An email to Frog, while working for them
Originally posted on May 5th, 2010
There is no doubt that this project could have gone a lot better as could a lot of frog projects. I can blame resourcing, sales, management, etc. but it would be too generic –a blanketing problem for strategic consultancies. So what is the problem? It’s the passive-aggressiveness of the blame. I for one would love to be able to tell people directly (with an emphasis on constructiveness) how I feel about their work, not to demean, but to have that much more of a firmer leg to stand on when it comes to delivering value to our clients. The bottom line is that we’re all smart individuals who are more than ‘capable’ of doing great work, but this can’t happen without mutual respect for one another.
I learned early on that with the MSVE project we would have to sacrifice quality for rapid conception. I made the mistake of placing too much emphasis on creating a solid and consistent visual design created before solid concepts had been formed. It was not until the particular concept I was working on was thrown out, that I realized that the project’s fast-paced nature meant sacrificing visual integrity in order to get our ideas across. This is not to say that there wasn’t an effort on my part to create a compelling visual style, but that I had to balance it out for the sake of time.
In an ideal world, concepts are created, wireframes (at least a structural map) are understood, and design is able to bridge the gap between the two to hand off to development. However, oftentimes, as in the MSVE project, phases overlap and everything ends up happening at the same time. I’ve worked on several projects like this to understand that it’s a problem that is acceptable, and I have no complaints with it in general. However, what I do have a problem are the unfair expectations placed on individuals and how it translates into blame. Perhaps it is human nature to blame others when it comes to under delivering and scope creep. I find myself doing so at times. But is it fair? As a team, we’re ALL responsible for the success of a project. At the same time we should all be cognoscente of project restraints and how it affects every member of the team. It’s extremely hard to know that one needs to sacrifice even a bit of visual design integrity in the interest of time, but if I’ve learned anything from this project, that is it. It’s frustrating to know that one can produce a more solid visual design, but are not able to because of a lack of resources -including commitment from clients. Being the smart and creative people that we are, it’s hard to accept the fact that we can’t do everything. For many of us, the thought of inadequacy is a hard pill to swallow. It stresses us out and when we fail in our expectations and we are led to question our ability to deliver ‘the perfect solution’. We don’t take into account that we all feel the same stress, and self-doubt within ourselves and because we need to reinforce our own abilities, we end up focusing on those of others. This is, I believe, is what has happened on the MSVE project.
Let’s recognize the fact that part of working with others should be fun. Let’s recognize the fact that it’s OK to joke around and even poke fun at one another from time to time. Let’s recognize that we all have individual personalities which extend beyond the working environment –personalities, which, in today’s society is acceptable to display in an office environment. But at the same time, let’s recognize that we are professionals who are getting paid to deliver our vast talents and expertise, and in order to do so, need to respect and work with one another.
The time spent working with the MSVE team has been a vast amount of fun, and I enjoy the company and camaraderie of everyone on the team. However, I feel that when it comes to work, the comfortability we’ve achieved with one another, has become detrimental to the respect that we give one another as a team. The fact that I’ve gotten ‘hung up’ on internal teleconferences doesn’t facilitate our ability to deliver –especially when it comes down to the wire. I don’t want to assume that it was done to be funny, because it wasn’t, but I don’t know what other reason there could be, given that I’m was attempting to confirm what needs to be done. If I were to stoop to the level of constructive feedback as ‘stylize to not suck’, I would say ‘grow up and be a professional’(albeit in different words)especially if you expect me to deliver on time. I would also advise you to look into the situation from my point of view. Power Points which number up to 17, 3 of which span the course of a day and include wireframes created at the last moment, does not help anyone to deliver quality work in the allocated amount of time. My impression, and correct me if I’m wrong, is that it’s OK for you to deliver last minute scenario changes, and not acceptable for me to deliver high-quality visual design comps done in less than a couple of hours (refer to John’s count-down via IM). I would love to accept the fact that such an assumption is wrong and that I may be over-reacting to the situation, but if I’m not and you are in fact judging my performance, I have to say that I’ve misjudged you as the professionals you are paid to be.
