The document discusses designer founders in tech. It defines what is meant by design, which goes beyond just visual design to include interface, information architecture, interaction design, functional specifications, content requirements, underlying technology, and user-product-business hypotheses and objectives. It defines what is meant by designer founders, noting they need skills across engineering, design, and business stacks as well as the ability to continuously guide their product and organization through design cycles. Critical assertions made are that differentiated brand and experience design from designer founders will be crucial to short- and long-term success in the crowded consumer tech market, and having a multi-disciplinary designer founder is a competitive advantage.

1. The Future of
Designer Founders
in Tech
designerfund.com
designerfounders.com
@enriqueallen

5. We All Want the
Sweet Spot

12. Photo: What’s Next, A Design Bubble? FastCompany

13. Long Term
Awesome Design Change?
consultant client/startup
Time

14. Different types
# of Designers of designers
employees
contractors consultants
founders
Roles

15. So I got out of the
building...
And started interviewing everyone I knew
who might know something about being a
designer founder...

16. Mitch Kapor
Electronic Frontier & Mozilla Foundations
Founder of Lotus 1-2-3
MIT Mangement Science
Radio DJ & Meditator
Yale Cybernetics
Summer Science Program
Public school

17. Mitch Kapor
Engineering Design Business

18. Software Design
Manifesto
Despite the enormous outward
success of personal computers, the
daily experience of using computers
far too o en is still fraught with
di culty, pain, and barriers for most
people, which means that the
revolution, measured by its original
goals, has not as yet succeeded.

19. More Than Interface
Design
Today, the so ware designer leads a
guerrilla existence, formally
unrecognized and o en
unappreciated. There’s no spot on the
corporate organization chart or career
ladder for such an individual.

20. More Than Interface
Design
The so ware designer is concerned
primarily with the overall conception of
the product.
The look and feel of a product is but one
part of its design.

21. Firm Grounding in Tech
Many people who think of themselves
as working on the design of so ware
simply lack the technical grounding to
be an e ective participant in the
overall process. Naturally,
programmers quickly lose respect for
people who fail to understand
fundamental technical issues.

22. But...
What’s the di erence between a so ware
designer and a designer founder?

23. John Lilly
Mozilla
Reactivity
ATG Apple Labs
Trilogy
Stanford Computer Science BS/MS
Stanford CS198 Section Leader & Coordinator
Ran Toyon Eating Club

24. John Lilly
Engineering Design Business

25. Ryan Freitas
Director of Product
About.me Founder
Second Verse Principal
Plinky Director Product Design
Adaptive Path Director
MetaDesign Interaction Design
Sapient Sr Info Architect
Interval Logic GUI Developer
USD Cog Sci/HCI

26. Ryan Freitas
Engineering Design Business

27. Christina Brodbeck
Founder
YouTube Founding UI Designer
MRL Ventures Web Designer
NASA UI Designer
SFSU Flash Teaching Assistant
Giant Campus Design Instructor
Keynote Systems
Communication Design
Urban Programs Resource Center
Web Designer

28. Christina Brodbeck
Engineering Design Business

29. Dave Morin
Path Founder
Facebook Platform &
Connect Co Inventor
Apple Product & Marketing
DM Design Studios
University of Colorado

30. Dave Morin
Engineering Design Business

31. Daniel Burka
Tiny Spec Design Director
Pownce Founder
Digg
Mozilla
Silverorange
Canadian Gov’t Art

32. Daniel Burka
Engineering Design Business

33. Jason Putorti
Bessemer Venture Parnters DiR
Intuit Creative Director
Mint Lead Designer
Fitting Group Consultant
Novaurora CEO
College Prowler CTO
3N2 CTO
Freelance Web Design

34. Jason Putorti
Engineering Design Business

35. What do future
designer founders
look like?
10 startups founded by designers we
invested in...

36. Melissa Miranda
ListCharming
SkinnySkoop
MUBI
IDEO
d.Light
Darmouth & Stanford GSB

37. Melissa Miranda
Engineering Design Business

38. Thushan
Amarasiriwardena
Digital Divide Data
LongJaunt
The Boston Globe
NC State

39. Thushan
Amarasiriwardena
Engineering Design Business

40. Khoi Vinh
Lascaux Co.
TechFellow
NYT Design Director
Behavior
Rare Medium
Subtraction
Otis College of Art and Design

41. Khoi Vinh
Engineering Design Business

42. Aaron Perry Zucker
Big New Ideas
Design for Obama
Students for Barack Obama
Westside Today
Selbert Perkins Design
RISD

