What Design Schools Still Don’t Teach
Design school taught me how to sketch. It didn’t teach me how to survive in a boardroom.
No one taught us how to:
— Justify a $300k tooling decision — Negotiate timelines without sounding weak — Spot the red flags in a stakeholder’s tone — Speak business without selling out
I learned all that in the field. Late nights. Burned budgets. Tough meetings.
But the biggest thing I had to learn? Design isn’t just what you make. It’s how you move through complexity. That’s what earns trust. That’s what unlocks influence.
Your design chops might open the door. But your business fluency keeps you in the room.
Need a lesson in how to design your next product?
What’s one lesson you had to learn the hard way, because school never covered it?
