Via Lenny’s Podcast
What is Design? I’m going to go back to the Edward Tufte quote that I use all the time, which is, ‘Design is clear thinking made visible.’ I think most people, when they talk about design, they think of it as the visual expression of an idea. They think of it as a team or a function or a group. I think of it as a holistic mindset.
When design thinking became big, I was always really confused because I didn’t know how else [one] could think. That was how I naturally thought—[that] design is trying to imagine the future you want to live in and then [taking] the steps to make it real. It’s living with a certain type of intentionality and almost a Buddhist type way, which is different from science, which is observational, trying to understand.
— 35 years of product design wisdom from Apple, Disney, Pinterest and beyond | Bob Baxley, at 15:53
Most people think of design as the “part of the iceberg above the waterline”—what’s visible in beautiful products. Design leader Bob Baxley argues the real work happens below the surface: “Design is trying to imagine the future you want to live in and then [taking] the steps to make it real.”
Using Edward Tufte’s definition—”design is clear thinking made visible”—Bob frames design as a holistic mindset, not a team or function. It’s about organizational alignment around philosophical questions:
- Why do we exist?
- What’s our vision?
- How do mission, tenets, and strategy ladder up cohesively?
- How does execution connect to these higher-level intentions?
Without this alignment, you get “bricks scattered across the backyard” instead of “a beautiful impenetrable wall.” Companies that achieve design integration—where everything makes sense as a cohesive unit—operate with greater efficiency, onboard new people faster, and create products that feel intentional rather than haphazard.
This is design’s strategic advantage: fewer people producing more coherent outcomes because everyone understands and works toward the same vision.
