From pixel pusher to design leader
This course is your blueprint for transitioning from executor to strategic partner: someone who influences product direction, not just UI.
What You’ll Gain:
• A path to promotion: Build skills that help you get promoted. Learn how to align your work with business goals, influence decisions, and lead with clarity.
• Practical tools for immediate impact: Get frameworks and templates you can apply right away to make better decisions, communicate value, and influence direction.
• Confidence to lead: Whether it’s running discovery, presenting to stakeholders, or shaping strategy, you’ll build the confidence to lead.
Why this course is worth it
Each week, you’ll complete a focused project using the templates and frameworks provided, then get direct, personalised feedback from a design director.
You’ll leave with:
• Tangible outputs you can use at work to drive alignment and influence decisions
• Confidence to speak the language of the business and lead conversations
• A strategic mindset that sets you apart from execution-focused designers
This is not a theory-only course. You’ll be doing real work, with real guidance, and building skills you can use immediately.
What you’ll learn
Build confidence, drive business impact, and become a strategic partner, not just a design executor.
Map your company's value streams to understand where design can have the most impact.
Analyse and present your work using leading (user behaviour) and lagging (business KPIs) indicators.
Use the "benefits over features" framework to connect your design decisions to revenue, retention, and growth.
Use the Discovery Whiteboard template to align cross-functional teams around a clear, validated user problem.
Run discovery as a collaborative process that gives you leverage over strategic priorities and reduces product risk.
Write clear discovery and delivery hypotheses to frame your design work as measurable experiments, not just visual outputs.
Structure your presentations using the Context → Problem → Solution → Impact framework.
Connect micro-level design decisions to macro-level business goals to tell a more compelling story about your work.
Use a structured feedback template to gather constructive input that improves your work and builds alignment.
Use stakeholder mapping to identify who to align with and how to communicate with them effectively.
Facilitate alignment workshops that create a shared understanding of what success looks like.
Translate research and stakeholder goals into a tangible 'north star' vision for the product.
Identify the key business drivers and KPIs your leadership team focuses on.
Measure the impact of your work on user activation, retention, and conversion.
Confidently link changes in user behaviour to their direct impact on business goals, even when you cannot calculate a precise ROI.
Initiate strategic conversations with your Product Manager to co-own the discovery process.
Advocate for process changes that create space for more impactful design work.
Build empathy for your colleagues' constraints to become a more effective collaborator and a more valuable team member.
Learn directly from Dan
Dan Winer
10+ years helping designers increase their influence and get promoted.
Who this course is for
Aspiring design leaders: For designers aiming to transition into leadership roles, seeking to increase their influence.
Ambitious designers: Mid-level designers aspiring to senior and beyond roles, eager to be seen as strategic partners.
Overlooked design teams: Where advocacy is critical to elevate the role of design within product and engineering-led organisations.
Prerequisites
Experience in product design
You have at least 1–2 years working as a product or UX designer in a tech company or startup.
Not for beginners
This course isn’t for those new to UX or still learning the basics; it’s for designers ready to take their skills to the next level.
Looking to grow your strategic impact
You want to move beyond execution and learn how to influence product direction and business outcomes.
What's included
Live sessions
Learn directly from Dan Winer in a real-time, interactive format.
Lifetime access
Go back to course content and recordings whenever you need to.
28 video lessons
All the concepts are broken down into bite-sized videos to come back to whenever you need.
Practical templates and frameworks
Get a toolkit of ready-to-use templates and frameworks you can apply immediately in your day-to-day work.
Community of peers
Stay accountable and share insights with like-minded professionals.
Certificate of completion
Share your new skills with your employer or on LinkedIn.
Maven Guarantee
This course is backed by the Maven Guarantee. Students are eligible for a full refund up until the halfway point of the course.
Course syllabus
4 live sessions • 31 lessons • 4 projects
Week 1
Sep
17
Week 1 Q&A
Wed 9/174:30 PM—6:00 PM (UTC)Optional
Communicating the value of design
Week 2
Sep
24
Week 2 Q&A
Wed 9/244:30 PM—6:00 PM (UTC)Optional
Owning product discovery
Schedule
Live sessions
1-2 hrs / week
The live sessions are a mix of focused mini-lectures, breakout rooms, journaling, and Q&A.
Wed, Sep 17
4:30 PM—6:00 PM (UTC)
Wed, Sep 24
4:30 PM—6:00 PM (UTC)
Wed, Oct 1
4:30 PM—6:00 PM (UTC)
Wed, Oct 8
4:30 PM—6:00 PM (UTC)
Projects
1-3 hrs / week
Apply learnings immediately to your real job. Each week, you'll use course templates to tackle a current work challenge. These hands-on projects create actionable outputs for discovery, strategy, and stakeholder alignment, helping you drive impact from day one. You'll get personalised feedback on every submission.
Async content
1-3 hrs / week
On average, there are about 6 lessons per week, available as pre-recorded videos and written content. The most important topics from each week will also be covered in the live sessions.
Testimonials
Hands down the best product strategy course I’ve ever taken! 🙌🏼 I’ve already had success with some of my learnings, for example, I created a value stream map that helped align my product team around my UX strategy. I also love his teaching style! Dan’s feedback was always thoughtful and specific. He’d highlight what was working and then offer examples of how to take it even further. What really stood out was how clear and actionable he made every lesson. I feel more confident and equipped to be a stronger strategic partner and leader in the product space. This course blends real-world application with expert guidance, and I fully recommend it!
Cindy
Senior UX Designer
Interview with Ridd - How to become more strategic and advance your career
In this interview with Ridd, Dan shares some insights for career growth from the course.