Aneil Razvi

Where does your design function actually sit?

Fifteen questions, about four minutes. You get a read on two axes most assessments collapse into one: how mature your design practice is, and separately, how far your AI adoption has actually gone. Most companies are further along on one than the other, and the gap between them is usually the real problem.

49%
of organizations sit at a single level, Emergent, out of six
13%
have updated hiring or reviews for AI, though 87% report support for it
30 vs 15
average designers at the least mature level, versus the most mature

That last number is worth sitting with. Companies at the bottom of the maturity scale average twice as many designers as the ones at the top. Headcount is not the lever.

No email to take it. Where you sit is free. The full breakdown and the engagement fit need an email.

Sources and method

Sources. Level names and population distribution from Nielsen Norman Group, The 6 Levels of UX Maturity (2021, reviewed 2024) and The State of UX Maturity, n=5,371 (2022). Outcome multiples and designer headcount by level from InVision, The New Design Frontier, 2,200+ organizations across 24 industries and 77 countries (2018). Revenue and shareholder return figures from McKinsey, The Business Value of Design, 300 public companies over five years (2018). AI maturity levels from Jakob Nielsen, The Capability Maturity Model for AI in Design (March 2026). AI adoption and organizational change figures from the AI in Design Report 2026, Designer Fund and Foundation Capital. The 2018 studies are dated on tooling and current on structure.