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I’m the founder of the Human Centered Design Network and the creator of This is HCD, the leading human-centered design podcast with over 1.5 million downloads. We empower organisations worldwide with expert design training and coaching for executives, designers and teams.
Part 4 of 4 - Sustaining Yourself and the Team
Hello Reader, Series contentsPart 1 - The Mindset (last week)Part 2 - Tactics for EnablementPart 3 - The Emotional ChallengePart 4 - Leadership Tools Hello Reader, We’ve walked through the arc: the mindset shift (Part 1), the tactics to enable others (Part 2), and the messy reality of leadership (Part 3). Now comes the hardest part: sustaining yourself and your team over the long run. Leadership isn’t about making a single leap into management — it’s about learning how to keep going, to lead...
Part 3 of 4 | Letting Go of Control
The Emotional Challenge Hello Reader, Series contentsPart 1 - The Mindset (last week)Part 2 - Tactics for EnablementPart 3 - The Emotional ChallengePart 4 - Leadership Tools If Part 1 was about the mindset shift and Part 2 about the tactics, Part 3 is about the human cost of stepping into enablement. Because let’s be honest: this isn’t just an intellectual exercise. It’s an emotional one too. Well it is and it was for me. Most design leaders built their identity around the craft. We were the...
Part 2 of 4 | Why Saying “No” Makes You a Better Design Leader
Closed Doors Vs Open Doors Hello Reader, Series contentsPart 1 - The Mindset (last week)Part 2 - Tactics for EnablementPart 3 - The Emotional ChallengePart 4 - Leadership Tools If Part 1 was about the why — making the uncomfortable but necessary shift from doer to enabler — Part 2 is about the how. Mindset alone won’t change much unless you put new practices in place that reinforce it. This is where design leadership becomes less about heroic delivery and more about building the scaffolding...
Part 1 of 4 | Unlock Your Leadership Potential
Closed Doors Vs Open Doors Hello Reader, Series contentsPart 1 - The MindsetPart 2 - Tactics for EnablementPart 3 - The Emotional ChallengePart 4 - Leadership Tools Most design leaders begin where we all do: in the craft. We often get recognised and promoted because we’re good at the craft itself. Back in 2008, I was lucky to have a mentor, Luke Schreur — a software engineer and one of the sharpest, kindest thinkers I’ve known. He told me something that’s stuck ever since: organisations have...
The Young and Old Test: A Simple Check for a Meaningful Path
Closed Doors Vs Open Doors Hello, Reader, Last week I wrote about cultivating teams and why I lean towards hiring optimists — the people who see open doors rather than closed ones. This week, I want to zoom out and look at something a bit more personal — not about who you hire, but about how you measure your own path. I came across something recently called The Young and Old Test. The idea is beautifully simple: • Would the child you once were be happy with the person you’ve become? • Would...
Optimists, Pessimists, and the Secret to Cultivating a Great Team
Closed Doors Vs Open Doors Hello, Reader, Hiring the right people is one of the hardest and most impactful things you’ll ever do as a design leader. I’ve seen brilliant strategies and well-funded programmes stall because the wrong mindsets got in the door. I’ve also seen lean, under-resourced teams punch far above their weight because they were filled with the right people — not just in skills, but in outlook. Over the years, I’ve found myself coming back to one trait, almost unconsciously,...
Navigating the "what's the f#cking point stage" of Design
Hello, Reader, There’s a part of design work we rarely speak about. Not because it’s unimportant — but because it’s uncomfortable. Unglamorous. Unshareable. It’s the “what’s the f#cking point?” stage. The part where you’re deep in the work, and nothing seems to move. The part where enthusiasm evaporates and the daily tasks feel like pushing wet sand uphill. Where you’re having more low days than high ones. Where it feels like you’re the only one who still cares. You might be in a government...
Trust Comes First
Hello, Reader, When we talk about enabling service design to take root inside organisations—whether that’s building a service architecture, launching transformation projects, or embedding design capability—it’s tempting to jump straight into tools, structures, and processes. But lately, I’ve been sitting with a deeper question: What truly needs to be in place first? It’s a theme I’m exploring for several upcoming conference talks, where I’ll be speaking about the foundational conditions...
When They Don’t Know What HCD Is
Hey Reader, Something unexpected—and kind of incredible—happened this week. Earlier today, I was invited into the Irish Government to meet with a Senator. The topic? Homelessness, and the role that design—and specifically, my podcast—might play in shifting understanding and education around it. I’ll be honest: I felt proud to be in that room. But what happened next caught me off guard. This Senator, someone with real influence and power, had no idea what Human-Centered Design was. They had...
The People Who Shape Us – A Reflection Exercise That Changed Me
Hat tip to Ed Sheeran for the title. I’m not a superfan, but I respect his creative journey and what he’s achieved—it’s pretty remarkable. Not know the song? Prepare for the ear-worm to enter your brain. Hey Reader, Years ago, someone said something to me that stuck: “You can predict where you’ll be in five years by looking at the five people closest to you today.” Now I am not entirely too sure it's that cut and dry, but nevertheless it hit home. If the people around you don’t align with...
I’m the founder of the Human Centered Design Network and the creator of This is HCD, the leading human-centered design podcast with over 1.5 million downloads. We empower organisations worldwide with expert design training and coaching for executives, designers and teams.