The Design-Driven Startup: UX as Preventive Care instead of a Band-AID

I was honored to be asked to be a keynote speaker for the XD Leadership Alliance, a group I’d highly recommend to leaders in Product and Design. Thanks to the XD Leadership Alliance’s great team, here is the summery and full recording of the 50-minute talk I gave at the Columbia Tower Club on May 30, 2019:

In a world where design is often an afterthought, what does starting a startup with a user-centered design from day one look like? How do you make design a part of your company values? Together, we’ll contrast the process of adding design in later versus starting out with a designer-founder at the helm, approaches that drive startup design ROI, tactics for achieving design emphasis with tight startup resources, and pitfalls to watch out for. In addition, we’ll touch on ways to permeate company culture with design principles, whether your company was started with a design-focus or you find yourself adding it in years later.