Inclusive and Radical Design with the New Design Buyer featuring Detria Williamson, CMO of IDEO
Thinking creatively is the key modus operandi at any good design company. When you’re the Chief Marketing Officer at a global design firm, as is our guest Detria Williamson, you think creatively, down to the bones of the organization. The members of the marketing team, the executioners of the plan, play a critical role in maximizing the effectiveness of the strategy. Williamson leads the IDEO Marketing team to design for the evolving needs, and learn how to speak to the new design buyer. Truly diverse and creative design requires a team representing the spectrum of race, gender, social class, education, and upbringing.
“[I’m] not just looking at diversity in terms of gender diversity, in terms of ethnicity — those to me are table stakes. When you hire radically inclusive leaders, those things just happen. They should happen automatically. But [also] diversity in terms of how they gain their skills. If you actually recruit everybody out of San Francisco, that’s grown up the same way that’s come out of the same type of households. It’s had the same track through the UC schools, — no knock against UC schools or the schools there — You’re probably going to get people that approach a problem with the same sort of approach, they come with the same stories, the same way they attack problems.
That out-of-the-box way that Williamson thinks about the design process has led her to be known in the industry for creating a term coined Inclusive Customer Experience. She gives some words of wisdom about what the most important three pillars of good design are.
“[There are] three [key] things from a design perspective: one is, designing for inclusion. Two is, designing for privacy and three is, designing for experience. CMOs have to do that. I would almost throw a fourth one in there which is, design for growth.
Her revolutionary way of thinking about design trickles down to how she thinks about building her team of designers, seeking individuals from varied backgrounds with a diversity of ideas. Learn more from Detria and IDEO on this full episode of Marketing Trends.
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