How fitness helps me be a better designer

“Champions are made from something they have deep inside them — a desire, a dream, a vision.” — Muhammad Ali.

One of my favorite things is biking to work. However, every morning, there’s one hill that almost always gets the better of me. As I ascend, lowering my gears a couple times, for a brief moment I say to myself “Ugh, maybe I can turn around and work from home” or “Ugh, I should’ve just taken the subway.”

But then I pump the pedals one more turn, I’m at the top of the hill, and the descent into a cooling gravitational pull relieves me of my worry, and everything just isn’t so bad.

I bring this relief into work with me. My ease is palpable (or so I like to think) and the rest of the day’s challenges come and go just like that hill.

My work life is at its best right now, and my fitness commitment also at its highest. I workout 5 times a week, and I’ve been thinking a lot lately how much my work life has improved by my increased fitness practice.

When I started at DigitasLBi early last year, I joined a group of kindred spirits, who are incredibly talented and savvy experience designers. As I’ve gotten to know them, I’ve learned many of them also enjoy regular fitness and are committed to keeping it in their lives.

I know countless studies show the connection between exercise and its positive effects on divergent thinking & creativity, but I prefer hearing real stories on how real creatives feel fitness and creativity are linked, and how it improves their professional lives.

When I discussed the topic with my teammates, some interesting themes emerged…

1. Solve problems faster with a clear head

Prior to our group discussion, I sent out a quick survey to our team asking basic questions about their fitness habits & preferences. One question I asked was “What’s your favorite thing about your job?” What was really cool, was several folks responded with “solving problems.”

Now, I would argue most people would prefer to have fewer problems on their plate at work, but experience designers on the other hand, relish any opportunity to find solutions to complex design problems, like a kid with a new Princess Castle Lego set just dying to make a spaceship out of it.

It’s a curious thing to find a group of people that arguably like problems. In fact, you could almost say problems are an experience designer’s currency. The more solutions you bring, the “richer” and more valuable the product.

But solving problems requires clear thought, and often a level of concentration that cannot always be reached at the drop of a hat. I’ve personally noticed that I’ve had my most succinct solutions reached on the days when I’ve had the hardest workouts that morning. I distinctly feel the rising endorphins and higher oxygen flow. When asked for guidance on certain design problems, I get to the solution more quickly and with greater confidence than days when I haven’t gotten my morning workout.

A clear head can save you money. Even financial planners are getting in on the clear-headed game. If I can get to better solutions faster, better products are sent to market quicker. Moral of the story: it’s in your best interest to let me get my workout in.

2. Confidence

I wasn’t always fit, but have been scribbling with crayons since I could crawl. Being athletic did not come naturally to me as a child, nor as I got older. It was only through a weight loss program a few years ago did I discover how much joy I could get out of fitness.

And a curious thing happened. The more I worked out, and the healthier I got, the happier I was at work, and the better I was at my job. Successfully finishing a challenging workout gave me the confidence to take risks with my work and be proud of the solutions I brought to the table.

Sometimes I still feel nervous getting on the treadmill, I won’t lie. But in a way, I treasure that anxiety. I treasure the hurdle I must overcome, and do with each workout. And in doing so, those challenges don’t seem so scary after all. As someone still coming up in her career, this is important to be reminded of often; no matter what it is, it won’t be as bad as you think. Be it an important presentation, a hefty deadline, or a nerve-wracking client call, I must keep turning the pedals, until the hill has been overcome.

My coworker Dawn, who regularly enjoys bikram yoga, has a similar perspective: “When I was 9 months pregnant, I still did bikram, and some days it was brutal: 105 degrees, 90 long minutes, and a challenging class. It’s often NOT easy to do when you’re at your best, much less exhausted or carrying around another human being. So compared to that, during some difficult client meetings I just think, ‘This is a breeze.’”

At the end of the day, it’ll be OK because I will have my “me time.”

Even just the simple reward of the workout awaiting you at the end of the day is enough to see the bigger picture. To the question, “What has sport & fitness taught you about dealing with corporate life?” one person said: “At the end of the day, it’ll be OK because I will have my ‘me time.’ ” By simply knowing your workout awaits you, the control is back in your hands, and your life is no longer at the mercy of people and events you cannot manage or predict.

