Strategy and Organisational Design Director in London

IDEO London is looking for a Strategy and Organisational Design Director who understands that strategy without activation is just intention — and that the gap between ambition and reality is where organisations most need a thinking partner. This is a senior role for someone who reads organisations the way a designer reads a brief: with curiosity about what's really going on beneath the surface, and with a clear instinct for where the real levers for change are.

You understand how systems work — how structure, incentives, culture, and leadership interact to make or break a strategy — and you know how to work with those forces rather than against them. When organisations are navigating something genuinely hard or new — adapting to AI, restructuring how decisions get made, building new capabilities, shifting culture, or figuring out what to stop doing — they don't need more frameworks or slides. They need someone who can help them see the system clearly, make honest choices, and design a path forward that will actually stick. And they need the confidence to act.

You'll spend most of your time leading complex client engagements, particularly in our Health portfolio, directing multidisciplinary teams and building trusted relationships with senior leaders. Alongside that, you'll help build something: IDEO London's strategy and organisational design practice, at a moment when the studio is intentionally investing in depth, expertise, and the kind of work that moves organisations forward rather than producing reports about them.

Organisations today are facing increasing pressure to evolve: adapting to new technologies, shifting customer expectations, changing workforce dynamics, and growing complexity across systems and markets. Strategy alone is not enough. Organisations need support translating ambition into the structures, behaviours, capabilities, and ways of working that make change real. This role sits at the heart of that shift.

The clients who need us most are navigating real transformation — health organisations reinventing how they deliver care, companies trying to embed AI into how their people work, leadership teams grappling with the human cost of change that's moving too fast. They need someone who can see the whole system, name what's really holding things back, and design interventions that create lasting change rather than temporary momentum.

Once here you will:

• Lead complex strategy and organisational design engagements from framing through to activation — not just defining the direction, but designing what needs to change for that direction to become real.
• Read organisations as systems: understand the structures, incentives, behaviours, and cultures that shape how things actually work, and identify the levers most likely to drive meaningful, lasting change.
• Act as a senior client partner — building trust with leadership teams over time, shaping the conversation before the brief is written, scoping opportunities, and staying invested in outcomes long after the engagement closes.
• Direct multidisciplinary teams across strategy, research, and design, holding both rigour and creativity, and keeping work grounded in what will genuinely move the organisation forward.
• Help clients make honest strategic choices — not just articulating ambition, but surfacing trade-offs, challenging assumptions, and aligning leadership around what they're actually committing to.
• Prototype strategic and organisational futures in practice: test ideas through experimentation and iteration so clients build real confidence before they scale.
• Facilitate executive conversations that advance decisions rather than defer them — bringing both structure and sensitivity to rooms where the stakes are high and consensus is hard.
• Contribute to IDEO's strategy and organisational design practice: develop methods, build POVs, mentor colleagues, and help make the studio's expertise visible and distinctive.
• Coach and mentor designers and project leads, modelling excellent client communication, facilitation, and strategic thinking.
• Help clients navigate the human dimensions of AI adoption — how organisations restructure for it, how teams build confidence with it, and how leaders model the change they're asking of others.
• Represent IDEO externally through writing, talks, and relationships — contributing to how the studio is known in the market for the quality and seriousness of its strategy work.

We're looking for someone with:

• A strong track record leading innovation, strategy and organisational design engagements — in consulting, in-house, or both — with the scars and the wisdom that come from seeing what it actually takes to make change stick.
• A genuine systems thinker: you understand how organisations work as interconnected wholes, and you know how to identify the structural, behavioural, and cultural levers that matter most.
• Someone who is as comfortable designing an organisational future as they are facilitating the difficult leadership conversation that makes it real — you move between strategy and making with ease.
• Experience helping organisations navigate real transformation: not just documenting what needs to change, but designing the conditions — structures, capabilities, rhythms, behaviours — that allow change to take hold.
• Strong facilitation and narrative skills, including the ability to hold senior executive rooms with clarity and care, and to build alignment across organisations where people genuinely disagree.
• People leadership that creates conditions for good work — you know how to direct a multidisciplinary team, develop junior talent, and maintain creative rigour under pressure.
• Experience scoping and building new client relationships — you're comfortable writing a proposal, shaping a brief, and growing an account over time.
• Curiosity about the intersection of strategy, AI, and the human dimensions of organisational change — you don't need to be a technologist, but you understand what AI is doing to organisations and what it means for the kind of strategy work clients need.