43. Aaron Perry Zucker
Engineering Design Business

44. Anab Jain
Ted Fellow
Nokia
Microso Research
CBS Products
Black Pepper Images
Royal College of Art
National of Design

45. Anab Jain
Engineering Design Business

46. Tracy Osborn
Limedaring
Remilon
CalPoly SLO

47. Tracy Osborn
Engineering Design Business

48. Nina Khosla
Betaworks
Lokho Design
IDEO
Empire Attack
fuseproject
Stanford Product Design

49. Nina Khosla
Engineering Design Business

50. Maurice Woods
Pentagram
Studio Hinrichs
Inneract
AIGA
Zimmerman Design
U of Washington

51. Maurice Woods
Engineering Design Business

52. Jennifer Lopez &
Abby Sturges
Stanford Product Design
Stanford Product Design
Newmark Industries
Hopkins Center for the Arts
Radius Product Dev
Dartmouth
Carnegie Mellon

53. Jennifer Lopez &
Abby Sturges
Engineering Design Business

54. Matt Sullivan
Yummrs
IDEO
ChipIn
DragonBridge Capital
Elepaio Enterprises
Middleburry College

55. Matt Sullivan
Engineering Design Business

57. All these companies
have designer
founders

58. Summary
So...

59. What Do We Mean
by Design (not just visual)?
Visual Design
Interface - Navigation - Info Design
Info Architecture - Interaction Design
Functional Specs - Content Reqs
Underlying Tech - IP
User - Product - Biz Hypotheses & Objectives
PRIVATE

60. What Do We Mean by
Designer Founders?
Engr Design Biz
Visual
IA
IxD
User Research

61. What Do We Mean by
Designer Founders?
Engr Design Biz
Visual
IA
IxD
User Research
Designer founders
need to continuously
guide their product &
organization through
the design stack cycles

62. What Do We Mean by
Designer Founders?
Engr Design Biz
Front end Visual Customer Support
Platform speci c IA Sales
Customer/Biz
Back- end IxD
Development
User Research Biz model & Operation
Tech DNA & Product Mngt.
Mngt.

63. What Do We Mean by
Designer Founders?
Engr Design Biz
Front end Visual Customer Support
Platform speci c IA Sales
Customer/Biz
Back- end IxD
Development
User Research Biz model & Operation
Tech DNA & Product Mngt.
Mngt.
Designer founders need
to continuously move
horizontally with skills
in engr & biz stacks

64. Critical Mass of
Engineering,
Design & Biz Skills
Don’t worry so much about
de nitions & titles...let the product
impact speak for itself...

65. Assertion #1
As the consumer tech market becomes
more crowded, di erentiated brand &
experience design is becoming critical to
both short & long term success

66. Assertion #2
Successful designer founders will attract
the remaining distribution of aspiring
design talent
Designer Founders
Awesome
# of Designers

67. Assertion #3
Designer founders have unique skills (not
just visual) to understand human needs,
make products that people actually want,
& communicate persuasively
Visual Design
Interface - Navigation - Info Design
Information Architecture - Interaction Design
Functional Specs - Content Reqs
Underlying Tech - IP
User - Product - Biz Hypotheses & Objectives

68. Assertion #4
Having a multi-disciplinary designer
founder that can lead & model design
practices is a competitive advantage
especially when combined with
engineering & business co-founders
Visual,
Interaction,
Engineering,
Jason Putorti, & Biz Skillz
Designer Founder

69. Assertion #5
Partners have an appetite for designer
founders who are capable of leading
product innovation within their companies

70. Lastly
“The most important social evolution within the computing
professions would be to create a role for the so ware
designer as a champion of the user experience.... What is
design? ... It’s where you stand with a foot in two worlds—
the world of technology and the world of people and human
purposes—and you try to bring the two together.”
-Terry Winograd

71. Lastly
“The most important social evolution within the tech startup
professions would be to create a role for the designer
founder as a champion of the user experience.... What is a
designer founder? ... It’s a person who stands with a foot in
two worlds—the world of technology and the world of
people and human purposes—and brings the two
together.”
-Enrique Allen

74. The Future of
Designer Founders
in Tech
designerfund.com
designerfounders.com
@enriqueallen