Things are rapidly changing in the UX field, and it can feel overwhelming. From AI hype to layoffs to changing roles, it is hard to know how to improve your skillset. We believe that UX professionals should focus on learning to think, act, and collaborate like product leaders.

The Current Conflicts

As the owners of a UX agency, Fuego UX, we have a unique perspective from collaborating with teams working on diverse digital products at technology companies. These teams usually consist of a mix of engineering, product, and UX stakeholders — and the ratio is rarely in UX’s favor.

In a perfect world, this “three-legged stool” should provide a stable foundation. In reality, a variety of factors can cause conflict between UX, product, and engineering teams. Despite the shared goal of creating valuable products, tension can stem from crossover responsibilities, internal politics, and differing perspectives.

Power Dynamics and Decision Authority

Decision making on what gets built and funded is often outside of a UX team’s control and is run by product or engineering leaders. UXers may feel frustrated that their perceived priorities for users and products aren’t placed at the top of the list. This imbalance is compounded in engineering-led organizations, where even product teams may be taking direction from engineering rather than calling the shots on what ultimately gets built.

Although we see more UX teams reporting to product leaders, many technology companies were (and still are) led by engineers. In the worst cases, UX may be left out of decision making entirely, with designers relegated to production work — creating mockups and specs rather than influencing product direction.

Misaligned Priorities and Communication Barriers

The rapid pace of modern product development creates another source of tension. Product teams often prioritize moving quickly and iterating, while designers struggle to see a clear strategic vision. When UX teams lack clarity about the direction and outcome of their projects, the result is diminished ownership and motivation.

This disconnect is exacerbated by differences in communication styles. Product managers are typically business-savvy and adept at speaking the language of user growth, retention, and product adoption — the very metrics that senior leadership prioritizes. UXers who can’t translate their work into these terms often find their concerns deprioritized.

Resource Constraints and Role Blurring

With recent layoffs across tech, many UX departments have been significantly reduced. As a result, other teams assume UX responsibilities out of necessity — for example, product teams may conduct user research or create design prototypes. This blurring of responsibilities, while potentially fostering crossfunctional understanding, often results in UX work that lacks depth and professional expertise.

Understand the Business (Beyond the Basics)

One of the most common pieces of advice we hear from UX leaders on our podcast is that new designers need to “understand the business.” While this is solid general advice, how should UXers actually do this?

First, learn how product leaders get things done within the context of the business. The job of a product leader is multifaceted and includes:

• Building the features, products, or platform
• Getting engaged, and retaining customers
• Maintaining and understanding competitors to the platform

Keenly observe who product leaders collaborate with, how they switch contexts, and the types of information they convey to various stakeholders (presentations, spreadsheets, roadmaps, concise memos, etc.).

Take a wide-angle view of the business and grow a holistic product understanding — not of just the specific products you work on but of all the products, services, and customer touchpoints offered by the business. Map the organization by observing who gets invited to strategic meetings, whose opinions shift decisions, and which teams receive priority funding during planning cycles.

Think and Act like a Product Leader

Understanding the business enables you to effectively advocate for UX within the specific context of your organization, partner with influential decision makers, and speak the language of your stakeholders.

Collaborate and Communicate Strategically

Use your understanding of the business to find shared priorities and build deliberate alliances with influential stakeholders from product and engineering teams. For example, partner with a product manager who values user research by helping them test assumptions quickly, or support an engineering lead by proactively addressing technical constraints in your designs.

Top product leaders are often diplomatic — and this is possible because they have a good understanding of the business and the organization. They collaborate with a range of teams and stakeholders to develop and grow digital products. These mature leaders:

• Constantly connect with others
• Prove the value of their team and work
• Compromise where necessary to advance their products’ direction.

They also know how to adapt communication styles with people at different levels of the organization. They are great at providing leadership with concise and relevant information based on what executives care about, instead of in-the-weeds reviews or technical presentations that will be ignored.

Adapt Your Approach to the Organizational Context

A good understanding of the business and the relationships between different departments allows you to speak the right language so you’ll be heard.

Establish UX’s unique value proposition within your specific organizational context. This contextual framing helps position the UX team as essential rather than ornamental.

• In data-driven companies, focus on how design improves key performance indicators and impacts metrics like user retention or conversion rates. This may mean leaning more on quantitative methods than is traditional for UX roles.
• In engineering-led organizations, speak the language of efficiency and implementation costs. Quantify design improvements in terms of reduced support tickets, faster user-task completion, or measurable engagement increases. Build credibility by acknowledging technical constraints early and demonstrating an understanding of the development process.
• In product-led organizations, emphasize UX’s role in market differentiation. Connect design decisions directly to competitive positioning. Become an essential partner in product strategy by consistently bringing user insights that inform roadmap priorities. Create a design roadmap that aligns with the product roadmap, showing how your work supports the overall product vision. This alignment demonstrates your understanding of business priorities and creates visibility for design work at multiple organizational levels.

Build Political Intelligence and Crossfunctional Skills

Developing political intelligence means reading your organization’s climate and timing your initiatives accordingly. Choose your battles wisely by distinguishing between issues that affect user experience fundamentally versus preferences that might be negotiable. Invest your political capital in high-impact decisions while demonstrating flexibility on less critical matters.

Ignore titles. Titles are constantly changing and evolving within technology roles. Also, the tools and processes that product, design, and engineering teams use are blending together. Just because your title doesn’t have the words “product” or “research” in it, doesn’t mean you can’t perform user research or collaborate on the product roadmap.

Balance research rigor with practicality. Product teams are talking to users these days more and more, which is a good thing! Learn how to do just enough research before diving too deep. The days of Ph.D.-level academic research in product teams are mostly gone and have been replaced with quick insights and iterative feedback. Devise easy ways for other team members to get product feedback on a continual basis.

Finally, grow your skills to be scalable and diversified. How we work and the technologies we work with will continue to change and evolve. Be curious and explore beyond just design to learn product, research, and development crossfunctional skills. Even a simple baseline understanding of the language and best practices of product and engineering will enable you to collaborate more closely with your counterparts and help you elevate UX within your product organization.

By approaching organizational dynamics with the same thoughtfulness you apply to user experience, you transform potential barriers into strategic opportunities for advancing UX in your company.