On the heels of reading Fast Company's Masters of Design issue, I attended the International Brand Design Conference and heard Claudia Kotchka present on the design imperative facing consumer goods manufacturers.

Kotchka leads A.G. Lafley's mission to make design second nature at Procter & Gamble. She provided insight on how you can create a similar cultural change in your organization.

According to Kotchka, design needs:

• a senior management champion. Any cultural change must come top down from the entire C-suite and business unit presidents.
• to live in the business units. Great design talent that can inspire, teach and lead needs to live where action is.
• to be integrated early in the process. Design is much more than "the last decoration station on the way to market."
• a voice. All of the above give design a voice that will be heard.
• measurement. We need to show the bottom-line impact design can create.

Since joining my new firm, I've been fascinated with the impact design has on the customer experience. But as much as business needs design to create customer loyalty, Kotchka warned that designers need to learn the language of business. "MBAs won't take design courses." It's up to designers to make this happen.

We see plenty of examples of top-down involvement in successful business initiatives. Does anyone have a bottom-up example they can share with the group?