Category: Thoughts

Thoughts | Growth Over Comfort

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Like everyone’s been saying, I can’t believe it’s November already—so close to the end of the year! October was a busy month for me, with a lot of new experiences, which has been making me think about growth and the struggles of pushing out of your comfort zone.

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Margie Warrell at Wrike Collaborate

At the beginning of October I was able to attend the Wrike Collaborate conference in Nashville, TN. It was a really great conference, but what stuck with me most was the opening keynote by Margie Warrell, and it was about choosing growth over comfort. She talked about how to be brave in every day instances, not just the big moments in life. As an introvert, being at a conference by myself was ‘brave’ for me, and definitely pushed me out of my comfort zone—but I surprised myself, and not only learned a lot but even made some new connections.

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The most appropriate quote for a session on change management.

It was nice to be amongst a new group of people—fellow project management nerds! I came back with so much energy and so many new ideas that I don’t think I would’ve had if I hadn’t gone to that conference and outside of my comfort zone. I also discovered that change management is a ‘thing’ and it’s much more complicated than I anticipated—and the idea of it makes me uncomfortable and creates tension, but that’s how you grow. I think that’s why ‘digital transformation’ has become such a big buzzword in the past few years—it’s change management in new words that sound more exciting and way less scary.

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In continuing my month of pushing myself out of my comfort zone, I attended the AIGA DC/Women Talk Design ‘Design Your Talk Topic’ event. I didn’t know anyone else attending, it was a two hour workshop at the end of a work day, and it was raining—if I’d been following what was comfortable, I wouldn’t have gone. But I told myself I needed to, and I was so glad I did. I learned a lot and met some great fellow designers who have some great experiences to share. I was very rewarded for pushing myself out of my comfort zone, and it made me realize that the things I want to speak about are valuable to people, and valid.

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This was nicely followed up by a speaking opportunity! At the end of the month I spoke on a panel at my alma mater, Marymount University in Arlington, about transitioning from student to professional designer. Part of me was thinking, what useful information could I possibly share? I was one panelist of five, and there were many years of experience between the five of us. But if I was invited to speak, I must have had something interesting to share, right? I’m not terribly inexperienced with public speaking (on a small scale), but this was a different environment. I decided this was good practice to be brave and get outside of my comfort zone. I had a great time with my fellow panelists, and somehow filled up all my speaking time! (Thank you again to my former advisor and chair of the Design department, Bridget Murphy, for the invitation!)

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Kyle Bogucki, Jennifer Wong, Raksa Yin, myself, and Beth Singer.

I’m looking forward to continuing to choose growth over comfort in different ways. And as I said at the end of my panel time, thank you for coming to my TED talk.

Thoughts | Creative Burnout

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A few months ago, the article “How Millennials Became the Burnout Generation” from BuzzFeed quickly went viral, as it perfectly summed up a lot of the struggles that Millennials (myself included) have been feeling. The author, Anne Helen Peterson, was recently interviewed on Jocelyn K. Glei’s podcast “Hurry Slowly” and it got me thinking a bit more about burnout as it applies to creatives. Anne talks about this in her interview, but burnout is much more prevalent because of the increase in intellectual labor, rather than physical labor. This is especially true for us “creative types,” as there is no distinct rest time—even once you’ve left work, your brain is still working, thinking, and trying to solve problems.

This is compounded by the speed at which work is now expected to be done—the United States itself has adopted a “start up culture,” which favors efficiency and outputs, and focuses on being lean and nimble. There’s nothing wrong with this on its face—but it has an effect on people much more than I think any of us really want to admit or deal with.

I talked a bit about this in my last post, but the focus on outputs when it comes to design and creativity creates a difficult situation. Personally, I can execute designs quickly, which leads to a higher level of output. But this efficiency doesn’t mean that the outputs are necessarily effective or my best work. Since technology has made everything so much faster, everyone’s timelines for accomplishing a goal or finishing a project have shortened—and oftentimes, that makes it more about finishing the project than enjoying the process and being happy with the end result. Even if we may be happy with the end result, sometimes we have to go right into the next project. To use a personal example, even though I was really proud of the ads I designed for the Capitol One Arena, I was not able to take the time to go see them in person, even though they were up for a month. What does that say about the value I place on my own work if I won’t even go five metro stops to see it? “I don’t have time,” I told myself, and now I wish I had made time. But the truth is, in my head, I was already onto the next project. The deadline had been made, stakeholders were pleased, project completed.

