1.
Emmet Connolly
@thoughtwax
From Visual Design
to Vision Design
VP of Product Design
Intercom
UXDX Dublin
Oct 2022
The role of Product Designers
in shaping product direction

2.
Shift from big tech to business impact
More disruptive change is coming
Designers now desire greater “strategic impact”
Design can
fi
ll a critical company gap
FOUR DRIVERS OF CHANGE
1.
2.
3.
4.

3.
DESIGNERSSHOULDSHAPE
PRODUCTVISION

4.
Where did we come from,
where do we go?
The seat-at-the-table-i
fi
ciation of design
PART I

5.
2000s 2010s

6.
Always design a thing by considering
it in its next larger context—
a chair in a room,
a room in a house,
a house in an environment,
an environment in a city plan.
Eliel Saarinen

7.
https://designerfund.com/business-impact

8.
Customer
problem
Product
solution
Business
impact
→ →

9.
Customer
opportunity
Customer
problem
Product
solution
→ →

10.
Business
focused
User
focused

11.
Syd Mead sketch
youtube.com
syd mead, cityscape, retrofuturism, highly detailed, soft
lighting, 8k resolution, oil on canvas, architectural
magazine
Stable Diffusion

12.
https://twitter.com/wbuchw/status/1563162131024920576

13.
Execution-focused Execution and strategy-focused
→

14.
“I want to work on strategy”

15.
Designers are seeking out strategy work

16.
Designers
Organisational
requirements
Product
Vision

17.
Strategy
What we want

18.
Strategy
What we want
Execution
How we build
→

19.
Strategy
What we want
Vision
What to build
Execution
How we build
→ →

20.
Understanding of customers, business, competitors
Facilitation and synthesis
Creativity, idea generation, product intuition
Exploration, divergence and convergence
Ability to tell a compelling story about the future
Ability to bring ideas to life visually
In short… DESIGN SKILLS!

21.
Designers are ideally suited
to fill this gap

22.
Shift from big tech to business impact
More disruptive change is coming
Designers now desire greater “strategic impact”
Design can
fi
ll a critical company gap
FOUR DRIVERS OF CHANGE
1.
2.
3.
4.

23.
What even is a
product vision?
And how to create one in several hundred simple steps
PART II

24.
Strategy
What we want
Vision
What to build
Execution
How we build
→ →

25.
Understanding Comics, Scott McCloud

26.
PRODUCT VISION CASE STUDY: INTERCOM INBOX

27.
Form a working group
• De
fi
ne DACI
• Set up working sessions

28.
Align on the objectives
• Why do you need a vision?
• What is the scope of the vision?
• How will you use it?

29.
Start collecting ideas
• From a broad group, right away
• Use as inputs for brainstorming later

30.
Uncover key problems and
opportunities
• Gather existing research
• Conduct new research
• Audit the product yourself
• Group it into themes
• Score them (frequency, importance)

31.
Gather inputs for
brainstorming
• How competitors solve these problems
• How other industries solve similar
problems

32.
Plan cross-functional design
workshops
• How will you use the time?
• Who should be there?
• What problems or opportunities are you
going to explore?

33.
Run cross-functional design
workshops
• Gather a broad set of ideas
• Discuss the most interesting ideas

34.
Synthesise the results
• Group similar ideas together
• Describe or visualise
• Rank them by potential and ambiguity
• Pair with someone on this

35.
Develop promising but
ambiguous ideas further
• Disambiguate the solution at a high
level

36.
Evaluate the ideas
• Which have the biggest potential?
• Consider your con
fi
dence, effort,
ambiguity, differentiation, revenue
impact, etc.

37.
Test the most promising ideas
with customers
• Show customers
• Show your Sales team
• Understand what resonates and what
doesn't
😇

38.
Develop key pillars for the
vision
• What are the broader themes?
• How will they help you win?
• How will you explain it to customers?
• What’s your revenue hypothesis?

39.
Turn it into a story and
communicate it
• Strategy → Vision → Outcome
• Share it far and wide, get buy-in
(getting folks involved in workshops
makes this easier)

40.
Plan how you'll bring the
vision to life
• Team remits
• Key projects
• Sequence

41.
DESIGNERSSHOULDSHAPE
PRODUCTVISION

42.
Emmet Connolly
@thoughtwax
From Visual Design
to Vision Design
VP of Product Design
Intercom
UXDX Dublin
Oct 2022
The role of Product Designers
in shaping product direction