What a designer really does.

Designer jeans, designer furniture, designer babies — these days everything is designed. The term ‘designer’ is an ubiquitously overused job title — and yet something everybody relates to.

If you can trust common belief, a designer is this creative genius that has an idea and just makes it happen. Well actually — it’s not like that — don’t believe common perception. Ask a designer. It is true though that being in this profession can be very fulfilling. If you’ve always wondered what a designer really does and what a typical day as one looks like, this is for you:

First things first: Meet the Team.

Aligning daily with your team allows everyone to know who does what, how long it takes and when to focus on a more important task. This is a core principle of an agile workflow. You might say, “but this is a software development method.” You’re right. Good catch, but here’s the thing: A designer’s main goal is to solve and break down problems. Get it now?
No? At its core, it’s very similar to what a developer does.

Now, can we please design something?

Do whatever makes you happy. But in an agency context it is very important to adapt to change.

I’m not talking about changing a pixel a bit to the left. I’m talking about project management.

At Edenspiekermann we have one project manager for every team.

Luckily, we have experts for just that. At Edenspiekermann we have one project manager for every team. The project manager makes sure that the most important tasks are prioritized, so the workload stays always manageable. Done.

Why talk about the work and not just get it done?

At first this sounds like a good idea, but think about it. Really. Now do it again. When you’re building a house you don’t start with the roof. You start with the foundation. The same applies to designing digital products. Don’t forget that a strategic, thoroughly thought-out workflow is necessary to reach a deadline in time. After all, design should be fun — and how fun is a roof without a house?

Common Misbelief: […a designer is this creative genius that has an idea and just makes it happen…]

We’re still not designing stuff, right?

Right, we’re not. And at the same time we are. Because all the planning beforehand is a big part of a designers job. Like understanding the client’s problem, talking to the client’s customers, interviewing users to break down the problem and doing it again and again. This is not a linear process. It’s a constant back-and-forth. And it is of utmost importance before starting with the visuals. You may have heard of it: form follows function. And function follows user.

“But I wanted this to look nice.”

Okay, so let’s do this now. Get your MacBook, open Photoshop, close Photoshop, and realize it really is not a design tool anymore. Actually a tool becoming obsolete can happen every other week because the lifespan of digital products is getting shorter and shorter. So don’t pick the software you know, but the one that works best for getting the job done. It might be Figma, it might be Sketch or a new tool. We really love Figma though.

Everything’s ready. It just has to be done.

That means the project management got the priorities straight, the project’s scope and deliverables are clear and the tasks are distributed to those with the time and the expertise.

“There is no such thing as a jack-of-all-trades. Design is a team effort.”

What used to be a problem is now a clear roadmap to the problem’s solution. By doing this we don’t lose ourselves, go in the wrong directions or do unnecessary work. So let’s get it done.

“But wait! You didn’t give me a timeline of your day yet …”

And you won’t get one. Because a ‘typical day‘ is not a thing. How much time you actually spent on doing the design varies a lot. There is not only one task or one project. There are multiple at the same time. And meetings. And workshops. And lunch breaks. And if you were productive even some ping-pong. Because designers are humans, not machines. For now, at least.

“If you were productive there is time for some ping-pong.”

One last thing.

At the end of the day you will be fulfilled by the work you did. But remember this: There is no such thing as a jack-of-all-trades. Design is a team effort. That’s why roughly every second meeting is about getting feedback. That may come from your colleagues, your test-users, the client or that one design hero guy that founded the agency.

Read more about how feedback works in the next part of the series:

→ What good feedback really looks like. (Or: Feedback from the design hero that founded the agency)