The document discusses how designers can take on more leadership roles by taking ownership of client goals. It argues that designers currently have limited influence, but that by making themselves accountable for measurable outcomes, they can use their creativity and ideas to profoundly impact businesses and society. The document outlines that it will explore how designers can claim ownership, discuss the courage needed in their new responsibilities, and envision what a designer-led world could look like.

1. Design is Leadership
Patrick Gibson

2. Problem
In the typical role as tradesperson, a designer
has limited opportunity to make his or her biggest
ideas heard.

3. Hypothesis
By taking ownership of a client's goals, the
designer becomes a leader who can measurably
impact business and society.
When designers shoulder the risk of failure, they
possess the authority to use their conviction and
courage of imagination to profound effect.

4. Creative References
Jonathan Ive
Senior Vice President of Industrial Design
at Apple, Inc.
“Today, Apple represents the most successful and
faithful marriage of business and design, as $32
billion in sales last year attest. And Ive has been
the company's lodestar in its journey to global
trendsetter.”
— Chuck Salter, Fast Company

5. Creative References
David Plouffe
Chief Campaign Manager for Barack Obama’s
2008 presidential campaign
“ The story of Mr. Obama’s journey to the pinnacle
of American politics is the story of a campaign that
was, even in the view of many rivals, almost
flawless. Mr. Plouffe [was] known for his
mathematic invocation of data in making decisions.
When Mr. Obama decided to run for the
presidency, Mr. Plouffe and a half-dozen staff
members began plotting out a strategy.”
— Adam Nagourney, Jim Rutenberg and Jeff
Zeleny, The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/05/us/politics/05recon.html

6. Creative References
Paul Rand
Designer of Enron Logo
“ You couldn't take a picture of Enron's crime:
it all happened in the world of numbers and
spreadsheets, of financial reports and affidavits.
But there was something you could take a picture
of, and that was Rand's logo. A company with a
made-up name, incomprehensible business
practices, and largely intangible assets suddenly
had a vivid manifestation, a logo that once might
have stood for nimbleness, balance and
connectivity, now given new life as 'the crooked
E.'”
— Michael Bierut, Design Observer

7. From the Valorized Designer
"What we need in the next century are
independently-minded, creative, constructive
designers who are not just 'capitalist lackeys,'
ideologues,' or 'technical whiz-kids.'"
— Nigel Whiteley

8. From the Valorized Designer
Indeed, tomorrow's designer must not create mere
graphic artifact and ephemera, but instead design
larger architectures employing these artifacts to
profound and noticeable consequence, with
accountability for the results.

9. Content Outline
Introduction: Problem and Hypothesis
Part 1: "The Paul Rand Problem"
• Design's Origins in the Typesetting Trade
• Paul Rand, Enron, and the "Consumerized" Designer
• The Design Consultant
• Could Design be Outsourced?

10. Content Outline
Part 2: "Claiming Ownership"
• The Importance of Measurable Results
• Becoming a Leader
• Designer as Entrepreneur
• Examples of the New Designer
• Barriers to this Model

11. Content Outline
Part 3: "The Courage of Imagination"
• What the New Responsibility Means for the Profession
• Design's Importance in a Complex Society/Economy
• What a Designer-led World Could Look Like

12. Potential Sources
• Interviews
• TED lectures
• Fast Company
• Wired
• Good
• Chip and Dan Heath’s Switch and Made to Stick
• Philip Kotler’s On Marketing
• Malcolm Gladwell’s Tipping Point