How to Crush the Talent Crunch
Summary
- How to hire, onboard, and retain designers
- How to tackle dysfunction in your org as a decentralized practitioner
Key Insights
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IBM's design team grew from a few hundred to over 3,000 designers globally under Phil Gilbert's leadership before the pandemic reversed this trend.
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High turnover during the pandemic involved even long-tenured and new hires leaving within months.
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Design Ops at IBM operates under a hybrid model with centralized design leadership and decentralized team support.
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Hiring challenges include long periods of radio silence for candidates and recruiters lacking specialized knowledge about design roles.
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Onboarding suffers from information overload due to multiple overlapping checklists from HR, design, and business units.
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Only 12% of employees strongly agree their company does well at onboarding, and only 29% feel fully prepared when starting their role according to Gallup data.
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Consolidating onboarding materials and creating timelines to spread knowledge transfer improves new hire experiences.
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Peer-to-peer coaching programs matched designers from different domains to promote cross-team skill sharing and engagement.
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Engagement is the common denominator affecting hiring success, onboarding effectiveness, and retention of design talent.
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Design Ops leaders must embrace discomfort and uncertainty while learning to focus on high-impact activities that truly move the needle.
Notable Quotes
"My superpower is to connect the dots between people, places, ideas, and opportunities."
"The pandemic flipped the equation, and IBM became the place that design talent left."
"Candidates sometimes got rejected within hours despite active recruiting efforts, and recruiters lacked visibility into the system issues."
"Lead with empathy because a lot of solutions will live outside of your wheelhouse."
"Onboarding is a marathon, not a sprint. Spread knowledge transfer over a feasible timeline."
"Only 12% of employees strongly agree their organization does a great job onboarding new employees."
"Employees with exceptional onboarding are 2.6 times more likely to be extremely satisfied with their workplace."
"We matched designers with new peer buddies outside their usual domains to encourage learning and networking."
"Engagement at hiring, onboarding, and growth stages prevents talent churn."
"The hardest lesson is being comfortable when you're uncomfortable and finding the best use of your time to create impact."
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