At some point in a UX career, craft excellence stops being the differentiator. What got you promoted won’t get you to the next level.

Moving from senior individual contributor to manager to leader requires a fundamental mindset shift – from designing interfaces to designing environments where people, teams, and strategy thrive.

In this talk, I share hard-earned lessons from my 20-year UX journey: the mistakes I made when I tried to “lead” by doing more, the discipline required to step back, and the shift from solving usability problems to solving organizational ones.

We’ll explore how to:

– Transition from tactical execution to strategic influence

– Build empowered, high-performing UX teams without becoming the bottleneck

– Translate design excellence into business outcomes leaders care about

– Clarify your personal leadership philosophy — and lead with intention

Whether you currently manage a team or aspire to, this session will help you expand your impact — designing not just better products, but stronger teams and more resilient organizations.