Dian is an accomplished UX leader and designer, currently heading the Product Design team at myTomorrows, a healthtech scaleup in Amsterdam. As NNg-certified UX manager he champions DesignOps and embeds design thinking into company culture. A strong advocate for co-creation, Dian fosters collaboration across teams and departments.
Originally from South Africa, Dian was a design lecturer at NWU and managed his own design studio before relocating to the Netherlands in 2021. With a diverse background spanning fintech, logistics, hospitality, retail, and healthcare, he has worked with multinational companies and startups alike. Valued for his critical thinking, creativity and storytelling skills, Dian is deeply connected to the human aspect of design.
Upcoming Talks
Designers are uniquely positioned to influence how organizations think, collaborate, and solve problems. But cultural change rarely starts with a framework or a slide deck – it starts with behaviour. In this talk, I explore how designers can use their design thinking mindset to influence company culture by first embodying it themselves: listening with empathy, experimenting openly, and iterating in how they work with others. Through practical examples – such as running collaborative design sprints, teaching non-designers the fundamentals of discovery, getting leadership buy-in, and opening up the creative process to the wider company – I show how design practices can become shared practices. The central idea is simple: if creatives model design thinking publicly, they help reshape how the entire company thinks and acts.
Past Talks
With this insightful and inspiring talk you will learn how to successfully lead and collaborate with your design team by focusing on individual strengths. If you are struggling with one or more individuals that seem to sabotage team meetings or 'do their own thing' this talk is for you. Learn how to identify and harness even the most difficult team member's attributes and transform them into strengths that benefit the team.