What does a Design Strategist do?

Overview

What does a Design Strategist do?

Design Strategists mainly do three things: Design Thinking, Management Strategy, Problem-Solving/ Innovation.

The Design Strategist will be someone skilled at applying creative methods such as empathy, visualization and synthesis to frame and solve problems. The consultant should have an interest in and an aptitude for combining design thinking, entrepreneurship and traditional business strategy methods to approach client challenges, particularly in the field of service innovation. – Peer Insight

So let’s look into the career in detail.

Last updated: February 10, 2018

Basic Details

Career Industries Business Design Psychology
Compatible Personalities Clever Confident Enthusiastic Intelligent

Workplace

You will be conducting a lot of primary and secondary research. Then you will have to and interpret, distill and present research findings in a consulting or corporate environment.

You will be using a lot of tools in your day to day activities that unlock the power of creativity.

Potential Employers

Design Consultancies
Business Consultancies
Design Firms
Consulting Firms

Requirements

Education

B.Des. Business Services and System Design B.Des. Human Centered Design

Skills

Empathy
Research
Communication
Storytelling
Problem Solving
Critical Thinking
Leadership
Decision Making
Attention to Detail
Multitasking
Active Listening
Judgement

What should I know?

Firm grasp of how research guides and inspires the innovation process (with a specific interest in services). Willingness and aptitude to stretch our thinking on design research best practices.
Strength in at least two of the following areas: product/service development, business modeling, business research and analytics, design tools, prototyping
Project management skills and written and verbal communication skills.
Ability to navigate confidently between the worlds of design and business, in some cases, across multiple projects.
Should have the ability to work effectively with a wide variety of creative and analytic professionals.
Ability to display confidence and generate creative approaches in situations of ambiguity.

Is this career suitable for me?

It takes a lot of learning, experimentations, trials and failures to become good at this career profile.

Pros & Cons

There will be pros and cons for all jobs. A pro to you may be a con to your friend. So choose your career wisely according to your point of view.

Pros	Cons
No two days will be the same	Very demanding work profile
A career choice which is in demand	More about people, less about numbers
More about people, less about numbers

Roadmap

How do I get there?

From the blog

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Additional Notes

Design strategists do quite a bit on projects depending on their skill sets. Inevitably at a design consultancy, multiple people will have different overlapping skill sets so the responsibilities of any individual role become blurry.

Here are some of the main activities one have to do :

Pre Project

Help design the project
Set up research activities
Articulate the desired project outcomes

Early Project

Help the project team frame the problems being solved
Define project success criteria
Complete stakeholder interviews
Help clients state the project vision
Choose or develop conceptual models or frameworks that direct the solution

Design Research

Design or participate in the research (depending on skills)
Help researchers synthesize the findings
Frame the insights of user research insights (personas, archetypes, customer journey maps, mental models, touchpoint analysis, etc.)

Workshops

Design, facilitate, participate in client workshops
Design, facilitate, participate in internal workshops

Ideation

Come up with killer ideas
Make sure business strategy is represented in the solution
Make sure the final solution is in line with project briefings
Develop prioritization frameworks
Evaluate costs and benefits

Creative Direction

Make sure business strategy is represented in the solution
Make sure end solution meets customer needs
Review all final creative
Help present final direction

Additional Read : Know the design strategist

3 months of IDF Membership and Learn Design Thinking

Design Strategist

Overview