Designers often look to design maturity models as benchmarks, comparing their own companies to idealized industry standards and thinking, “We’re so behind!” This can spark a drive to “improve” the company’s design maturity, which often translates into attempts to “educate” leadership on what they’re doing “wrong” or how the organization can “catch up.” But is maturity really the most useful framework here? Or might labeling a company as “immature” potentially miss the point?
Strategic choices or environmentally emergent design?
Rather than viewing these organizations as falling behind, we could recognize their design choices as deliberate — or, at the very least, shaped by their business environment.
Consider budget airlines like Ryanair and EasyJet, which operate on tight margins, compared to luxury airlines like Qatar Airways or Emirates, which invest heavily in a premium experience. On a maturity chart, budget airlines might appear less advanced due to limited investments in experience and aesthetics. However, these design decisions aren’t signs of immaturity but strategic choices made to align with a market where affordability is more important than luxury.
The fiction of industry standards and the illusion of an “endpoint”
Design maturity models often suggest that there’s an ideal direction or end goal — a point at which a company is “fully mature” in its design practice. But it’s worth noting that these standards are often a fiction, a level of “maturity” achieved by only a small number of elite companies with extensive resources. For most organizations, this ideal is impractical and even irrelevant.
In reality, not every airline aspires to be Emirates, just as not every company needs to emulate the most design-intensive players in their industry. For a company like Ryanair, the goal isn’t to eventually “grow up” and adopt the design principles of a luxury brand but to continue delivering on its promise of affordability. It’s not an immature state but a deliberately chosen position that aligns with their business strategy.
Different markets, different designs
Budget airlines cater to customers who value low costs over high-end experiences. Their design choices reflect a strategic decision to prioritize efficiency and cost savings. Is this truly “immature,” or simply a different way of conducting business?
If we judge these airlines by an unrealistic maturity standard, we risk overlooking the practical logic behind their decisions. Their lean design choices are part of a broader strategy that aligns with their competitive positioning, which doesn’t depend on the lavish aesthetics of high-cost carriers.
Rethinking maturity as strategic alignment
When we use design maturity as a universal yardstick, it implies a narrow, one-size-fits-all model that may be more aspirational than practical. Effective design is tailored to the unique needs and goals of the business, not to some external checklist or distant ideal. What if we evaluated design based on how well it aligns with the company’s strategy, rather than on how “mature” it appears?
By evaluating design through this lens, we can avoid the trap of measuring against an unattainable ideal and start seeing “maturity” as less relevant than effectiveness.
Design as strategic decision-making
It may be time to rethink maturity models, seeing them less as benchmarks and more as tools to support different business strategies. By framing design choices as strategic responses — whether deliberate or emergent — we recognize that “maturity” isn’t a universal goal. The aim should be alignment with business priorities, making design choices that drive meaningful outcomes, rather than chasing a fictional ideal.
The next time you’re evaluating your organization’s design approach, consider whether “maturity” is the best metric. You may find that the company is making exactly the right decisions to align with its environment and achieve its goals, even if those decisions look nothing like the maturity charts.
The article originally appeared on andybudd.com.
Featured image courtesy: Getty Images.
