Our mission
We provide leaders with a forum to address the most critical challenges and opportunities facing global business—through the lens of strategic design leadership.
Our mission is to advance the role and value of design leadership in the highest levels of business by preparing and developing design executives as influential C-Suite leaders, Board Directors, and industry authorities.
As the premier membership network for the world’s foremost design executives, we elevate both the individual leader and the practice of design leadership across the most influential organizations in the world.
How we work
At the heart of our model is the Council, an invitation-based community of senior design executives who serve as strategic voices within the industry. Members co-create our annual agenda, shape the knowledge base, and lead initiatives that advance our mission on a global scale.
Participation is by invitation, ensuring each member brings relevance, perspective, and strategic alignment to the collective. Through curated membership programs, we develop future design executives and amplify the influence of today’s top design executives—ensuring design leadership continues to grow in relevance, reach, and impact.
Explore membershipWe offer a subscription-based platform featuring member-led, business-informed intelligence and research on the critical forces reshaping global design organizations — from technology and craft to leadership and strategy.
Our insights, sourced directly from senior design executives, empower leaders to act as trusted partners to Founders, CEOs, C-Suites, and Boards. Through research reports, media publications, and strategic events, subscribers gain the foresight needed to drive business impact and shape the future of design leadership.
Become a subscriberTo elevate the voice and impact of design leadership at the highest levels of business and society, we actively advocate for the strategic role of design across global platforms — from boardrooms to media stages.
Through partnerships with leading publications, strategic visibility at flagship business events, and initiatives to advance design executives into board and C-Suite roles, we drive continuous elevation and reinforcement about why good design is good business.
Our history and essence
The Design Executive Council began as a graduate thesis project in 2022, when our founder Gordon Ching, asked a curious question to design leaders:
That question sparked numerous discussions and an eventual formation of a small, committed group of design leaders—first in San Francisco, then expanding to New York and Seattle. Our first gatherings centered around bringing peers together for dinner every quarter, a beloved tradition that remains.
As we listened and learned from the needs, visions, and ambitions of design leaders, this organization was born—not as a solution, but as a collective commitment. A commitment to honor our shared love for design, the opportunity to raise a new generation of design leaders, and to tirelessly bridge the worlds of design and business in service of something greater.
Today, we’re a fully operational company led by our Founder & CEO, supported by a board of advisors representing design executive voices, council members and corporates, industry partners, subscribers, and a broader community of leaders invested in the future of design’s role in business and society.
