Agile processes to satisfy a full ecosystem
Design Team Processes
Design teams need strong processes to enable designers to do their work efficiently, independently, and confidently. I’ve now successfully set up design processes for billable (agency-style) creative teams and in-house creative teams.
A few key components of this process:
Talking with leadership and the creative team to understand current pain points and identify any low-hanging fruit.
Outlining the steps for approvals, creative, and executive reviews and assuring buy-in.
Identifying or sourcing the correct software(s) - with a “the fewer the better” mindset.
Standing up an immediate V0 process for low-hanging fruit and a transition plan for longer term.
Thoroughly document the process creatives are expected to follow, and build in automated project management systems wherever possible.
I lean towards concise, precise, over-communication in this process - not so much to overwhelm, but enough to keep all stakeholders onboard and engaged.
Brand Intranet and Training
Design is not the only team that needs to be On-Brand. You can have a top class design team, but if your larger company does not know how to be on brand, or where their brand resources are - you’re likely to have a disjointed brand experience.
I build Brand hubs or intranet everyplace I go. One centralized resource - that covers:
Branding basics - for non-designers
Company templates - slides, docs, etc
How to engage the creative team
Creative team process
Brand and partner guidelines
This single resource makes it easy to find necessary brand or creative materials and transparent for everyone to follow processes in the way they’re expected to.
Self-Service Design Templates
A company’s workforce and their needs frequently out scales the number of designers available to take on the work. My strategy is to create a full library of pre-designed, pre-approved design templates for common design tasks or needs.
These templates can be locked so that only certain aspects are editable, downloaded subject to approval, or completely open. In investing the effort up front - we free up creatives to focus on high impact projects, and enable sales, customer success, and marketing to create on brand collateral on a dime.