Michael Histen, a VP who’s been with Digitas several years, enjoys CrossFit. He’s discovered that prioritizing working out has aided his management skills. He’s learned how to prioritize work and projects better after years of accomplishing the simple task of finding one hour four times a week for himself.

“Folks ask me ‘how do you fit it [working out] in?’ And I think, if the President of the United States can find time to work out, so can I!”

Michael brought up a great point about a XD lesson in the CrossFit box he’s learned. It dawned on him recently how CrossFit has to accommodate users from varied levels of fitness familiarity, and the CrossFit formula somehow works for folks just starting out AND those who’ve been working out seriously for years. It reminds Michael that, depending on the product, finding a solution that can work for all levels of familiarity is of upmost importance.

3. Being stubborn is effective.

The theme of “powering through” and not taking no for an answer came up frequently in our discussions. I would argue experience designers are a stubborn, rebellious bunch. We’re good at what we do because we question everything to the point of being downright pains in the ass.

My teammate, Stormi Knight, mentioned how the simple lessons of taking Spin classes over and over can be brought to her work directly. “Knowing how to set up your bike, after several classes of trial and error, can definitely relate to setting up a process or project.” If you keep trying, and trying, and trying, and trying, at some point you’ll find the formula and combination that works for you, that feels right, and is the way you like to work. It’ll be your style for setting up a project, working with your team, and managing the work ahead. It takes a certain stubbornness to deny the failures that come and go, and decide to keep going until you find the elusive construct that works for your project.

4. Look for a different way to cut

My teammate, Laura Materna, brought up some interesting lessons she had learned from her time playing frisbee. On the field, you only have a few moments to make a quick decision that could make or break the game. Games can be won by making the right cut to get open, ideally turning the tables on the game in an unexpected way.

Laura has brought that lesson to her XD work. With every problem, she “looks for a different way to cut” to not only get at the solution, but innovate and bring something new to the table.

“Successfully finishing a challenging workout gave me the confidence to take risks with my work and be proud of the solutions I brought to the table.”

My teammate, John Robbins, told me recently how he was struggling with a homepage design for a hospital, and just couldn’t figure it out. While hiking last weekend, it finally hit him that his design was way too complicated, and he needed to take several elements away. When he came back to work on Monday, his simpler solution proved most distinctive for the brand, and as a bonus, easier to develop.

When surveyed, I was interested to find that hiking was one of the more popular activities amongst my team. As to a reason why, I think Thoreau said it best: “the moment my legs begin to move my thoughts begin to flow — as if I had given vent to the stream at the lower end and consequently new fountains flowed into it at the upper.”

The outdoors was certainly a theme in our team’s discussions. It’s no secret that getting away and taking a break boosts your productivity, but I feel the need to reiterate an important lesson: fresh air, and a change of scenery allows my teammates to relax, and simply look at a non-screen environment, to see something different, to see something real. In doing so, the important things in life are underscored, the best solutions made most obvious.

Conclusion

I know the accounts above are highly anecdotal, but I believe the lessons and connections of fitness to experience design & creative work are undeniable. As experience designers & creatives, we can’t turn off our perception, our absorption of the XD problems that exist all around us. Whether we like it or not, we’re learning from our lives and our own experiences every minute of every day. A 20+ person group of designers who largely incorporate fitness into their lives must be on to something when it comes to addressing those problems, and honing their perceptions of the world.

When I started at Digitas, the new location and work styles meant I had to change my fitness routine, from working out after work, to before. I had to make the commitment to keep fitness in my life, even if it meant getting up at 5:45 am some days. When I realized how early I’d have to get up, I cried for a minute, I won’t lie. But once I tried it, once I folded that practice into my day-to-day, I realized how lucky I was to have fitness and experience design in my life at all.

I get to solve problems for a living. I get paid to overcome challenges. I get paid to be productive, and have become healthier as a result.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to bike home. I have a few more hills to climb.

The views expressed in this post are that of the author and may not reflect the views of the agency or company.