While I don’t want to shut down the validity of this as an option I feel it also isn’t answering the question. “Not playing the game!” isn’t a great answer to “How do I play the game?”

She’s explicitly said she doesn’t want to manage Consultants have to sell, organize projects, work w internal stakeholders, etc. If you’re successful you have to hire—and manage—people. This option doesn’t really address the fundamental question: Does she want to manage or focus solely on delivery?

To Carolann: I’d strongly consider managing others. You can direct their work and increase your influence tremendously and amplify others to make good design possible. I’ve been managing for years now and still do projects here and there. My ability to deliver has only been improved by navigating process and navigating cross functional teams w a designer lens. Even as an IC you have to learn to manage ppl upwards: exec buy in, product manager focus, dev resources, etc. It’s the nature of team work.

But if you want to focus on increasing your effects as an IC I suggest detailing out what that role means and bring it up to the company. This time next year what will design improve that you’re lacking today? Think in skills and deliverables. UX is an umbrella term: Content creation, visual design, content writing, and user research (discovery, optimization, etc). Figure out which skills in these buckets would prove valuable to increase then plan that skill tree out. If you don’t know try interviewing people in your area to provide more detail.

Good luck!