About Wink
The Wink Collective helps designers of all kinds develop the strategic thinking skills needed to drive real business impact.
We focus on the space between design, product, and business, where decisions are made and value is created.
Wink was created from a simple observation.
Across industries and disciplines, many talented designers struggle to influence decisions, not because of their ability, but because they haven’t been taught how to think in business terms.
This gap exists in brand, UX, service design, and beyond.
Wink exists to close it.
Who Wink is for
Designers across disciplines who want to increase their impact
Creative professionals looking to move into more strategic roles
Design and product teams aiming to better connect design to business outcomes
How It’s Applied
We give students the battle-tested strategic playbook they need. You learn to apply each pillar to real-world projects, turning confusion into confidence and professional immaturity into measurable job-readiness. You learn the disruptive skills that actually get you hired and promoted.
We deploy our methodology to optimize team performance, resolve cross-departmental conflict, and build scalable design systems that directly align creative output with quantifiable business objectives.
Our Founder
Craig Edis is a product and design executive who has lived the 20-year strategic journey you’re trying to skip.
His career, from award-winning design and branding to executive-level product leadership, gives him a brutal and unique perspective: he sees every pixel as a complete brand, product, and user experience.
Craig specializes in leading organizations by balancing strategic vision, emotional intelligence (EQ), and amazing execution. He doesn't just translate business goals; he translates them into user-centred solutions, navigating constraints to deliver elegant, quantifiable solutions. His experience across startups, global enterprise, and public sector has prepared him to guide anyone, from a junior designer to a CEO, to measurable business success.
Craig is passionate about mentoring teams, building agile processes, and establishing a collaborative culture where professionals can grow without the drama.
His blend of product, design, marketing, and business acumen makes him the well-rounded leader ready to drive measurable impact from day one.
Craig Edis
Founder & Principal
The 5 Pillars of the Wink Methodology
The mission is simple: Help designers feel confident. Help teams work better. Help businesses stop wasting money on design that doesn't work.
The Wink Methodology is the ultimate strategic cheat sheet. It blends service design, user psychology, accessibility, and practical business mastery into a clear, reliable process for real-world work, not just in academic theory.
It reframes design from “making things look good” to “making things work better”—for users, for teams, and, most importantly, for quantifiable impact.
-
Design starts with understanding the business problem and not just the brief.
Wink teaches and applies methods to:
Define objectives in business terms, not only design outcomes.
Identify the real problem behind the ask.
Align stakeholders and teams around measurable goals.
The Outcome: Designers and teams move from order-takers to strategic contributors.
-
Empathy meets evidence. Every design decision is anchored in human insight.
The Wink approach integrates:
Service design and user research techniques.
User psychology and behavioural insights.
Data-informed decision-making and validation.
The Outcome: Designs that not only look right, but work right. Meeting user needs and driving engagement, retention, and satisfaction.
-
Design doesn’t happen in isolation. Wink cultivates the ability to work with others, not around them.
We emphasize:
Effective communication across disciplines.
Managing feedback from non-designers.
Collaboration between product, marketing, and business teams.
The Outcome: Designers become trusted partners across functions, improving efficiency and reducing friction.
-
Professionalism is a mindset, not a milestone.
Wink equips designers and teams to:
Manage time, feedback, and ambiguity with confidence.
Present and sell design effectively.
Stay composed, adaptable, and emotionally intelligent under pressure.
Build credibility through process, not opinion.
The Outcome: Designers project confidence and accountability; key traits employers and clients value most.
-
Design teams thrive when creativity meets structure.
Wink introduces systems that balance flexibility with clarity:
Streamlined workflows, process mapping, and design ops practices.
Scalable collaboration frameworks.
Repeatable tools for feedback, approvals, and measurement.
The Outcome: Leaner, more focused teams that deliver consistent, high-quality outcomes, faster.