CHRIS JACKSON - WELLINGTON, NZ
I work with design leaders when the organisation around their team is changing.
Most design teams don’t struggle with talent. They struggle with system clarity—how work flows, how decisions are made, how design is understood, and how strategy connects to execution.
That gap is where performance is lost.
THE STORY
What I do now.
Strategy
I help design leaders make sense of what's changing around their teams, clarify strategic direction, and decide what their design organisation needs to become.
Advisory
I work alongside design leaders as a strategic thinking partner when the answers aren't obvious. I help them navigate change, test decisions, understand organisational dynamics and work out what to do next.
Future Readiness
I help teams step back from immediate delivery, challenge the assumptions shaping how they work, and explore how their role, capabilities and ways of working may need to evolve.
The common thread is simple:
I help design leaders understand what is changing, what it means for their organisation, and what they need to do about it.
The work
The hardest moments aren't always when a design team is struggling.
Often, the team is capable. The work is good. People are busy and the organisation is moving.
But something has changed.
A restructure, a new strategy, new leadership, new technology. Changing expectations of design. A different relationship between the organisation and its customers.
The old ways of working may still function, but they no longer quite fit the world around them.
That's where I work.
I help leaders make sense of what has changed, surface the assumptions that are shaping the team, and work out what needs to evolve, from strategy and capability to culture, operating models and organisational relationships.
Because the question isn't only how to make a design team perform better. It's what the team needs to become as the organisation around it changes.
How I got here
I started in furniture and product design, working between studio practice, exhibitions and early design consultancy across London, New York, Barcelona and Milan.
Over time, I became less interested in what design produced, and more interested in what design made possible inside organisations.
That shift took me into service design, strategy and foresight, and eventually into working directly with design leaders inside government, financial services, energy, transport and technology organisations.
Along the way, the questions became bigger:
What happens when an organisation changes faster than its design team?
What assumptions are shaping how the team works?
What does design need to become as its role in the organisation evolves?
And how do leaders make sense of all this while still having to deliver today?
Those questions now sit at the centre of my work.
NOT A CV
Selected Experience
20+ years working across design, strategy and organisational change in government, financial services, technology, energy and design education.
Former Service Design Director, DNA, Wellington
Former Principal Advisor, Ministry of Justice, New Zealand
Worked with organisations including ASB, Kiwibank, Meridian Energy, Greater Wellington Regional Council, Red Cross NZ, Serato, The Guardian, V&A, MIT, Z Energy, The Ministry of Education and TU Dublin
Lecturer and international speaker on design leadership, strategy, systems thinking and futures
Creator of Futures of Design 2045, a scenario resource for design leaders downloaded by 500+ people
23 design awards, including DINZ Purple and Gold Pins
IFTF Strategic Foresight Practitioner
MA Furniture Design & Technology, Bucks New University
BA (Hons) Furniture & Product Design, Nottingham Trent University
I continue to teach and speak internationally, exploring how design organisations can understand change, make better strategic decisions and evolve their role inside complex systems.
A note on my approach.
Most design conversations start with what the team produces. I start with the system around it. Because the way a design team works is shaped by far more than its talent.
It's shaped by assumptions, relationships, incentives, technology, decision-making, organisational structures and the expectations placed on design.
When those things change, the team has to change too.
That's why I tend to look beyond the immediate problem and ask:
What's changing around this team? What assumptions are no longer holding? And what is this design organisation becoming?
The answers help leaders make better decisions about strategy, capability, ways of working and where design can create impact.
If any of this resonates, let's talk.
If you're leading a design team and something is changing—in your organisation, your strategy, your team or the role design is expected to play—I'm always open to a conversation.
Sometimes you need a clear diagnosis. Sometimes you need to work through a strategic decision. Sometimes you just need an experienced person outside the organisation to help you see what's happening more clearly.
No pitch. No pressure. Just a conversation about what your design organisation is becoming and what you might do about it.