(You know who you are), this is for you

Originally published on March 19th, 2011

Hypothetical Situation

There exists a group at (Company) who refer and promote themselves as THE creative authority when it comes to pushing ’emotional design’ at (Company). They argue that their websites are (better) because they’re based on engaging emotion and are more media-centric. I’ve been to their websites. Sometimes Flash doesn’t work and, well, the experience is emotional indeed.

Engaging emotion must exist in good design. However its unbelievable to me how ignorant some designers can be when they think that emotion alone is good enough for the user experience.

The goal of a site should be to provide relevant content and to promote business objectives in a way that focuses on making it clear to the user what’s being communicated. Unlike television, internet usage is based on focused consumption of information initiated by user interest. Because of this, designing for the user must be meticulously thought out to accomodate for their specific needs.

Design fails when it plays on human emotion in order to sell an idea. It corrupts information and is dishonest in its manipulation of the user.

Emotional connection is important, but without an earnest desire to cater to the user, becomes an elaborate con. And that’s something that I can not stand by.

Every designer MUST be held accountable to their user/client. Every ‘t’ needs to be crossed, and every ‘i’ not only explained, but in a way that is meaningful to the user.

It really upsets me when designers attempt to establish a sense of superiority based on their self-assessed ‘experience’. Experience means nothing if not backed by servitude to the user.

I have absolutely no respect for designers who demand compliance via a bloated sense of self-importance, or their position within a company. And I have no patience for “hot shot” designers who feel as though they have been bestowed the right to tell people what do without the need to justify their reasoning.

As employees we CAN NOT work under an environment of fear. If we do so, we’re not doing our jobs and ourselves justice. As designers, we are tasked with coming up with smart, project-appropriate decisions. Unfortunately this is oftentimes made impossible by leaders who feel that they have the right to enforce an unquestioned agenda on those who work for them. As time and trial has proven, a business built on tyranny only works at Apple.

The design community is very interesting/predictable in that everyone has a tendency to find fault in projects of which they weren’t involved in.
I know this because I oftentimes catch myself finding the faults in someone else’s designs without thinking of context.

Sadly, it is well known that designers can be very passionate about their ideas, and because they’re so emotionally driven, it is frustrating to have to explain what can only be seen in the mind’s eye. For visual people, words alone aren’t able to express as much as color, music, imagery, etc. and so they get caught up on rely on ’emotion’ to explain their decisions. However, I want designers, especially those in a position of power, to realize that pushing ’emotion’ as a reason for design makes you look like an idiot. Even though its difficult, you must go through the process of translating what you see into constructs that others can understand.

As web designers it is short-minded and immature to think that a ’emotional experience’ alone will lead to adoption of new technology.

A design weighted heavily by emotion is short-lived. Perhaps this works for viral marketing campaigns, but lets be honest, how many of us has clicked the ‘skip intro’ button, or get frustrated when we return to a site and have to wait for the same ‘cool’ animation (or fade -see Apple homepage) to load. It may have been something to send links out to before, but afterwords just becomes insulting.

Marketing employs strategies to direct users and to get them excited about a product. A designer needs to be able to see past campaigns and realize that the bulk of their responsibility is to create a site that is useable and extensible.

The fact of the matter is that, marketing strategy is an evolving process. Building a site based on such an infrastructure without keeping in mind the user, will ultimately lead to failure. Again, think ‘Skip Intro’.

I’m calling out (Group at Company) because I feel as though they don’t respect usability. They don’t fight for the user. Their goal is to win awards, many of which do not take into consideration user analytics the measure the success of a site.

Why am I ranting about this? Its because it forms this ‘draft’ mentality where everyone is looking out for themselves and not for the user or the company they work for.

I’ve never been one to just give respect due to title or background, and I don’t expect the same from me. What’s important is how much respect they give to those ‘under’ them and most importantly, the user.

You don’t command respect without respecting the opinions of those with whom you work.

Director-level folks who rely on their egos, and use their position of power to drive the way they treat others are incompetent, useless, dead-weight.