Hi folks. Missed a couple of weeks for vacation, RSI on my left hand, and working on my next book. I’m back with more advice on overcoming what makes design hard. Hope you are doing well this week.
You’ve voted before that being ignored is one of the most difficult situations you face. One goal of this book was to help you overcome your most difficult situations.
In Why Design is Hard I explain that one superpower designers have is investigation. We are good at digging deep to understand the root causes of things. When you are ignored it’s a great time to rely on this superpower. Don’t act until you understand the causes. Here are some of the common ones.
The list of reasons why designers are ignored
You work in a truly dysfunctional, broken and stupid organization. This is often what I hear designers say, but it’s rarely true. Your frustrations might be valid, but that likely doesn’t justify condemning an entire organization that is obviously still functional and smart enough to earn the revenue that pays your monthly salary. At minimum, admit there is a difference between dysfunctional for you and dysfunctional for everyone. Use your investigative superpowers. The most likely reason is that there are mismatches between your expectations and what the leaders in your organizations expect. If so, the first move is to identify those gaps and the second move is to figure out how to close them.
Sometimes executives do foolish things, like hiring people without fully understanding what role they will play. They might be copying what competitors are doing or get inspired by a trend they heard on their favorite podcast. This can result in a situation where, despite good intentions, no one on the team has the expertise to properly lead designers. Most organizations have low design maturity, which is why it’s foolish for us to expect high design maturity. It’s very rare. Alternatively, the CEO could be paying for design theater: they want to be able to say to customers, “we have a UX team,” or “our usability experts approved this,” without actually having to change anything about how product decisions are made.
Bad design makes money. Designers are almost always in the quality business, but often the business model your organization has does not use quality as a strategy. It’s common for the profit motive to reward releasing products faster or cheaper rather than better. This is disappointing for most designers. Sorry! We all want to make great things but organizations that have making great things as their strategy are rare. Don’t let this depress you. Instead, open your eyes to the value system of your organization. Don’t take the gaps personally. If you keep your eyes open you can better target places where your desires and the organizations reward system align and you’ll be happier there.
You want to work on ideas leaders don’t understand. The best argument to make to a leader is this: “You said problem X is the the most important for this project and I can solve it if you let me do Y.” That’s it. If you can do the homework to investigate their goals, and line up an idea that will deliver on it, they will love you. They will give you budget and resources. Why? It’s their job. But to try and persuade someone on an idea that they don’t understand is very hard, even for the most brilliant and respected designers in the world.
Do you listen to people you don’t trust yet? Everyone is busy and relies on people they have already worked with. It’s not something personal or against you. Who wants to go out of their way to take more risks? It’s human nature not to do this. What does this mean for you as a designer? It means you need to use your investigative superpower to find ways to earn trust. Who on the team listens to you the most? Ask them for ways you can take more initiative and show the rest of the team that you are reliable, valuable and have useful talents.
Also see my list of the ten reasons bad design happens, which is more comprehensive and every designer should know it.
Charm your way to allies who listen to you
One major lesson in Why Design Is Hard is the difference between designers and deciders. If you feel ignored it means you are definitely not a decider and need to learn how to be more of an influencer. Charm is something that is designed! It’s a skill you can develop to express ideas and opinions in a way that is easier for people to like.
One time-tested tactic is when you join a project, interview every contributor like they are a customer. Use another of your superpowers, your curiosity, to charm your coworkers. In Leah Buley’s excellent book, The User Experience Team of One: A Research and Design Survival Guide, she calls this a listening tour. Ask them to show you, not tell you, what they make. Listen. Learn. Ask good questions. By having them show you their work and how it appears to users, you will be in a visual medium, a strength for you. Be curious, take notes. Ask where they think they need design help.
In this listening tour, who is friendly to you? Who welcomes your input? What is the smallest unit of success you can create with them? When someone makes a unit of work better because of you, that’s what you want to present to the rest of the organization about. Tell this story: “Person X had important problem Y. I did design task Z and we improved it Q%.” Why does this work? Everyone wants their problem solved. And when they see you helped a teammate they respect solve a problem they will want you to do the same for them. And you will be on your way.
The fact that bad design makes money is so real, great post, love it! Thanks for sharing
A listening tour thingy, on company-team time, is adjacent to mingling. And adjacent to that is mingling at lunchtime.
I am saying don't eat lunch with your favourite people all the time, but instead spread yourself around the team for lunches. And then, of course, listen and share.