Frequently Asked Questions

These common questions and their short answers are taken from Catt Small’s book The Staff Designer: Grow, Influence, and Lead as an Individual Contributor (2025). You can find longer answers to each in your copy of the book, either printed or digital version.

1. I’ve been a senior designer for a while. Why am I not staff yet?
   There are several possible reasons why you haven’t gotten promoted yet. One possibility is that the career ladder is not super clear, meaning expectations of the role haven’t been given deep enough thought. In that case, you’ll need to work with your manager to go over the expectations of the staff role and discuss the ways in which it differs from senior (see Chapter 1). You also might not be thinking far enough into the future about your product area. Visioning is discussed at length in Chapter 5. Finally, it’s also possible that you are doing everything right, but your manager is unaware of your impact. You might need to improve at communicating your impact more broadly if this is the case (see Chapter 8).
2. I’m a [lead/principal/other fancy title] designer. Is that the same level as staff?
   Possibly! It depends on the structure of your organization’s design career ladder. The lead level usually sits right above senior and is quite similar to staff, although it often includes a people management component. The principal level may be equal to staff, or it might be the level above staff. All of this is covered in Chapter 1. Additionally, the scale of your company might affect the needs of your role and affect how you might position yourself as at a different company. Chapter 2 is all about organizational design.
3. My manager keeps saying I need to build influence. What does that mean?
   One possibility is that you are probably a great collaborator to your peers, but you aren’t connecting with senior leadership enough. This will require a heavy investment in your collaborative relationships, which we cover in Chapter 4. It’s also possible that your ideas aren’t getting very far—perhaps you aren’t pitching in a convincing enough way. You can begin to advocate for your ideas once you have audited your workplace connections (see Chapter 6).
4. I’m in so many meetings. How am I supposed to find time to make such a large impact?!
   You need to befriend your calendar and get in control of your workload. Chapter 3 has lots of time management and work prioritization techniques that will help you free up focus hours. Another issue might be that you need to delegate the more tactical work so you can focus on larger-scale projects. Chapter 7 gets into the concept of scaling yourself so you can claw back time for more strategic efforts.
5. What is a vision and how am I supposed to make one?
   A vision illustrates how a concept will play out in the near or far future. Designers can create visions for small features, product areas, or entire products. For example, you can make a vision that shows how your team’s feature might be used by other product areas. Or you can make a vision that shows how your team’s product area might evolve in 2–3 years. Chapter 5 outlines the process of defining and presenting a vision.