You’ve poured weeks into a design: research, iterations, late nights. Then, in the boardroom, stakeholders tear it apart. Welcome to the Boardroom Massacre: where brilliant work dies because stakeholders expected something else. The root cause? They weren’t part of the journey. Here’s how to fix it.
Throughout different teams I’ve helped develop, one major issue stands out as the most painful challenge in a design team without senior design leadership: the disconnect between designers and the stakeholders, which often emerges as stakeholders frustration and distrust of the designers.
The real culprit? Stakeholders aren’t invested in the solution. Designers often work in isolation, presenting ‘finished’ work that shocks stakeholders who expected something entirely different.
Mostly there are two reasons, first, incapable designers; second, lack of design ownership from the stakeholders. While training (or hiring) can fix unskilled designers, the second issue demands approaches that feel unnatural to many designers.
Traditionally, designers are expected to be magicians, pulling out amazing designs out of thin air, and lots of designers are also acting this way. It is a common thing for designers to incubate ideas on their own and only after some while comes out with the finished design that wowed its audience — or not, more often not.
While there are designers that can do magic, most will be struggling with understanding the incomplete brief, the vague stakeholders intention, and generating good enough ideas.
Therefore, forget the ‘big reveal.’ Instead, adopt iterative co-creation: share rough concepts early and often. This transforms stakeholders from critics to collaborators, building ownership before designs are polished.
That’s why, one of the actions I always advised my design mentees to master, is to build on their design through progressive disclosure: a quick, small iterations of build and learn.
The challenge is that lots of stakeholders might not see the benefits at first, and would think twice before agreeing to spend their precious time reviewing small design progress, however, designers need to ensure these regular checkups to ensure proper alignment.
As the consequence, stakeholders must also learn to get familiarized with the tools of user experience design to ensure proper communication takes place. Conventionally it means reading visual artifacts like wireframe or storyboard, which might add some challenges for less-design exposed stakeholders.
GenAI slashes prototype time, letting stakeholders experience ideas — not just imagine them. Clickable demos replace abstract wireframes, making feedback concrete and actionable.
Stop the massacre. Start iterating, include stakeholders early, and let GenAI handle the prototypes. Your next boardroom meeting? It might just be a victory lap.
(byms)