Audrey Liu

Forrester reports that companies investing in design-driven innovation see a 228% ROI. As someone who advocates for design to have a seat at the table, I love this stat! But companies evolve… and so should design. It’s no longer *just* about securing a seat; it’s about questioning if you want a seat at *that* table. Maybe it’s about building a new one. One that welcomes the voices too often left out. ❤️

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With no affiliation, sharing this as I know it will be good. Peter Merholz's ideas have been instrumental in my shaping of design teams. As iF Design point out here - the right environment around the design team is key to producing a successful team. The role of the leader is to create that environment.

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I’ve been reflecting on a recent conversation about design as control versus design as collaboration. Dr. Liz Gerber puts it this way, "AI...has been promised to do whatever we want. The one thing it can’t do is tell us what we want." Jai Shekhawat asked, "What might a future interface look like?" I’d challenge us to even expand that question to include what future societies might look like when we prioritize collaboration over control, inclusion over speed, sustainability over scale. Whether design, technology, media, or civic spaces, the common thread is the same: we cannot outsource human values to systems. I believe our work is to invite possibility, to imagine what humans want before tech imposes what’s possible. “To create anything new and novel, you have to be prepared to do something different to get after it," Kevin Bethune notes. As design finds its role alongside AI, we can feel confident that our choices shape systems, not the other way around. What choices then are we making today, in design, in media, in our communities, to ensure human dignity leads the way? Thank you to Lee Moreau for convening the conversation.

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This is what investing in AI in design looks like. As with many other job families, the design industry focuses on what might the impact of AI be: will it lower the quality with slop? Will it replace humans? Etc But I don't see much focus on to understand and really capitalise on the potential AI brings to design. We are largely treating it as any other tool: a way to get incrementally better. At best it's a short course for the designers, at worst it's expecting designers to already know how to use it. But AI has the potential for making radical shifts and leaps. I'd love to hear, and learn, from anyone who is making significant strides to drive AI transformation in design.

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Similar to the power of, “yes and”, design’s core value is the craft itself applied to experiences; does not matter if it’s a UI, customer journey, or onboarding experience for new hires. Running Marketing and Design at Replit is one of the many fond memories for the ages. Designers, it’s okay to do work outside your department.

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If your personas describe users in isolation, you’re limiting impact. Real work is collaborative, constrained, and increasingly shaped by automated systems. Our design artifacts need to reflect that reality. This piece explores what it means to expand personas beyond the single user, and why relationships between actors matter just as much as the actors themselves. https://lnkd.in/g4dxrrHx #designexcellence #designleadership #userpersona #AIintegration

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Leadership isn’t about control, it’s about care. In a great essay for MassArt Design Innovation, Peilan Liang writes: “We need your presence, not just your plans.” Her piece is a gentle call for a new model of design leadership, one grounded in listening, co-creation, and trust. For anyone starting out and navigating complex, fast-moving teams, this one’s worth reading. https://lnkd.in/eKMMHnPh #DesignLeadership #MassArtMDES #PsychologicalSafety #LeadWithCare #HumanFirstLeadershi

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A lot of conversations I have with design teams start the same way: “We’re moving fast… but we keep circling back.” It’s rarely a skill issue. It’s a timing issue. Most misalignment doesn’t come from bad design. It comes from discovering truth too late—after engineering starts, after a sprint closes, or after launch. And the cost of that delay is enormous. A late fix can be 100× more expensive than catching the issue early. But the teams that validate upfront—concepts, prototypes, even simple assumptions—consistently move faster, not slower. I’ve seen: • 25% fewer iteration cycles • Clearer rationale behind decisions • Less friction between design, product, and engineering Early insight isn’t a tax on velocity. It’s the engine of velocity. When we test earlier, we spend less time reworking and more time progressing. And our teams feel it—not just in timelines, but in confidence and morale. These themes are showing up across the teams featured in our newest Leadership Signal. It’s a great pulse check on how leaders are tightening alignment earlier in the process. https://bit.ly/4ixuGp2

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The biggest shift I have seen as a VP of Design isn't AI-generated wireframes or prototyping shortcuts. It is designers using AI to step directly into frontend coding. No more design QA. No more translating Figma into tickets. Designers polish the experience in the same medium the user actually sees and feels. This change transformed my team. Designers loved the autonomy. Engineers loved being free to work on complex backend code. Quality went up, and we shipped faster. The more I talk with design leaders, the clearer it is that this will not stay a niche skill. This is becoming part of how modern design teams work. I launched CraftAmplify to help designers build this skill properly. We focus on writing production-quality code rather than prototypes. The response has been incredible. Thank you to everyone who put in the work and started shipping real code. Watching designers push their first production PR has been the highlight of my year. Each cohort is capped at five designers to keep the experience hands-on. I checked this morning, and there is only one seat left for all of 2025, so I added new sessions for January and February 2026. Details are here: https://lnkd.in/eXqsMadG #ProductDesign #Frontend #AI #DesignEngineering #CraftAmplify

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“In research and design, language matters – because what you ask for shapes what you get. Understanding the difference between observations, themes, and insights is essential – not just as a semantic exercise, but as a way to do more meaningful work.” My Symplicit colleague Kate Schie breaks down observations, themes, and insights in her article, walking through how they build on each other and how we can articulate them to frame action on the back of research.

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GV (Google Ventures) have a long history of hiring former designers and design leaders to support their portfolio companies. Folks like Jake Knapp, John Zeratsky, Kate Aronowitz, Daniel Burka, Braden Kowitz, Vanessa Cho, and Tom Hulme. In my latests podcast interview, Kate Aronowitz explains why this is, and what designers bring to the table. Interestingly it's not about craft, but rather the way they see the world with a beginners mind.

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This is a fantastic read on the evolving role designers must play. I love the section on the Inversion of Paradigms. How are you evolving your role as a designer? What's working, and why? What's not, and why? https://lnkd.in/eAMVaA7X

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