Design Communication
When you ask your designer to do something and they ask why, they’re doing their job. The ensuing conversation is invaluable in helping them solve the problem correctly. The two of you can probably come up with a better solution than either of you could have done individually.
Mike Monteiro • You're My Favorite Client
Asking question is part of the job.
The single biggest improvement is to flip that around and just show the final result.
I understand why designers present their process. They’ve done a lot of hard work, solved difficult design issues, tried out different approaches, failed, and thrown away ideas. It has been hard—it took ages to come up with something that they now know is good and
... See moreDonna Spencer • Presenting Design Work
just show the final design
If a designer shows you work in progress, it’s a great sign. It means they’ve moved beyond a fear that all you’ll see is the broken stuff to a willingness to collaborate with you. Look at it in the spirit of collaboration. Ask questions about what they’re showing. Talk about where they’re headed with it. Feel free to ask if there’s any feedback
... See moreMike Monteiro • You're My Favorite Client
If something isn’t working, point it out and go into as much detail as possible as to why. Tie it to the goals we agreed to earlier in the project. Understanding your reasoning is critical to solving the problem. Being told to do something a certain way, or worse, getting a comp of it done that way only means we have to reverse-engineer the whole
... See moreMike Monteiro • You're My Favorite Client
If a design isn’t working, tell the designer what and why. Be specific.
Talk about strengthsCritique isn’t just about what’s not working.We sometimes have a tendency to focus on negatives, the things that cause us problems, get in our way, and that we’d like to see changed. We often take the positive for granted. In our project meetings and design discussions it’s often no different. We spend the vast majority of time
... See moreAdam Connor • Discussing Design
Good critique doesn’t forget to tell what is working
4️⃣ Question Framework
To ensure that we uncover and include all of these details there is a simple framework of four questions that we can ask ourselves, or the other individuals participating in the critique, as shown in Figure 2-1.
These four questions flow together to generate feedback in the form of critique. By asking these questions, we collect the necessary information with which we can think critically about the design we’re examining
What is the objective of the design?We want to understand what we’re analyzing the design against so that we can focus our attention on things that are pertinent to the conversation and the improvement and success of the design. Try to identify the objectives that the designer was aiming to accomplish through the choices she made. What are the
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