Winning over executives, PMs, and engineers is harder than ever.
- Your colleagues are drowning in content
- AI can generate thousands of ideas in milliseconds
To have a meaningful impact on your company's bottom line, your ideas must shine on one particular dimension: they must be actually interesting.
Why "Interesting" Beats "Right" Every Time
Outstanding thinking isn't enough.
Your ideas are only memorable if they're implemented. They're only implemented if stakeholders find them compelling.
Here's the truth with stakeholder engagement: Your ideas are only effective if they're interesting.
There are plenty of bright, clever designers intent on making a name for themselves. Yet they share ideas that are incredibly dull. You've been in those meetings. You've read those LinkedIn posts.
In my experienced, stakeholders aren't impressed with ideas because it takes way too long to get to the clever bits. They checkout shortly after the designer begins talking. Often because designers show up predictably, with the same tired approach every time.
If they snooze, you lose.
How to Make Your Ideas Actually Interesting
1. Start With Them, Not You
You know what interests them most? Their ideas.
The best way to make your idea interesting is to connect it directly to a problem (or aspiration) they've actually talked about. Your idea is the solution to their problem. When you start talking, start with their problem, not your solution.
Changing someone's mind requires understanding what stakes they're playing for. You can't do that if you lead with your agenda. Effective executive communication always starts with them.
2. Get Real
Replace jargon with concrete terms they understand.
Instead of: "It's important we diverge and converge with our ideas."
Say this: "It's expensive to roll this out without testing whether it will work."
Hard-hitting reality wins. Design industry specific language loses.
3. Dress It Up
Think of your central idea as a plain turkey sandwich.
Your metaphors, stories, colorful language, and humor? Those are the tomatoes, mustard, lettuce, and cheese. Those are the things that catch your stakeholders' eye.
Without the fixings, you've got a dry, plain sandwich nobody wants.
4. Cut the Explanations
If you're detail-oriented (which I'm guessing you are), you feel compelled to explain every exception, variation, and edge case. I did this constantly when I felt like people weren't listening to me.
In a world where most Design Leadership ideas explain way too much, just know that when your main point is short and sweet, leave it at that.
Clear point + easy-to-remember is what wins stakeholders.
5. Hook Them in 30 Seconds
Your presentation is either a sight or sound experience. If you go to a movie and don't know what's happening within the first ten minutes, you start looking at your phone. It's the same principle with sharing your ideas.
The first 30 seconds are the most important 30 seconds.
If you want to be the designer that has influence, you need to engage stakeholders immediately. Play around with different ways to grab attention within those critical opening moments.
Your Turn
What do you do to make your ideas interesting to PMs, Engineers, and Execs?
Reply and let me know. I'll compile the best responses and share them with everyone who contributed.
