helping a fellow team member, encourage them to do more. The flip-side to this is when there is conflict. Whether it’s between team members or people outside the design team, you need to be right there.

Broken relationships which aren’t healed means there’s no way you can grow good things on the team.

Number 8 / Make comments with caution

Getting comfortable with the team is different than being buddies with them.

What this means is when you comment in a design review and there are other team members involved, whatever you say will end up being the final word. You may not want to have the final word, or you may simply desire to contribute top the conversation.

The trick to this is to always let others make their comments first. You may immediately see the answer, but let them explore the space.

Join a thoughtful journey through the 10 character traits with a free email series

Starting with today, I’ll give you a characteristic each day. Think about it, see where you can implement it, and tweak in your own leadership journey.

Lead on!