It's a bonus if you:

• Have led transformation in health organisations.
• Have experience helping organisations navigate AI adoption in ways that are genuinely human-centred: restructuring for it, building capability around it, and managing the workforce anxieties it creates.
• Have built or contributed to an innovation practice or capability — you know what it takes to design for change from the inside.
• Are fluent in strategic choice-making frameworks (Playing to Win and others), and can use them as tools for real decision-making rather than as slides.
• Have experience in European markets or with European regulatory environments, where navigating complexity is part of the brief rather than an obstacle to it.
• Are fluent in a second language.

What We Believe: IDEO exists to tackle the gnarliest problems in the world with imagination and optimism. For strategy and organisational design, that means something specific: we don't write strategies that live in decks. We design organisational futures that people can actually inhabit — where the structures make sense, the behaviours are possible, and the change has somewhere to go. If you want to do strategy work that treats the human and systemic complexity of change as the design problem, not the obstacle — this is the right place to do it.

What does IDEO offer you?

• Innovation and creativity: Lead work that genuinely matters — from shaping organisational transformation and future growth strategies to building innovation capabilities at some of the world’s most ambitious organisations, working alongside talented people across disciplines.
• Learning and growth: Whether it’s deepening your organisational design expertise, growing senior client relationships, or building your external profile through speaking and writing, we’re here to support your development.
• Community and well-being: Collaboration and community are central to what we do. We foster moments for creativity, connection, and reflection, and respect the need for work-life balance.
• Projects with purpose: We partner with clients to use design as a force for good, solving meaningful problems from inception through to implementation.
• Compensation: £90,000–£100,000 GBP, depending on experience.
• Location: This position is based out of our London studio with an in-person-first working model, including at least three days a week working from the studio. Please note that the successful candidate must be based in the UK and have the unrestricted right to work in the UK. Unfortunately, we are unable to offer sponsorship for this role.

IDEO proudly supports flexible work.

Commitment to Diversity: At IDEO, we are committed to the work of advancing diversity, equity, and inclusion within our organisation and in the world. Our purpose of having disproportionate, world-changing impact through design is directly connected to our ability to bring many different perspectives to the table. This applies to our candidates, the people we hire, the clients and customers we serve, and the communities we learn from in our research. As a human-centred organisation, we are committed to working with and designing for people of every race, ethnicity, gender identity, sexual orientation, age, socio-economic status, physical ability or attribute, religion, national origin, or political belief. We recognise that this commitment requires ongoing work and sustained attention, as well as adaptation to new insights and best practices. We keep our diversity data public for the sake of accountability and transparency.

Application requirements and instructions: If you identify with our values, are excited about great design, and would like to contribute to our community, we would love to see your CV, a cover letter, and examples of your work.

• CV: please highlight experiences related to the ‘We’re looking for someone with’ section above.
• Cover letter: please share why you are interested in this role and how it aligns with how you are looking to grow in your career.
• Work examples (confidentiality permitting): please include two or three projects that demonstrate your experience leading strategic, organisational, or transformation work. For each, tell us the challenge, your role, the approach, and the impact.

We know that many of you are coming from a range of backgrounds — strategy consulting, organisational design, innovation, transformation, business leadership, or a mix of all of the above. We think about strategy and organisational design broadly, so include examples of whatever work best represents how you think, lead, and create impact.