🎨 What nobody tells you about being a founding designer with Taylor Palmer
Join 6,000+ designers improving their soft skills, weekly!
Master the soft skills needed to be a great UX Designer
Beyond UX Design's mission is to give you the tools you need to be a truly effective UX designer by diving into the soft skills they won't be teaching you in school or a boot camp. These skills are critical to your success.
Discover the important distinctions between being a solo designer and a founding designer as Taylor Palmer reveals the often-overlooked realities of establishing design leadership in early-stage companies.
What's the real difference between being a startup's first designer and being a founding designer, and why does it matter?
But first, check out this week's sponsor:
SPONSOR
With Wix Studio, you can quickly adapt designs for every device, reuse assets, my favorite, export from Figm, and much more.
Being the first design hire is a far cry from being a founding designer.
At least... I THINK it is…
Since I’ve never held a “Founding Designer” role myself, I couldn’t think of a better person than Taylor Palmer to come on the show and teach me a thing or two.
You may know Taylor as one of the original co-founders of the popular UX Tools, but he’s also been a founding designer for several small startups.
He’s been doing this kind of thing for a long time, and he’s ready to drop some knowledge about the difference between a founding designer and a first design hire. And, lucky for us, he shares some insights on what it takes to really #nailit.
Pick up Jeff White's Storytelling Toolkit! Use BEYONDUX at checkout to get 10% off Jeff’s Storytelling course to influence your team and advance your UX career.
1️⃣ Don’t get confused by titles: A Founding Designer establishes design practices and scales teams, a Design Founder is part of the founding team with equity stakes, and a first design hire is simply the first Designer on staff.
2️⃣ Founding Designers require more than design skills: A founding designer isn’t just the first designer—it’s a leadership role that requires building and evangelizing design practice within an org. You’re setting up research practices, design systems, and establishing frameworks for success.
3️⃣ A generalist will thrive as a founding designer: As a founding designer, you need to be comfortable wearing many hats and working across various disciplines. You should have experience in multiple areas of design from visual and research to brand and strategy.
4️⃣ Building a design practice requires strategic thinking: When growing a design team, balance current and future needs. Understanding immediate pain points and ideal team structure helps make strategic hiring decisions that bridge the gap between present and future needs.
5️⃣ Successful founding designers are effective change agents: This role requires influencing organizational change and bringing others along with new ways of working. Building strong relationships and knowing which approaches work in different contexts is critical for success.
Ok web designers. Let’s talk about the “c” word...
Creative Burnout
You’re working on a site for a really big client, but between resourcing, feedback, tight budgets and even tighter deadlines—it doesn’t make the cut. Wix Studio helps close that gap, so you can deliver your vision with less friction. Built for agencies and enterprises, you get total creative control over every last pixel. With no-code animations, AI-powered tools, reusable design assets, advanced, intuitive layout tools and a Figma to Wix Studio integration, you can design the way you want to and deliver when you need to. And if you’re worried about the learning curve eating into time you don’t have—don’t be. Wix Studio is intuitive by design, so your entire team can hit the ground running.
Join 6,000+ designers improving their soft skills, weekly!
Master the soft skills needed to be a great UX Designer
Beyond UX Design's mission is to give you the tools you need to be a truly effective UX designer by diving into the soft skills they won't be teaching you in school or a boot camp. These skills are critical to your success.
