Over the coming years, we’ll see the power that design has to help navigate the biggest shifts our world faces. How businesses can remain relevant and competitive as major changes take place to how business itself is done, and how societies can manage and thrive in the environmental and technological shifts we stand on the edge of. The ability of design to create solutions and reinterpret challenges into new ways of thinking and shaping the way forward has never been more needed.

Across industry sectors, wherever design is able to influence and shape, it has the opportunity to effect change, accelerate progress and create impact.

Only at the DBA’s Design Effect can you spend a day getting under the skin of what makes design effective in the business and societal environments you work in, across the range of design disciplines. Be that product design, digital design, packaging, user experience or service design. Experiential, industrial, brand, retail or culture. There’ll be high-level speakers, rigorous case studies, lively audience and panel debates and the best conversation you’ve ever had about design over dinner.

Book your tickets at the bottom of this page or via the button below:

Joining us at The Design Effect

Find out more about our speakers. We’ll be announcing more speakers, as well as agenda details and timings in the coming weeks. 

Richard Seymour, Co-founder of Seymourpowell, TED speaker and industry pioneer

Richard has a passion for beauty and how products matter. His award-winning career spans design disciplines, from book and record-sleeve design, through advertising and film production design. Seymourpowell, which he co-founded with Dick Powell in 1984, is regarded as one of the world’s leading product and innovation design consultancies.

Richard believes that design is fundamentally about making things better – better for people, better for business and better for the world. Much of his time now is spent helping multinational corporations understand what lies before them in the future and finding ways to ‘rewire’ them to better face these challenges.

Valeria Adani, Partner, Projects by IF

Valeria has over 13 years’ experience in product, service and organisation design, bringing a human-centred perspective to data and technology.

In her work at Projects by IF, a strategy and design agency specialising in trust, she helps organisations increase trustworthiness in their products and services to drive adoption and growth. Prior to IF, Valeria was Head of Service Design at frog. She has worked as a service designer, facilitator and design thinking coach in design agencies and academic institutions in the UK, Italy and China.

Clive Grinyer, Director, Clivegrinyer Ltd

Clive has set up and led influential design teams for major global companies like Barclays Bank, Cisco and Samsung and has led digital and innovation projects across the public sector, including his role as Head of Service Design at the Royal College of Art. He began his career with innovation consultancy IDEO and was co-founder of the design consultancy Tangerine along with Apple design chief, Sir Jony Ive.

Clive encourages organisations to think strategically and use design to shape how they co-create and collaborate, build great innovation, technology and digital teams and change their organisational culture to focus on customer experience and impact.

Vuokko Aro, VP Design, Monzo Bank

Vuokko leads the design and research teams at Monzo, overseeing vision and execution for both product and brand across the business. From Monzo’s prepaid era to today, her work has created beloved experiences across all customer touchpoints, influenced company direction, and contributed to building a profitable business with over 9 million customers.

Vuokko’s experience in the US and Europe working on startup and well-established brands, such as Citymapper, has enabled her to adopt a customer-centric approach to user experience design that elevates the whole industry.

Kate Ancketill, CEO, GDR

Kate has been an innovation partner to over 30 of the world’s largest brands including Microsoft, Google, BBC, Lego and P&G. As the CEO and Founder of trends, foresight and strategy consultancy, GDR, she uses professional strategy and research expertise to distil complex global subjects into clear narratives.

From economic headwinds to demographics and the advance of exponential technologies, Kate contextualises big shifts in consumer trends, inspiring companies to work differently and drive change across the commercial sector. Through GDR’s consultancy, trend analysis and sector reports, they imagine new possibilities and direct practical strategies that are fit for the future.

Pernilla Johansson, Head of UX, Digital Delivery, Volvo Group

Pernilla has nearly 30 years design leadership experience in multinational corporations, currently leading UX within Digital & IT at the Volvo Group, driving an ambitious digital and cultural transformation. As Chief Design Officer at Electrolux, she managed a global network of 200 designers across seven locations, following 13 years at Philips Design.

Pernilla is a people-centric leader who fosters holistic, research-based experience development and has built multiple high-performing teams across three continents, resulting in design effectiveness and numerous award-winning solutions. Exemplified by co-founding the Centre for Organisational Creativity, aiding organisations in building their creative capacity in a systemic way. 

