Looking Good vs. Working Well: How Design is Like Weightlifting

At the gym the other day, while strength and conditioning training, I started thinking about a common challenge we have in the design field when asked to “just make it pretty.” As user-experience professionals, we find this discomforting and often push back at such requests. Why? That’s where weightlifting comes in.

At the various gyms I’ve belonged to, there are often two types of weightlifters: 1) folks working on becoming strong looking, and 2) those focused on becoming functionally strong. The first group is at the gym to focus their routine on lifts that accentuate these muscles. While the second group focuses on things like core strength and supportive muscles with a goal of preventing injury.

The concept of functional strength training is, “training that attempts to mimic the specific physiological demands of real-life activities,” recognizing that real activities recruit more muscles than targeted lifts like a bicep curl. For example, a chin-up uses eight different muscle groups to complete the exercise. Some act as stabilizers, while others are expanding and contracting to complete the motion.

Design is very similar. The idea of just making something look pretty glosses over the whole value of experienced, focused design. If the UI is hard to use and not intuitive, no amount of “lipstick on a pig” is going to make it easier for users. It might present well in a meeting or win some artistic award, but it certainly won’t achieve the results stakeholders wants.

Just like a chin up recruits 8 different muscle groups, good design recruits a series of skills: user research, collaborative ideation, iterative design, and user validation. When brought together, these muscles groups help ensure a successful outcome for your user.

Nice biceps and pecs may look good on the beach, but when you need to recruit your buddies to help with a move, a strong core and good stabilizers will make sure they don’t end up in the hospital.