Companies seeking to deliver exceptional holistic designs to boost business performance require not only great designers, but great design management and design leadership. There have been numerous articles and studies seeking to prove that that it is not the size of the design budget that necessarily leads to success, but in fact success is contingent on the way that design is led and managed. This is outlined in the case study published in the Journal of Product Innovation Management by Ricardo Chiva and Joaquín Alegre; Investment in Design and Firm Performance: The Mediating Role of Design Management1. Chiva and Alegre assert that “Design management plays a significant role in determining the effects of design investment on firm performance. Companies that manage design effectively and efficiently attain better performance than those that do not. Good design does not emerge by chance or by simply investing in design but rather as the result of a managed process.”
For an organization to create design managers and design leaders, the first position they must take is to find those who naturally want to take the proverbial leap into this territory. Designers can be good designers, or they can be good managers; rarely can they be both. Finding them is easier when the organization makes a clear option in one’s career path and provides the support to succeed.