Defining the Strategy for a Global UX Team
Context & Challenge
Following a major organizational shift, UX at Adevinta evolved from a set of strong local teams into a single global UX organization serving the European markets.
This consolidation of the discipline under one structure brought with it a complex reality. Teams came from different markets, with different histories, ways of working and maturity levels, as well as diverse relationships with Product, Technology and Data.
The main challenge was to define a shared strategy that would:
- •Align more than 120 UX professionals around a common direction
- •Clarify how UX should operate within the new product organization
- •Balance short-term operational needs with a long-term vision
- •Take the first steps towards building a shared design culture at a global level within the Adevinta group
My Role
As Design Director for Real Estate, Mobility and Emerging Verticals, I was appointed to lead the initiative to define the global UX team strategy, in collaboration with other design leaders across the organization.
My responsibilities included:
- •Leading the team responsible for defining the strategy
- •Shaping and structuring the different stages of the project
- •Leading interviews with internal teams and key stakeholders from Product, Technology and Data
- •Defining and facilitating alignment workshops with the Design leadership team
What we did
Diagnosis — understanding where we were
We started by building a shared, evidence-based understanding of the current state.
This included:
- •In-depth interviews with all UX managers across markets
- •In-depth interviews with key stakeholders from Product, Technology, Data and Business
- •Analysis of business priorities and performance data
- •Analysis of how other teams outside the Adevinta group had addressed similar transformations
- •A cross-cutting SWOT analysis to identify strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats
Key findings included a high level of specialization and UX talent, strong perceived value when UX was involved throughout the full product lifecycle, inconsistent ways of working across tribes, and difficulty in clearly linking UX work to business impact.
This phase helped move the conversation from individual perceptions to a shared understanding.
Direction — where we wanted to go
The first step in defining the direction was the creation of a mission and vision for the global design team, carried out through a series of strategic workshops with all design leaders across the organization.
Building on the diagnosis and the defined mission and vision, we articulated a three-stage strategic model with three clear strategic objectives:
- •Foundational — establishing UX as a single global team
- •Consolidation — embedding UX consistently within product tribes
- •Excellence — positioning UX as a strong strategic partner for the business
Action — our plan
The final step was translating the vision into a prioritized action agenda, structured across short-, mid- and long-term horizons.
During the first year, with the foundational goal of establishing a single global team, we defined several priority focus areas:
- •Establishing clarity around UX roles, responsibilities and career frameworks
- •Defining shared rituals and ways of working across discovery and delivery
- •Converging tools, metrics and research standards
- •Strengthening collaboration with Product, Technology and Data
- •Investing in team health, learning and professional development
Each initiative was explicitly connected to the strategic pillars, making priorities and trade-offs visible.
Take a look to the final version of the UX global team strategy >>
Why this mattered
The definition and implementation of the strategy provided a clear north star during the first year for a newly formed global UX team.
Above all, it enabled UX leaders and practitioners to make decisions with greater coherence, confidence and shared intent, even within a complex and evolving organizational context.