The Merholz Agenda

Peter Merholz's semi-weekly newsletter on organization design, design leadership, and bringing humanism into the places we work.

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Peter Merholz <newsletter@petermerholz.com>

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[TMA] Surfing the Waves of Liminality

By Peter Merholz · Apr 10, 2026 · View online →

My publishing schedule has been in flux due to Spring Break travel (visiting colleges with the 12th grader!). But I've been busy, so wanted to share...

There are still a few seats at the table for the Intentional Design Leadership Circle, the 6-week cohort Jesse and I are facilitating for director-and-above design leaders. The idea is to escape reactivity and, within a space to reflect and connect, become intentional in your leadership work.
Learn more and register -->

LIMINAL 3: The Waves Within Waves

Two hours ago I hit publish on the latest episode of Finding Our Way, which is the third installment of LIMINAL, our side quest in unpacking this moment we are in.

We recorded this episode a few weeks ago, and one theme from it has stuck with me most since then: the need to operate collectively.

There's something about this moment that is driving people to tackle their challenges in isolation, with each of us figuring it out for ourselves. In some contexts, we are pitted against one

October 2025

The Merholz Agenda

[TMA] Surfing the Waves of Liminality

[TMA] AI Transformation Tests Your Team Leadership Practice

[TMA] Fundamentals and the Future: Leadership Edition

[TMA] Design Quality Won't Manage Itself

[TMA] Roles Were Always Blurry. Use Skills to Bring Focus.

[TMA] Skepticism, not cynicism, in this liminal moment

[TMA] Welcome to LIMINAL

[TMA] UX/Design Leaders Are Failing the Next Generations

[TMA] When "Closer to the Customer" Means Knowing Them Less

[TMA] Overcome UX/Design Leadership's Learned Helplessness

[TMA] Product Management's Failure is UX/Design's Opportunity

[TMA] Should [Front-End? Research? Accessibility?] Belong in the Design Org?

[TMA] Reporting to the CEO? What Do We Want from Design?

[TMA] Might AI Fix Broken "Agile Transformations"?

[TMA] The 2025 State of UX/Design Organizational Health

[TMA] Uncertainty is Opportunity

[TMA] What's Different About Design with AI?

[TMA] The Increasing Importance of Service Design

[TMA] Don't Be a Weak-ass Design Leader

[TMA] A History of Design and an Interactive Cube!

[TMA] Introducing "Design Org Dimensions"

[TMA] On Designer and Researcher Burnout; Share Your Experience

[TMA] The Design Executive's Starter Checklist

[TMA] Pokemon, Config 2025, and Recruiting

[TMA] 🌶️ Spicy(?) Takes on AI, Design Tests, and Cowardice

[TMA] New UX/Design Leadership Masterclass Offerings

[TMA] Thoughts on AI/UX: Quality, Bespokeness, and Adaptation

[TMA] Tools don't design, people do (yes, this is a little about AI)

[TMA] Make Meaningful Metrics

[TMA] Design's challenges make sense with this perspective