The Design Conductors: Your Essential Guide to Design Operations

Your favorite apps and programs share one thing in common: they are all thoughtfully designed. Design Operations is the business practice that ensures great design and great designers thrive and deliver meaningful impact. The Design Conductors is your comprehensive guide to DesignOps. You’ll learn how to successfully advocate for, build out, scale up, and ultimately operate design organizations.

Although The Design Conductors is definitely for designers, it’s also an essential field guide for product and project managers of all types. Anyone who works in the intersection of process and change management, such as healthcare, tech, or financial services, can learn the design methodologies used by DesignOps practitioners. People who work hand-in-hand with designers, particularly those in the fields of software, hardware, or creative design, will also find this book useful. Finally, leaders in design, product, business, and engineering should read this book to learn how to create their own DesignOps culture where teams who build great user experiences can thrive.

• Learn what DesignOps is and where it began.


• Explore the most common backgrounds for people who want to become DesignOps practitioners.


• Define the eight career competencies that all DesignOps practitioners share.


• Learn the practical application of building, running, and growing a DesignOps team--one that is already in existence or one that is built from scratch.


• Highlight the different kinds of paths a DesignOps professional can take in their career--with real-world examples.


• Operationalize values by leading to effect transformative changes in teams and businesses.


• Show how the four most common DesignOps org models influence the ways in which teams can function and be organized.


• Use the book’s comprehensive toolkit for both hiring or interviewing for a DesignOps team.

Rachel Posman is a seasoned Design Operations leader driven by the opportunity to empower teams to deliver customer and business success while achieving personal and professional growth. Currently, Rachel leads the Central DesignOps team for Salesforce's global UX organization, which designs programs, processes, and systems that enable the design of great product and employee experiences. Previously, she led design and research operations at Uber Eats, and was a Design Program Management leader for the service and experience design teams at Capital One, Adaptive Path, and others. Rachel draws inspiration from her background in business, design strategy, service design, and a first career as a professional ballet dancer, blending these disciplines into her holistic approach to problem-solving and leadership in DesignOps.

John Calhoun is a designer, writer, and operations leader living in the San Francisco Bay Area. John is currently a leader of Salesforce's Design Operations team, which builds the platform for delivering best-in-class product design solutions and experiences at scale. Previously, John was a producer and game designer for Electronic Arts, with 17 years of experience developing video games and adjacent media. Cultivating a culture of great design through the principles of confidence, clarity, and partnership is what drew John to DesignOps; enabling teams to do great work (and live great lives) will keep him in DesignOps for years to come. John is a frequent speaker on product design and operations topics, and he can be found hiking the open spaces of California and playing bass in his spare time.