Leadership

When hiring a UX leader, what is the key factor? Do job titles tell us much, or is proof of ability reflected more in responsibility they have held, and the results they have shown? I tend toward the latter.

Senior UX leaders should not just be great designers who have been given a bigger title. They need to have experience leading cross-functional teams, including user research, Interaction design, visual design, prototyping, industrial designer, front-end development, analytics and business intelligence, program management, and technical support.

A good leader knows how to both build and inherit teams, and turn them into groups of confident, effective, and happy managers and contributors. No leader is successful on their own.

Great leaders have the pulse of organizational priorities, and translate these, so their teams understand why their work is critical. They also listen to and leverage their teams' insights to make the team and the organization better. Wouldn't it be nice if all leaders did this?