Confessions of a Designer Imposter

Or, a career with an identity crisis

Pretty much since it started, I’ve had a tenuous relationship with my design career. Like Carrie to Mr. Big, I am for better or worse drawn to it again and again. With each go around, I’m wooed by a new problem to solve, charmed into collaborations with clever people, embraced by the sweet, warm, comfortable known of a team, an office, a paycheck. But inevitably I’ll become frustrated by the things that will never change, exhausted by all the little exigencies of daily life (meetings), and I’ll be parting ways dramatically to make declarative, no– definitive fresh starts doing something completely different. And yet.

And yet, here I am about to step into an exciting, promising new role. Once more, I’m moving forward in a career that has unfolded fruitfully and satisfyingly, if perhaps not willfully. It’s not that I have emotional amnesia. I think the main problem is that I’m not really a designer.

I have this friend, I’ll call him Tom, because that’s his name, and he’s very proud of his work and also very self-aware, and he won’t mind at all that I’m using him as an example. Every aspect of his life is shaped in some way by his keen aesthetic sensibility, his orientation towards order and symmetry and balance. You should see his apartment! Impeccable! He regularly contributes thoughtful and well-researched POV pieces to influential industry publications. Tom designed a logo for his wedding invitation. (It was evocative yet understated.) Tom is a designer. No– he is a Designer.

The design community is a broad one, but tight-knit, and you definitely know who the cool kids are. They are the scions of the conference circuit, the blog-posters and pod-casters, the workshop runners, the Creative Morning talk-givers. They’re smart, they’re witty, they have funky eyewear. They get rad book deals, and I enjoy reading their books. I am following all of them on Medium.

But I am not one of them. Or, I don’t feel like one of them. I’ve hardly taken the road less traveled, having more or less worked my way up over nearly twenty years, from pixel-pushing minion to arm-waving directrice. Along the way, I’ve been tremendously fortunate to land in roles and environments that have supported the things I’m interested in and have let me work on them in a way that encourages me to experiment and get weird sometimes. I love what I do for work. It’s intellectually stimulating and challenging in all the right ways.

But it is still work for me.

I think there is a latent understanding that to be a designer requires a kind of meta-level of commitment to the culture and community. To be a designer implies, well, designing. Producing, making, Always Be Creating. You must deliver and champion your point of view unto the community, and teach others as a part of the evolving design curriculum. You’ve got to really put yourself out there. It’s a lifestyle.

Today more than ever, designers are truly empowered not just as problem solvers, but as problem framers, as architects of social and cultural movements. As the work of IDEO (most prominently) has shown, design thinking is a sensible methodology for sociological inquiry, and its framework of testing and iteration can often realize measurably better results than in any purely academic setting.

And because of this, design as a profession and as a community really does take all kinds. The more meandering your path, the more esoteric your hobbies and proclivities, all the better! Design is fundamentally about perspective, so whatever you’ve done to broaden yours can only enhance your qualifications. How do you think I’ve gotten as far as I have taking all these crazy detours (I’m a nutrition program evaluator! I’m a wine buyer! I’m an importer! I’m a baker! I run a coffee bar!) and still coming back like a boss? Yeah, make that as a boss.

So why do I feel like such an outsider?

The first truth is that I simply prefer doing other things. When I get home, after I check my Post-Its at the door and the black turtleneck comes off, you’re more likely to find me researching sourdough fermentation or plowing through heaps of literary fiction than drafting my next blog post about how to run a design sprint. Like I said, I do, I really do like reading that stuff, and being inspired by my peers who are actively shaping design culture as we know it, even if it is occasionally a little punchdrunk on the ol’ Kool-Aid. It’s just not where my own creative energy is stirred into action.

And that’s related to the second truth, which is that as a creative pursuit, I’m a much better cook or baker than I’ll ever be a designer. It’s where I achieve that elusive state of flow, whether my head is deep in recipe research mode or my hands are deep in brioche dough. Talking about food, writing about food– that is where I find my voice, it’s when I feel the most clear-headed, my thinking the most structured. Even technically my skills are far more developed. Because honestly, let’s just say that in design I’m more of an ideas person. But in the kitchen? I can execute.

Now, for the sake of all past, present, and future employers, I will be clear. I’m good at my design job. I am confident and I am engaged. I am present. My sweet spots have always been generating big ideas, building enthusiasm around a vision, and especially in guiding teams and individuals. My weaknesses can sometimes be details and follow-through. But I own it and I work through it. Or, at least I make sure to surround myself with people who make me look and feel smarter.

Let me digress for a second with a little story.

On the first day of 9th grade honors English, my classmates and I waited fidgety but silently in our seats for our instructor to arrive. Slight and wiry, with a straggly ponytail, over-sized glasses, rumpled khakis, and Birkenstocks (of course!), Mr. Kobasa entered the room and paced between the rows of desks. “WHO ARE YOU?,” he bellowed, singling out each and every student. Mind you, “Dead Poet’s Society” had come out recently, so we were as titillated by this barbaric yawp-ing as we were surely intimidated.

Who, indeed. The point, of course was that we couldn’t answer, shouldn’t answer. Not then, but perhaps eventually, and we’ll have a hell of a time figuring out what to say when we’re ready. The reality is, though, that while we tend to lead lives that are probably more fulfilling than just full of quiet desperation (yeah, that class was pretty heavy on the transcendentalists…), we often find ourselves hanging our identities on what we do, the cocktail party small talk version of ourselves. Therein lies the crux of my designer-imposter syndrome. Yeah, design is what I do, mostly, sort of, but I struggle to earnestly stand behind this identity in the way that I think others who proudly wear the mantle of designer (or Designer) choose to. It’s not that I’m not worthy, it’s just doesn’t quite fit.

So this is the third, and kind of inconvenient truth, especially as I take this next step, and until the next detour comes along. I’m in no hurry. What I do know is that whatever it is I’m doing, I care about my work sincerely. But food will always come first, because that is who I am. I am an eater and I am a feeder. I am a cook.

Heather Eddy has 20 years experience leading product and experience design strategy with companies like adidas, Scholastic, Gilt, and Capital One. She’s recently begun coaching aspiring entrepreneurs at shesrobust.com

Hey! You made it all the way to the bottom. Clap not just for me, but also for yourself!