An interview with Ryan Scott

Ryan Scott is Founder of Accelerate Design and will be speaking on ‘Describing the ROI of Design’ at Leading Design London 2024 (6–7 November) at the Barbican Centre.

For nearly 20 years, Ryan Scott has run multiple businesses, coached hundreds of designers, and led numerous cross-functional teams to launch some of today’s most recognisable products.

His perspective on design leadership is shaped by his experience in-house at startups of every scale. As one of the first designers at DoorDash, he reported to one of the company’s co-founders and led multiple 0-to-1 product launches, including live order tracking, mobile group orders, remote driver training, and the company’s food photography program. At Airbnb, Ryan led multiple cross-functional teams to redesign and rebuild the company’s most business-critical products.

Now, Ryan teaches and coaches experienced designers in the business skills necessary to excel at the leadership level.

Ahead of his talk at Leading Design London, we caught up with Ryan to ask him about overcoming challenges and the importance of design leaders understanding the wider business.

What would you say the top three character traits of an effective leader are?

1. Empathy. Towards users, but also towards direct reports and cross-functional partners. Empathy is the basis for strong negotiation.
2. Strategy. A deep understanding of the big picture, and how design fits in as the company constantly grows and adapts to market forces.
3. Responsibility. This is twofold. 1. They set their teams up for success by providing additional tools and training, and 2. They recognise, own, and work to resolve the structural, operational, and cultural challenges that hold back ICs from delivering their best work.

Which leader has had the greatest impact on you over the years?

I worked under Alex Schleifer when he was Airbnb’s Chief Design Officer. Alex grew Airbnb’s team from a couple dozen to hundreds of Designers, all while stewarding Design’s culture and influence as the company hired PMs, engineers, and designers from less design-led tech companies.

Here was a Design team that flipped the script on what was expected from designers. Expert-level craft was a given. What got you ahead was strategic thinking, sales and negotiation skills, and understanding how your work impacted the big picture.

At Airbnb, not only was I able to do the best design work of my career, it’s also where I started asking big questions about our work and industry:
- What is Design’s business impact?
- Why do PMs have so much influence?
- Why can’t designers drive the roadmap?
- When does data lead to poor decision making?
- Why aren’t more designers in the board room?

What is the greatest challenge you have faced as a leader?

At many companies, the biggest recurring challenge has simply been the slow attrition of morale when designers don’t feel seen or heard.

Business folks often have significant misconceptions about what Design is and does. As an industry, we still have a lot of work to do there.

On the other hand, there are also unproductive ways designers think about business. I heard one design leader describe business folks as “the other side.” Another designer framed the idea of understanding business better as “abandoning the user.” These perspectives don’t serve us.

One question that helps me think and act strategically is, “would you rather be right, or effective?”

I want designers to be better positioned in our businesses to gain influence, drive impact, and be rewarded. My recent approach has been giving designers new tools and perspectives to open our minds — and sometimes, get out of our own way — to achieve our higher-level aspirations.

At previous Leading Design conferences there has been a lot of debate about how much design should concern itself with the ‘business’. Why do you think it’s important for design leaders to understand the wider business?

This question is more revealing when asked in reverse: “What’s the advantage of not understanding the wider business?” I’ve seen zero strategic benefit to not understanding business better.

Why advocate for Design with one hand tied behind your back? User problems and business problems are two sides of the same coin. If the user has a problem, the business will have a problem, and often vice versa.

Some stakeholders are compelled by the user problem, while others are compelled by the business problem. That’s fine, because a great solution will address both.

When people are motivated by different interests and incentives, I want to shape my argument to whatever will be most compelling to them. To do that well, it helps to have some understanding of things like the competitive landscape, macroeconomic environment, go-to-market strategy, performance metrics, and financial outcomes.

What signal does it send if our empathy and curiosity stop at users? If you’re in-house at a tech company, Design is always a minority. “Business” — whether that be strategy, sales, marketing, finance, etc — is what 99% of a company’s employees spend their time on. As a designer, why would I expect that people listen to my perspective if I don’t show interest in the thing that 99% of employees spend 100% of their time on?

Understanding business grows our careers, not just our companies. Business tools and frameworks — like go-to-market strategy, positions vs interests, Diffusion of Innovations — are incredibly powerful when deployed by designers to move a company towards Design.

For the last year, I’ve been teaching these tactics to designers. Many have seen senior business leaders support their ideas, have been asked to lead business-critical projects, and have been rewarded with promotions and raises.

Not embracing business tactics and lessons only prevents designers from leveraging tools that could help us succeed.

If you can’t beat them, lead them. Entrepreneurship isn’t for everyone, but I think our industry would benefit from more design-founders. At Airbnb in 2018, Brian Chesky asked us, “why shouldn’t designers be in the board room?”

Instead of climbing a corporate ladder built by non-designers for non-designers, why not build our own companies and develop products our own way? The ability to carve your own path is rewarding and fulfilling, and becomes more accessible with some business savvy.

How important do you think it is for execs to fundamentally understand design? And if it is important, how do you enable them to do so?

Design creates enormous business value when leveraged correctly. Business leaders are better prepared to create value for their customers, win marketshare, and out-position the competition when Design is a tool they know how to wield strategically.

That being said, it’s our responsibility to help non-designers understand how design creates business value. Having attended business school, I can attest that business leaders aren’t being trained on Design the same as disciplines like Strategy, Marketing, or Finance. If Design is “product” we’re selling to a “customer,” it’s our job to create value props that resonate and make non-designers want to “buy.”

Making any effort to speak the same language as business leaders can go a long way — because business folks don’t expect it. Often, they’re delighted. As a CTO put it to one of my alumni, “I didn’t know designers worked or thought this way.” Understanding their priorities, incentives, and goals — and then explaining how Design will help drive those outcomes — is a huge first step.

What advice do you have for design leaders who are working in an org that doesn’t already understand and value design?

If your current tactics aren’t working, try new tactics.

Leverage a user research mindset and deeply investigate what matters to your “target customer.” What pain points are they experiencing? Where are they struggling? What are they afraid of? Whenever I had a difficult stakeholder relationship, the unlock was pausing my agenda and focusing on first understanding their needs and concerns.

Many business-leaders are open-minded to discovering new types of value. If designers suddenly step up and start talking about our work in business terms, many business leaders do a double-take. Start with what you can control: You. Invest in deeply understanding your company’s goals, motivations, and strategy. Speak to the business rationale of your design decisions and see what happens. You may be surprised by the response.

And finally, what are you currently listening to, reading or watching?

I recently finished Slow Productivity by Cal Newport.

The book posits that productivity is naturally non-linear, but that the agricultural and industrial revolutions conditioned us to think about work and productivity as a linear function of input-to-output (i.e. x hours in a factory = y widgets).

The knowledge economy is more abstract and creative, so the linear relationship between “hours worked = widgets created” no longer makes sense. Periods of pause and reflection actually help fuel clarity that lead to bursts of productivity.

It’s an interesting read for designers, especially if you’re stuck in a “feature factory” type product environment.

We are delighted to have Ryan speak about ‘Describing the ROI of Design’ at Leading Design London 2024 (6–7 November).

Leading Design is brought to you by Clearleft, a strategic design consultancy based in the UK. We work with global brands to design and redesign products and services, bring strategic clarity, and transform digital culture.