One company I have always strongly admired for their leadership style and the way they value and encourage creativity and innovation is IDEO. They are a design consultancy dating back to 1991, when designers and engineers merged their existing firms on the premise that these two disciplines should be collaborating together, instead of the common practice of designers creating a solution only to have it altered in the engineering phase. Founder David Kelley in the video below talks about this simple change from the normal way of working, and how it helped both sides present more innovative and ultimately successful solutions when they worked together, considering both form and function in tandem throughout the design process.
Stemming from this new way of working was the concept of human-centered design, pioneered by IDEO and later adapted throughout the design industry. Again a rather simple concept, yet not the standard practice at the time (or even today) - it’s the idea of consulting the people you are designing for, rather than creating solutions for them from the top down. By taking this approach, they acknowledge that a product or service with a difficult learning curve for its users does not fall on the responsibility of the user, but rather is an indication of poor design. This valuable insight led to design research and user testing being addressed early on in the design process, in order to ensure a quality result that could be as simple as possible for the intended users.
IDEO exemplifies a truly transformational leadership style across the board - within the company culture, in their influence on the industry and society, and through their efforts to expand their methodology beyond their own staff. Inside the company, their hiring strategies and internal culture are committed to diversity in every sense of the word. Beyond just a policy of inclusion, they value individual uniqueness, and seek to know what you care about outside of work - talents, hobbies, and passions. Allowing employees to embrace their uniqueness in the workplace can certainly be an asset to the company, especially working in a creative field. However, considering Google’s learnings from Project Aristotle, we have also seen how important it is for people to feel comfortable being themselves at work. Creating a culture of acceptance not only makes us feel happier, more respected, and more confident, but this also leads to improved collaboration and greater creativity if we have mutual respect for each other, and do not need to fear rejection of our ideas.
IDEO has expanded these principles outside of their own walls and become a powerful thought leader and educator throughout the industry. Through David Kelley’s founding of Stanford’s d.school for design, an online education division called IDEO U, and the crowdsourcing project platform OpenIDEO, they have numerous ways of bringing designers and creators everywhere into the fold, keeping them continually improving and engaged in the latest design strategies. Most importantly, they aim to spread their mission of designing for a positive impact throughout the industry. Having a core mission that others want to be a part of is incredibly important - it is what has made them stand apart from other design consultancies, and how they have been successful at attracting and retaining the right people for their team.