In case you didn’t know, March is Women’s History Month! This year, we’re highlighting the next generation of trailblazing women on our Blawg with our Ladies Who Lead interview series. Today, we’re highlighting Mia Blume of Design Dept.
Vital Stats:
Occupation: I run a leadership development company called Design Dept. We work with creative leaders to transform the way they work through coaching, workshops, and custom learning and development programs. We work with leading designers and creatives at companies like Google, Lyft, Shopify, and many more. We also run a program called Within, which focuses specifically on providing learning experiences for womxn and non-binary leaders in tech.
Background: I went to school for graphic design, but spent most of my career as a product designer in technology.
Power Lunch: Chicken taco bowl!
The Good Stuff:
1. Was your path to your current work linear, or did it take twists and turns? Pretty linear at the start. I began my career at IDEO, learning the ins and outs of strategic design work. After that, I transitioned into startups (Square, Pinterest), where I learned to balance business strategy, design and gettin’ things done. The shift to starting my own business (at least in my own mind) was a bit twist. While my path to executive leadership was clearly painted before me, I decided to shift to create the resources and experiences I wish I’d had in my own leadership development.
2. What does leadership look like to you? Bringing intentionality to how we build and collaborate together.
3. What is your biggest motivator in your work? Making change. Tech isn’t known to be the most inclusive or healthy industry.
4. Can you describe a time when you faced a challenge or setback in your work, and how you overcame it? Honestly, last spring when COVID hit, was a huge challenge for the business. Suddenly, all of our in-person training was cancelled and educational budgets were getting cut. While I didn’t know anything about providing online education, we took our core principles and rapidly iterated on the experience until we landed on something that really worked. While I wasn’t shipping software, so much of my history learning to iterate quickly towards better outcomes helped me get the business back on track… and beat our previous annual revenue goals.
5. What advice would you give to others who want to create a purpose-driven or innovative space in their industry, but aren’t sure where/how to start? Start small. Experiment towards success. We rarely know what we need to build at the beginning, so iteration and learning is key.
6. Are you one of those people who “enjoys” networking? What tips do you have for others who are a little less enthusiastic about it?I’m such an introvert, despite my very public and socially intensive job. What I found with networking is that events and generally “networking” behavior just didn’t feel authentic. So I focused on building relationships instead. And, honestly, my business success is entirely based on those relationships built over the years.
7. If you were going to embark on a new business opportunity, who would you want to be your co-founder, and why? AOC. We’d have fun and kick ass.
8. Any resources you’d like to share with our readers that will help them level up their leadership skills and empower them to keep changing the world? Design Dept! Oh, you mean other than what we do? One of the books I like to share recently is No Hard Feelings. Not just for leaders, but critical to understanding how to be human in the workplace.
How to Support Mia:
Social Media: Follow her on Twitter @designdeptco (or @mialoira, for Mia specifically!)
Thank you for the wisdom, Mia!