Expanding Organizational Influence - Course overview
Learn to adopt a company-wide outward focus by effectively engaging with cross-functional stakeholders and executive leaders across the business. Develop the skills, behaviors, and practices to navigate the organization with confidence.
Who this course is for
Established senior design leaders who want to elevate their organizational influence and drive impact beyond their design team.
Choose your course time slot
Tailored to your individual needs, select the perfect time slot for you and book the course.
Manage stakeholders to drive strategic influence
Connect design objectives with organizational goals
Co-own strategic roadmaps to emphasize proactive leadership
Understand the signals of mature design organizations
Communicate the value of design in business terms
Showcase design’s role in problem-solving
Influence without authority to inspire action and impact
Speak fluently in executive language
Kickoff session
We start the course with a live kick-off session to get to know each other and set you up for success.
Week 1: Mapping your organization’s stakeholder landscape
Shift from an internal focus on your functional teams to an enterprise-wide view by identifying key partners, influencers, and decision-makers. You’ll learn how to map your organization through the lens of power, interest, and influence, uncovering ways to drive strategic impact. Gain a fresh perspective on the organizational system around you and uncover opportunities to influence.
Week 2: Building relationships to lead without authority
Expand your relational capital across the organization by treating influence as a design challenge. You’ll learn practical, design-driven tactics for building trust and visibility with stakeholders beyond your direct team. And develop habits and engagement strategies that strengthen informal networks and unlock influence beyond your job title.
Week 3: Creating shared objectives to mobilize others
Foster alignment across functions by creating shared goals rooted in trust and mutual benefit. You’ll explore how to use design facilitation and co-creation techniques to break down silos and unite diverse teams around a common purpose. Walk away with language and frameworks that help you articulate shared success and mobilize teams toward collective action.
Week 4: Elevating the design conversation and shaping culture
Reframe design from a tactical service to a driver of strategy and culture by aligning your work with business outcomes. You'll build fluency in business language, measurement frameworks, and storytelling techniques that position design as essential to enterprise success. You’ll also explore how design influences the behaviours, mindsets, and shared values that define organizational culture.
Week 5: Co-owning strategic roadmaps and prioritization
Embed design into cross-functional planning processes and shift from reactive delivery to proactive leadership. You’ll learn how to influence roadmaps, socialize priorities, and sustain long-term strategic visibility. Gain tools to increase design’s presence in planning cycles and shape what gets prioritized - not just how it gets delivered.
Closing session
We end our course with a live session to celebrate your achievements and onboard you to the iF DESIGN ACADEMY alumni community.
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Doug Powell is an award-winning designer, lecturer, commentator, and thought leader on design issues. He has presented at various global conferences, forums, and universities, and served as the national president of AIGA.
In the past decade, Doug has served as Vice President of Design at IBM and Expedia Group, where he oversaw design practices, design systems, designer career and leadership programs, and scaling cross-functional design thinking practices across the companies. Doug is the producer and host of This is a Prototype - The Design Leadership Podcast.
Guest Lecturers
Pernilla is VP and Head of UX Design, Digital and IT at Volvo Group. She has built and led design teams in large global organizations across three continents.
Michael is the former Chief Product Officer at Preface.ai, and previously the Global Design Principal at IBM. He brings deep insight into product strategy methods through a human-centered design approach.
Brian is the former Senior VP and Chief Design Officer at 3M. He brings 25 years of experience navigating global organizations and building cross-functional alliances.