A strong future vision makes the destination clear.

One of my favorite activities is hiking. Over the summer, my wife hiked up Mount Pisgah in North Carolina. The importance of seeing our destination was critical, so we could plot a course. The journey was so much fun, and the views at the summit were incredible.

It got me thinking about the importance of vision in product design. Vision is critical. There’s no trail map when you’re designing new product experiences. You have to make it along the way. When you’re coordinating teams of people you need a shared vision to reach the destination in the end.

If you want to inspire and lead teams to create something uniquely new that departs from the status quo, you have to create artifacts that points the entire organization to that future destination. Otherwise, teams of people will end up separated from the pack and lost in the woods.

The trick is to make these vision artifacts clear enough to inspire movement, while leaving enough mystery to inspire teams to autonomously innovate their way to the end vision. Each situation is different, so it takes time and wisdom to know when things are clear enough, but leaves enough magic for smart folks to get you there.

I’d love to hear stories from Design leaders sharing how they’ve used future vision to drive innovation in their organziation.