The "craft" of design

As apart of designer onboarding, I give a short talk that breaks down the facets of design craft. The goal of this talk is to establish a common language for understanding "good design" and to activate a sense of intentionality to designers. Although most designers can identify good design, creating quality work involves more nuanced skills and understanding—which is why having a lightweight framework has proven helpful.

Skill

Ultimately our goal as designers is to create meaningful experiences for specific audiences but we are bound by the tools at our disposal. Our effectiveness hinges on our mastery of design tools, understanding the audience (users and stakeholders), articulation of design decisions and consensus building. These make up a foundational set of skills for a product designer and continual development in these areas is essential.

Traits and practices:

• Understanding of customer needs and expectations

• Tool proficiency

• Output and communication speed

• Design execution quality

• Articulation of decisions

• Consensus building

• Depth of design in low and high fidelity

• Accessible design

In turn, the resulting outcomes:

• Faster design execution

• Organized workflow

• Design fulfills goals and objectives

• Delightful experience

Scale

Junior designers typically start by designing within constraints of a single page or an individual component. This is appropriate because it limits the scope and complexity of the problem. As designers become more senior in their career, scaling your work to adapt to larger contexts becomes a core skill. From a page to a user flow, considering different audiences, use cases, cultures, stakeholders, technologies are all factors that add to the scale of a product.

Traits and practices:

• Design rationalization depth

• Prioritization across functions

• Vision towards end goal

• Experience mapping

• Detailed design requirements

• Adaptable designs

• Cross-platform expertise

• Feasibility comprehension

In turn, the resulting outcomes:

• Organized step approach towards end goal

• Prioritized list of requirements with reflecting designs

• Scaled designs that can adapt upon learnings

• Balanced experience with constraints

Taste

Do I know what "good design" experiences look and feel like? While subjective, it's undeniable that certain individuals have a knack for good taste and can consistently demonstrate an innate understanding of design that speaks to their users. This can often be referred to as "visual eye" or "craft"

Traits and practices:

• Visual harmony and balance

• Purposeful and intentional design decisions

• Wide exploration of solutions, pushing boundaries

• Correct hierarchy and priority

• Eliminate non-essential elements

• Industry awareness of competitive landscape

• Uphold high implementation standard

In turn, the resulting outcomes:

• Thoughtful, "smart" design

• Beautiful, frictionless interfaces

• Delightful user experiences

• Better engagement and performance

These are some of the skills that great designers demonstrate. Calling them out gives designers a starting point for leveling up their abilities, sets the bar high, and shows them what it takes to do their best work.

If you've read this far, thank you for taking the time to hear my thoughts on design craft. If you have any thoughts or questions, please feel free to reach out to me. Let's keep the discussion going.