The Importance of a good Brief
A good brief vs a bad brief, can be the difference between good work and bad work — but it can also be the difference between good work — and great work.
So Critiq had its second event this month, and we are just getting round to giving you the feedback and info we collected from the workshop. However, here is pretty much a transcript of the talk and how the workshop went down incase you missed it:
I have a saying, and belief, that:
Anyone can be good at something — but be great at something you have to have a passion for it.
A real drive, that pushes you to go beyond what anyone else is willing to do. When it comes to design, I really think that this is true, and is important at each stage of the process. If this is the case, than the brief, is the most important part. Fail to maximise on the potential of the brief — and you have already failed to maximise on the potential of the designed outcome.
Before I get into things to consider when generating a good brief, I just want to make a point about what design is to me… I have another saying.
If you get a 100 people into a room, and you show them a piece of work, and you get 100 different opinions on what the piece means, that’s not Design, that’s Art.
Design has a purpose, therefore it must have a consistent meaning. You could say Art has goals too — but these are far more abstract and broad (generally speaking). In a strange way, some more contemporary art, street art and sculpture specifically, has returned to having a specific meaning. Perhaps as advertising has become more obscure, this new pop-art is the new social commentary.
In any case, design has a specific purpose. From a website, to a brand, to a single piece of UI or copy nudging a user experience. If the purpose is not clear, these elements will not work together — to understand the purpose, you need a good brief.
Empathy is at the heart of design. Without the understanding of what others see, feel, and experience, design is a pointless task.
TIM BROWN
Ideo
Credit (www.designbetter.co)
Design thinking is a popular method used to design better products. However the process is the same one we have always used for branding, website designs or any goal related design project (So that’s all of them right?).
Define
Developing a point of view (POV)
This is the first stage in Design Thinking — but looked at it from a point of view that is reflective of any project, and not just product designing. When explaining on www.designbetter.co as:
- Who is your user? (Note as many specific details as possible.)
- What is their deep, unmet need?
- Why is this insightful? (List the insights you gleaned from your empathetic need finding process.)
Stripping this back a step further, you’re just asking the 3 of 5 Ws:
- Who: is your | Audience / User / Target Market?
- What: is their | need / expectations / requirements / wants?
- Why: will they | care / find this insightful / a problem worth solving?
And really, these questions can be used to reframe any design project brief. However, there can be the need to get a little more specific, as not all projects are as open as the search for innovative solutions, as much as we might like them to be. These extra Ws could be viewed, especially in commercial agencies as:
- Where: will they | see / interact with / experience the solution?
- Which: Metric can be measured to determine if you are successful?
There’s just one other entity we are forgetting about. The one everyone pretends is not a factor. The Client.
Now this talk is not about Good clients, and bad clients, that could take a long time, but the fact is that as a designer working in the commercial world, you have to know how to deal with clients and you need to get comfortable asking them these questions whenever possible and where appropriate.
Asking the right questions, early on and getting everyone bought into the process, will help save you a lot of pain and heartache later. It also really helps remove the whole “I don’t like it” when ‘I’ is a 50 year old make who makes 100K+ a year when his website is for 18–24 female students -scenario.
Client Craic
Now extracting a good brief is often hard, but these questions as a base for framing what it is you’re being asked to do is a great place to start, there’s lots of books on design thinking and the designbetter.co is a great place to start if you want to read up on this. I just want to take 5 minutes to share some grade A top class difficult client type responses to you asking for a brief:
Branding
“I don’t know what I want, but I’ll know when I see it!”
You’re not choosing a puppy.
“Great news, I want to have no input at all, you’re the professional, I’m giving you complete creative freedom”
That’s fine, but what is it you want again?
Website
I don’t care what it looks like but it has to be good.
How will you know?
As long as everyone can find all the information they need
What information does EVERYONE need to know? Who is Everyone?
Developing a POV — can give the client as well as the design team, a good starting point and is something to get everyone on the same page with.
Taking the answers to the questions you can then start to create your POV. The Netflix analogy is a great one to show how getting this write helps frame everything moving forward:
“Caroline is a 26-year-old single mom who loves sci-fi movies. She needs a way to rent DVDs that doesn’t clutter her already-busy schedule, while making her feel relaxed after a long day of work and taking care of her daughter.”
Vs
“Caroline is a 26-year-old single mom who loves sci-fi movies. She needs a way to access new and entertaining content in a way that allows her to consume it at her own pace, while making her feel excited about discovering new shows to share with her friends.”
Moving this on for Critiq.
- Who is your user? (Note as many specific details as possible.)
- Creatives and designers
- Varied disciplines and backgrounds
- Varied interests and creative outlets
- Wide range of Ages and experiences - What is their deep, unmet need?
- A way to share their work
- receive feedback
- Improve their own work
- Develop their own skills - Why is this insightful?
- Help remove ‘imposter syndrome’
- Not all designers work in an environment where they can get peer feedback
I don’t want to go into the second 2 Ws, as I wanted this to be an open workshop — but an example of a POV based on this is:
“Sean is a 24 year old Designer, working in house for a local company. She needs a way to share her work with people outside of her office, receive peer feedback so develop her work while not publicly disclosing her employers projects — in an environment, that keeps her enthusiasm high, and allows her to learn and grow as a professional.”
This is just an example of a POV, you may be able to come up with a better one.
Workshop
The guys and gals then split up into groups, to really quickly try and hash together some ideas using some of these methods to get some idea of the who, what and why for Critiq, to help us know, what is the next steps for the group.
This worked, exceptionally well and everyone really threw themselves into it.
The results were really interesting, myself and Jamie took the time a few nights later to go over everything, Jamie has kindly put this together for you here>.
You could really help us out by completing this form, as we have just a few questions to help us on the next steps:
So that was Critiq2 and it seems like we have a heck of a lot to do, but importantly, its worth doing and people want to get involved.
If you, your colleagues or friends would like Critiq, get in touch and let us know — we are on twitter as @critiqclub and will be posting updates on their very soon. If your not already, get on our mailing list too!