Sean Carney, Founder, C-Suite Advisor, CDO.BV

Sean has built and led multi-award winning teams for Electrolux, Assa Abloy and most recently Philips where he served as the Executive Vice President and Chief Design Officer. He has a passion for connecting systems, data, people and capabilities to find creative solutions that result in better for the world outcomes.

Sean currently works as an independent advisor to CEOs of multinational corporations, startups and creative agencies, whilst helping craft new ways of working through innovative new platforms such as The Group of Humans and Neol. He is a founding member and Trustee of Design of Good, which pulls together thousands of designers each year to work on societies biggest challenges, in alignment with the United Nations SDG’s. 

Mary Mc Bride Ph.D., Chair and Professor, Creative Enterprise Leadership, International Graduate Programs, Arts and Cultural Management, Design Management

Mary is a coach, communication strategist and consultant to enterprise leaders worldwide. She designed and heads up the Creative Enterprise Leadership international graduate programmes in Design Management and Arts and Cultural Management at Pratt Institute.

Mary is passionate about the power of design to enable, engage and enliven with her research focusing on developing the personal, organisational and systemic capacity for creative experimentation, innovation and change. She heads up the leadership development practice at Strategies for Planned Change and has most recently published, Leading as if Life Matters: An invitation to attend a future of our own making, with co-authors Xue Bai and Maren Maier.

Ben Sheppard, Chair, Design for Good

Ben brings together hundreds of the world’s best designers, from organisations like Philips, PepsiCo and Lloyds, to work on the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals in his role as the co-founder and chair of global non-profit Design for Good. 

He was a long-standing partner at McKinsey & Company, where he led global research on design for over a decade and convened the Chief Design Officers’ Roundtable, a regular gathering of over fifty of the world’s most senior design leaders. Ben’s work includes leading innovation, design, and development on everything from jet engines and cars to medical devices and coffee machines.

Kevin McCullagh, Founder, Plan

Kevin brings strategic clarity to design and innovation for clients such as Coco-Cola, Hyundai, Sky, and Yamaha. As the Founder of Plan, a product strategy consultancy who we help leading mobility and consumer tech companies navigate the tricky early stages of innovation, he anticipates future disruptions and what they mean to product development.

Prior to Plan, Kevin was a director at product design consultancy Seymourpowell, where he set up one of the first dedicated design strategy teams in Europe.

Jos Harrison, Global Head of Brand Experience & Design, Reckitt

Jos has over 20 year’s experience in strategic brand design and believes brands and business are society’s greatest vehicle for improving our culture, our health, and our planet. He champions the role of human-centric design and creative business leadership in bringing to life sustainable business models.

In his role at Reckitt, Jos provides strategic tools and creative direction, connecting design to other vital functions within the company and empowering brands to create behaviour change that have a lasting positive impact at a global scale.

Keep an eye out for more speakers being announced soon. 

Event Information

Bringing the best of the industry together to learn, share, and think differently, whilst also celebrating this year’s cohort of DBA Design Effectiveness Award winners, and the creative and business minds that make our industry shine.

Book today and join us at The British Museum on 8 October for an afternoon of talks, debates, films and evening discussions over dinner that will inspire and ignite, feeding your mind, your passion and your stomach.

Tickets include food and drink throughout the afternoon and evening, plus access to all sessions and networking. Talks and discussions in the Clore Lecture Theatre, networking in the Egyptian Sculpture Gallery and three course dinner in the Great Court.

The afternoon and evening content is for all attendees. Winners announcements for the DBA Design Effectiveness Awards will made throughout the afternoon and evening event. The evening dinner – which will also include talks and discussions – is for all attendees to enjoy and participate in.

Dress code: Day to evening elegance and celebration. 

Limited places. Book quickly to avoid disappointment. Discounts available for DBA members and 2024 DBA Design Effectiveness Awards winners.

FAQs

Can I book a full table for the dinner? 

Yes! Booking to attend the Design Effect includes an afternoon of talks, debates, films and evening discussions over dinner. Tables at the dinner can sit 10 – 12 people. Please book for the number of attendees and a member of the DBA team will be in touch to confirm each attendee’s details for the full event.

I’ve booked two tickets but my colleague can no longer attend, can someone else come in their place? 

Yes, absolutely. Whilst tickets are non-refundable or exchangeable against future events or other DBA activity, you can update the attendee details so someone else can come along. 

I’m booking for the team, how do I let you know who will be coming on the day? 

A member of the DBA team will be in touch to confirm each attendee’s details including any access and/or dietary requirements and if there’s anything else we can do to best support everyone’s enjoyment of the event.