CHRIS JACKSON - STRATEGIC DESIGN LEADERSHIP
Your team isn’t underperforming.
It's operating without a clear, shared strategy for how it creates impact. That gap shows up as friction, invisible work, and constant reprioritisation.
I help those leading design teams to build that strategy, starting with a workshop and going as deep as your team needs.
THE PROBLEM
Most design team challenges aren’t visible as problems. They show up as patterns.
Misalignment, overload, and inconsistent visibility of design’s impact.
Your team is capable, but the organisation doesn’t always see that capability clearly. Work is delivered, but strategic space is limited. And responsibility sits with you, even when the causes are systemic.
These patterns don’t resolve themselves because they sit in the space between strategy, delivery, and organisational decision-making.
And they persist until the team has a shared, explicit strategy for closing that gap.
THE DESIGN TEAM STRATEGY
A structured way to build clarity on how your design team creates impact, and a shared strategy for improving it.
It starts with a workshop. For teams that need to go deeper, it extends into advisory work grounded in your team's real operating context.
Major NZ bank · Strategy Realignment
Culture reset and redirection for a design team of 40
Reframed how a 40-person design function aligned on priorities, reducing internal friction and clarifying strategic direction across leadership layers.
Regional Council · Capability Building
Building a service design team from the ground up
Built a service design capability from inception to organisation-wide delivery maturity over three years.
ABOUT ME
I work at the intersection of design, strategy, and organisational change.
Over the past 20+ years, I’ve worked with organisations across government, financial services, energy, and technology.
I help design leaders build clarity and strategy around how their teams create impact—through workshops, capability building, and advisory work.
I’ve won 23 design awards, spoken internationally, and created the Futures of Design 2045 Scenarios.
TRACK RECORD
Recognised across design, government, and the private sector.
23
Design awards including DINZ Purple and Gold pins
500+
Downloads of the Futures of Design 2045 Scenarios
50+
Organisations across NZ, UK, Europe, and the US
20+
Years in design, strategy, and organisational change
LET’S CONNECT
If you want a low-commitment way to start, the Futures Workshop is a good first step. It’s practical, run in a couple of hours or remotely, no long engagement required.
If you're further along and want to talk about a deeper strategy engagement, the first step is usually a short conversation about what's actually happening in your team.
Ready to build strategy for your team?
Four futures for design and what they mean for how teams like yours will need to operate.
A scenario set designed to help design leaders think about how their teams may need to evolve over the next two decades.
It helps you step back from delivery, surface assumptions, and think more clearly about how your team, role, and systems may need to evolve.
Field Notes on Design and Strategy
A fortnightly digital postcard on how design really shows up inside organisations, and what shapes its success.
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