There is a saying that the people deserve the kind of leadership they get. Indeed, the design community or user designers as a group deserve good leaders and truly are blessed with good design leaders. Good design leaders will inspire upcoming designers. They will lead a group to achieve its set objectives and not only stay ahead, but mentor upcoming designers through their clarity and promotion of cultural shift.

One of such identifiable designers who is worthy of being called an admired design leader and worthy of my emulating is Micheal George Burke. Micheal was at Dell technology for four years and four months after which he has worked in various capacities as an experienced user designer, coach researcher and mentor. His LinkedIn page states that : starting in Aug 2021 he is leading research to understand user groups, their task, work environment, mental models and competitive landscape.I will however say to me, Micheal is more than the description on his LinkedIn page. My contact with Micheal is short but has been compelling. It began when I started my post graduate program in User design at the great learning / university of Texas in Austin in the summer of 2024. I was a total green horn to UI/UX and at a point was almost overwhelmed with the course work and heavy course load. I needed not only an intrinsic motivation to continue my training but also an extrinsic motivation. Fortunately, I attended his first mentoring session, and instantly became inspired as a designer. It was obvious from this first session that Micheal as an online adjunct instructor in design has not only an inadept understanding of design methods and process but enough interpersonal and professional skills to mentor the next generation of designers which includes me.

As a design leader, I observed that Micheal Burke possesses some traits of effective design leaders these traits include but is not limited to

1. Open mind. In his interaction before and during mentorship sessions especially the breakout rooms, Micheal displays such great open-mindedness in the examples he gives that one is inspired to learn and contribute to discussion despite any existing limitations. In His mentoring styles, he is so open minded that you can actually forget you are in an online class session. He challenges you to feel like in an onsite academic situation.

2. Trust. Micheal has earned my great trust as a design leader. Through his interaction and mentorship style. He doesn’t come as a leader who runs down upcoming members of a team but one whom you can trust not only to lead the team to achieve its set goals but help you to become a relevant member of a team no matter your level or discipline.

3. Courage is not being bold but the willingness to tolerate others’ ideas. In the mentorship group session, especially in the breakout room on 22nd December 2024, Micheal puts our ideas forward before correcting us. This is very essential to build a trusting team especially in the work environment where designers will need to collaborate with, developers, engineers, product managers, and other designers as well as management.

4. Not afraid to be challenged. In His teachings and mentorship, Micheal has demonstrated that he is not afraid to be challenged as a design leader. He also challenges us his learners and especially inspired me to new ways of thinking. He has communicated how design tools work and how to effectively deploy these tools in creating iterative designs that can speak to users.  Whether it is adobe, Jira and especially Figma , I am inspired to learn the design tools that will help me to achieve learning task in the design work environment.

5. His growth mind set. Micheal by displaying the professional traits which shows he is open to new ideas inspired my curiosity in no small way. Looking for more encouragement, I had to peep deeper into his professional and academic background. I discovered that he has a first degree in Anthropology and has since carved an enviable niche for himself as a design leader and mentorship. He displays such great professionalism in his mentorship sessions that one can conclude that he has not only a mastery of design thinking but also the ability to conceptualize design strategies that will align with the principles of strategic communication and stakeholder management in any organization where he is called to lead design team.

Application of lessons learned.

Micheals is a design coach, who provides life mentorship and 1on 1 group support in mentoring the next generation of design leaders at great learning and other places.  It is so obvious he has a positive growth mindset and good mastery of design principles. This great growth mindset has positively instigated in me, a drive not to let my prior non -tech background hinder me from finding my way up as a design leader. I realize and learn through his mentorship and teachings and experiences that my prior experience before coming to the wonderful and innovative world of design could be used as steppingstones to promote cross functional collaborations, cultural shift, and global collaborations which are essential in overcoming challenges in user design leadership.

His communication style encourages creativity in us his mentees as well as teach a culture of cooperation, collaboration and teamwork. For instance, in my capstone project team at Austin Texas/ great learning, I was collaborating with student designers whom I consider as probably more skilled that I was. I initially felt intimidated by the level of competence I saw in my teammates. However, Micheal during a group mentorship, helped to change the narrative. He inspired so much confidence in me that I willingly took up a challenging part in the group assignment.

As a career coach, Micheals has an impressive portfolio and resume. His current experiences which include fourteen {14 positions} has inspired me so much that I wish I had met him earlier. Knowing that such early contact would have definitely propel me to seek not only an early career break into design but the courage of a growth mindset. I have since learn that the world has problems and designers like me solve problems.  I have learnt to trust in myself and problem-solving capabilities knowing that products can do better when the users who have a positive experience through my designs make purchases. Through trusting in mentors such as Micheal I am ready to breakout into the exciting world of endless possibilities design gives.

Olapeju Adeitan writes from Crystal Minnesota USA,