Everyone’s a Designer
Whereas this statement used to annoy me, now it excites me!
I like to think back to when I was a green designer, just starting out — actually I don’t like to think about it too much but it’s good to reflect on.
Back then, I had to come up with the answers. This was my problem to solve. In order to do my job well, I needed to win at designing awesome experiences.
I had a pretty tough time! I felt like I wasn’t winning all that often.
I’d take the brief from the product manager, put my thinking cap on and bury myself away to ‘do design’. Once I was finished, I’d materialise with my designs, hand them over, and run!
I didn’t run at the start, but I soon learned to.
It seemed that everything I presented was pulled apart and debated. No matter how much thought I’d put into it and no matter how many alternatives I’d considered, it seemed that there was always something that people didn’t agree with. I was proud of my work so I’d often get defensive. Then there’d be arguments and debates. And — because we were working in waterfall — by the time we all agreed, the business priorities had shifted and off we’d all go onto another project, often without building any of the things that we’d argued so furiously about.
Not the most productive or pleasurable process.
Contrast that to the way I work now. Now, I don’t have to come up with all of the answers. In fact, sometimes I don’t even try to come up with answers, I just try to come up with as many questions as I can. I let other people answer the questions and in my experience, people love answering questions and solving problems.
Many hands make light work
Designing collaboratively allows other designers, team members, stakeholders, and even users to create design ideas and explore alternatives. Much better to get another person’s view early on in the process than towards the end.
By throwing more brains at the problem, you’re likely to uncover alternatives and ideas that you wouldn’t have thought of yourself.
A problem shared is a problem halved.
Shared understanding
Collaborative design also facilitates early communication, discussion, debate, and idea sharing which help to create a shared understanding among the team.
In this world, there are many heads, but in each head there is a different world. — Ida Jo Moreno
When all members of the team have had an opportunity to contribute their ideas, the designer can then synthesise all of the input into designs that can be tested with users. Going back to the team with user feedback on their ideas (or even better — having the team members observe the user research) is a great way to generate a shared vision of the desired outcome.
Shared ownership
When you include people in the design process, they become invested in the product and feel a sense of ownership. As a result, they are more likely to provide useful input, rather than just feedback for feedback’s sake.
The first quality a UXer should have is modesty and humility. To be open to suggestions from the ‘least likely’ person (even the cleaner) and to keep in mind that as a designer they are the facilitator and custodian of good design, not the creator of it. — Bernard Schokman
As a design facilitator, you’re more likely to be valued, trusted, and respected than you would be as a precious designer. That feels good and a nice by-product is that you’re more likely to get to a better design faster. You spend more time creating and less time debating.
More
My colleague, Vedran Arnautovic, has previously written about running collaborative design sessions and 4 steps to improve your UI sketches which I recommend if you’re interested in working more collaboratively with your team.
Jason Fried recently wrote a great little piece about asking more questions and giving less answers.
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