Leadership talks

Leadership is the work of setting direction, earning trust and creating the conditions in which a team can do its best work. It is not limited to people with a manager title: designers, researchers and product managers lead whenever they frame a problem, bring people around a shared goal or argue for the user.

For UI, UX and product design, leadership matters because good design rarely survives on craft alone. Teams need a clear purpose, psychological safety to experiment and leaders who can connect user needs to business goals. Cross-functional and agile ways of working make this even more important, since decisions are spread across many people rather than handed down.

The five talks here span 2010 to 2016. Simon Sinek gives three of them: “How great leaders inspire action” and “First why and then trust” at TED Talks, and “Why Leaders Eat Last” at the 99U Conference. Jeff Gothelf shares “Almost Everything I’ve Learned From 5 Years of Lean UX” at UX Poland, and Jon Kolko speaks at Midwest UX on “How to Use Empathy to Create Products People Love”. Related themes include team management, design thinking, creativity and the design process.