Summary
Karen, a leader at MasterCard, shares her experience driving digital transformation by positioning design as a vital business competency. She explains how MasterCard is evolving from traditional plastic card payments to a device-based commerce ecosystem involving smartphones, wearables, and IoT devices, with a strong focus on security and seamless user experience. Karen highlights innovations such as biometric identity checks and payment-enabled fashion accessories and home devices. She stresses the importance of leadership alignment, cross-functional partnerships, and maintaining strong relationships across organizational silos to successfully launch complex enterprise projects. On the talent front, Karen advises authentic engagement with the design community, value alignment in hiring, and the need to build teams that exhibit intellectual curiosity and collaboration. She advocates for performance management as an integral part of the employee experience with continuous feedback, coaching, and development plans while addressing performance gaps respectfully and decisively. Throughout, Karen underscores that driving digital innovation in enterprises requires negotiation, influence, and clear communication of mission and progress to gain and sustain support.
Key Insights
-
•
MasterCard is shifting from plastic cards to a secure, device-based commerce platform embedding payments in wearables, IoT, and mobile devices.
-
•
Digital commerce requires rock-solid security including biometric authentication like 'selfie pay' to ensure consumer trust.
-
•
Success in enterprise innovation depends heavily on aligning leadership and cross-functional sponsors to a shared mission and agenda.
-
•
Building relationships beyond one's immediate team and boss is critical in dynamic, frequently reorganizing enterprises.
-
•
Understanding how your company makes money is essential for design leaders to influence business decisions effectively.
-
•
Authentic engagement with local design communities and sponsoring events are more effective hiring strategies than cold outreach.
-
•
Retention depends on cultural fit, intellectual curiosity, meaningful work, and clear demonstration of business impact from design efforts.
-
•
Performance management should be viewed as an ongoing employee experience, emphasizing continuous feedback, objective setting, and coaching.
-
•
Addressing performance gaps early with respect, clarity, and HR partnership prevents negative impacts on teams and individuals.
-
•
Earning a seat at the decision-making table requires demonstrating the value of customer experience insights toward driving business outcomes.
Notable Quotes
"The journey at MasterCard has been about articulating digital transformation and design as a business imperative."
"Consumers are clamoring to have payment capability embedded in all their devices, from phones to rings."
"You don’t just get a seat at the table, you earn it by championing good customer experiences and rallying teams."
"Hiring isn’t easy, but don’t spam LinkedIn; build authentic conversations and engagement with your design community."
"How many people here actually know how their company makes money? 100% of us should understand that."
"Performance management is really the employee experience, not just a yearly review process."
"If you wait too long to address performance problems, it really hurts the rest of the team and the employee."
"In large enterprises, you have to get your minimum viable product out early and then build it up over time."
"Inviting lawyers and compliance teams to usability testing quickly changes the conversation around what’s possible."
"Leadership alignment is the first layer of the cake; without it, you have to negotiate and influence heavily."
Or choose a question:
More Videos
"There’s never enough attention you can give to change management in scaling design impact — don’t do it alone."
Standardizing Product Merits for Leaders, Designers, and Everyone
June 15, 2018
"There’s no such thing as one-size-fits-all methods; what works in one part of the map doesn’t work in another."
Simon WardleyMaps and Topographical Intelligence (Videoconference)
January 31, 2019
"The Reflexive Compass helps us discern bias patterns early, take accountability, and measure impact."
Sandra CamachoCreating More Bias-Proof Designs
January 22, 2025
"It takes at least one team member to choose to set healthy standards for collaboration."
Darian DavisLessons from a Toxic Work Relationship
January 8, 2024
"After each interview, I input the transcript into ChatGPT and ask for three key takeaways that I can quickly share with stakeholders."
Fisayo Osilaja[Demo] The AI edge: From researcher to strategist
June 4, 2024
"Temporary, quick, and sometimes rough artifacts have a lifespan just long enough for the conversation they enable."
Uday GajendarThe Wicked Craft of Enterprise UX
May 13, 2015
"Investing in people and fostering collaboration always pays off in stronger teams and better user experiences."
Davis Neable Guy SegalHow to Drive a Design Project When you Don’t Have a Design Team
June 10, 2021
"Once cash prizes were gone, people stopped feeling ownership of the design system."
Eniola OluwoleLessons From the DesignOps Journey of the World's Largest Travel Site
October 24, 2019
"Design producers love their creative tools and want to keep using them without multiple manual reporting steps."
Aurobinda Pradhan Shashank DeshpandeIntroduction to Collaborative DesignOps using Cubyts
September 9, 2022