But when listening to this episode of “Hurry Slowly,” their discussion on not taking time to appreciate your work as a symptom of burnout resonated with me. Everyone is moving so fast that they don’t stop to appreciate even their own creations (insert the cliche quote from Ferris Bueller’s Day Off about life moving fast). Burnout isn’t something that goes away overnight, or comes on suddenly—I think it’s always kind of the wolf at the door, and you have to be cognizant of a lot of different behaviors—and work to change a lot of behaviors—to not let it in. Clearly this is not something that can be fixed on a large scale quickly, but I think it’s something all creatives (myself included), need to be thinking about.

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Disclaimer: these are my personal opinions and do not reflect the opinions of any of my current or former employers.

Photo by Jacob Kiesow on Unsplash

Thoughts | The Changing Value of Design

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Something I’ve been thinking a lot lately is how the value of design and design skills has changed over the past ten, or really even five, years—graphic design is much more accessible in the past both given the technology changes, but also new tools, like Canva, that provide basic design technology to anyone who needs it. I think Canva is great as a basic starter tool that can provide people with a starting point, or for resource-strapped organizations, a way to still have decent, customized design. But it’s not the same as having a professional graphic designer or agency research and create a piece for you or your organization.

However, one thing I have noticed over the years is more content about ‘how to make money as a graphic designer without the education,’ and similar topics, and I believe that has led to an increase in the dangerous thinking that design is easy. Sites like 99designs and fiverr perpetuate this idea, where you can get designs (and what is often really spec work) from designers at a fraction of the cost and the time. These are band-aids—not long term, thought-out solutions, that often lower the value of a professional designer or firm’s work.

There is a very big difference between design that looks good and design that is effective, which I think is a difference that many non-designers are not aware of. This is why many designers (myself included) are often handed the start of a project and asked to “make it pretty.” That request in itself shows that many people just want something that looks good, regardless of whether or not it’s effective. Just search ‘branding’ in Pinterest and a plethora of single page brand boards will show up, which yes, may be pretty, but do not provide any of the background or strategy. And although the designer may have that information, that’s not what people look for. People go to designers for “pretty,” not “effective.” And that lowers the value of truly good design.

“Design is having ‘a moment’.” – Stephen Gates

It’s great that the appreciation of design is much more widespread than ever before—as Stephen Gates says, “design is having ‘a moment’.” But much of that appreciation focuses on the end product, rather than the process—and I think that’s purely because many people do not understand everything that goes into a design. There’s a great quote that says “Design is for solving problems, not vetting solutions,” and I think that sums up a lot of what many designers run into now. Requests are frequently to vet a solution by “making it pretty,” rather than to solve an exact problem. Graphic design (or any design, really) will be most effective when it follows the creative process—that can vary from designer to designer or firm to firm, but the starting point of that process is research and information gathering—and the most important part of that is defining the problem.

This isn’t easy to do—this is why tools like design thinking (which has been turned into a buzzword) and process are so important. If you design something without defining the problem, researching the target market and competitive landscape, how can you define or determine success? If it looks good does it mean it’s “successful”? Not necessarily. Some of my favorite projects haven’t seen much ROI (again, that doesn’t mean it’s “bad design”—it’s just what happens when it comes to creativity and experimentation).

Furthermore, design is not something that happens quickly—some designers may execute faster than others, but that does not include time that needs to be dedicated to defining the problem, research, ideation, and concepting. In our current culture of instant gratification and efficiency, everything is measured on how much can be produced and how quickly. And it’s really easy to fall into this trap—it’s one I’m trying to slowly dig myself out of, this focus on pure output rather than following the process and producing something truly creative—and effective. But I think if more designers share their process and the value in it, and that sometimes quick execution will not lead to a successful, effective, or creative project, people will come to understand it.

A great starting resource for this is ‘The Strategic Designer‘ by David Holston, which I’m currently reading—it has a whole section on communicating the value of design to clients which I find particularly helpful.

TL;DR – Pretty design does not equal good design, and designers need to share their process and the importance of it to make their value known.

Disclaimer: these are my personal opinions and do not reflect the opinions of any of my current or former employers.

Photo by Markus Spiske on Unsplash