Communicating Design

Getting to consensus through communication.

Whether you work in a fast-paced start-up or as a freelance designer with independent clients, explaining your design to other interested parties is just part of the job and can often be the biggest barrier to progress on a project. What sets great designers apart is their ability to communicate the ‘what, why, and how’ of their design decisions. Here are some tips to make sure you are setting yourself up for success during every stage.

Let everyone know your process: Before, During, and After

UX means different things to different people. For some, it’s just getting the UI looking sharp. For others, it’s all about content creation or service design or conversion rates. Find out what UX means to your stakeholders and also explain what it means to you. Then describe your process in great detail. If your projects start off very research heavy and it will be a few weeks before you get deep into specific interface design, explain it right off the bat. Also let them know why you work this way and provide specific examples of how this process was effective in other projects. Don’t assume they know already and always remember to reiterate over the course of the project.

Show > Tell

Whenever possible, I try to show my work versus just telling. We are naturally visually and experientially driven creatures. We can all better wrap our heads around new ideas if we can mentally and physically pick them up and turn them over in our hands, metaphorical or otherwise.

Explain Low vs High fidelity

When I first started working with clients, I assumed that because everyone in the room worked at a tech startup in product positions that they understood my process. By not explaining ahead of time, we had different ideas of what it would look like at each phase. Every company and client is different and have their own unique processes. In the kick off meeting working with new people I like to reiterate the way I build designs and establish that early versions are often in a lower fidelity wire frame so we can pin down ideas before going deep. As I’m presenting work throughout the process, I regularly remind everyone of each stage. In addition to helping to manage expectations at each stage, it also allows everyone to learn a new process and adapt their own.

Use Jargon Sparingly

You won’t look good if no one knows what you’re talking about. When working with other designers and people in tech, it’s easy to get in the flow of speaking in shorthand. But your clients and stakeholders might not have gotten the memo. If someone doesn’t understand what you mean, how are your design decisions going to be clear? Well placed jargon can make your audience feel smart or stupid depending on how and when it’s used. It’s like using big words in writing: try to use it in a sentence that describes it even if the person has never heard it before.

Keep the Focus with Simple Slides

When formally presenting designs with a supporting deck, keep the focus on you, not the slides by making them mostly visual. I will often follow the rule of thumb for creating advertising banners: the text should take up 20% or less of the total space. You don’t want people attention to be split by having to read and listen at the same time. Our instinct is to read everything in front of us, even if the person speaking is saying exactly the same thing. We want to make sure we aren’t missing anything. So make it easy for them to keep them attention where you want it: on the design!

Remember to Listen

Your stakeholders have their own unique insights and they know more about their company and product that you ever will. This is their baby, never forget it’s always a collaboration. This doesn’t mean you always have to agree. They are hiring you for your expertise and perspective. Listening doesn’t mean you have to be ‘nice’, it just means that you have enough self awareness to understand that you are not the only one with great ideas. Sometimes it’s not even about their idea, but using it as another jumping off point. Part of your job as a designer is to listen to what the stakeholder says, read between the lines, and work your magic to make their dreams come to life. No small miracle really in the end.

Get buy in from as many people as possible

Make it OUR design. Get everyone involved! — take engineers on field trips, do design sprints with as many people as possible, anything to get people to feel a part of the process. The more exposure each team member has, the greater their culture is participating in the design When the ‘big reveal’ happens, it isn’t really revealing at all because you already know you have input and support from different angles. There won’t have to be a hard sell because there is already mutual understanding and participation. You may be handsome and charming like Don Draper, but presenting work like they do on Mad Men is ill advised. No client wants to feel like they are in the dark.