Genius-Driven Design
There’s a behavioral anti-pattern in software design I call “genius-driven design”, where someone (a “genius”) thinks really hard and comes up with a solution to a problem, which is then implemented as designed. Fire and forget. Never look back. And if people complain, they’re holding it wrong.
I’m not saying that this always leads to bad results. Obviously, some designers have amazing intuitions about what works and what doesn’t, but even if that’s the case I think the approach lacks humility, and success becomes a function of luck rather than diligence.
A UX-designer friend of mine, who’s an avid promotor of design thinking, likes to remind everyone that “every design is a guess”. It may feel like the best design in the world, but unless you test it you can’t really know that. Even while it’s true that an experienced professional produces superior guesses and gets it right more often, the proof of the pudding is always in the eating.
But even if your team is routinely testing designs, there’s usually some “genius-driven design” lurking in the background. It could be a single person, or even a team tradition to beat each other over the head with this-won’t-works and we-tried-thats and nobody-does-thats. I believe the effects of those criticisms is that people tend to lose their creative courage, and will tend to produce more safe (and boring) work.
A better way to approach it involves a slight attitude adjustment on both sides. Each designer needs to always be asking “how can this work be improved”, instead of “do you like my work”. Each critic needs to voice their concerns as a testable claim and if possible offer one or more suggestions for improving the design.
For example, consider a button designed for a specific action. If the design follows the status quo, not much feedback is to be expected. But if it deviates, even in a minor way, then the “critics” (i.e. everyone) will challenge things like position, color, size, white-space, alignment, stylistic details, etc. A critic may say, “users will not notice the button therefore they will not use it”. This criticism may be informed by years of experience and deep knowledge of cognitive theory. But still, if the designer disagrees, what is the designer to do?
Address the criticism thoughtfully. And failing that, treat it like any hypothesis, by testing it. You may discover it matters very little for user experience, or it may make a world of difference.
But wait a minute, why hasn’t the designer simply followed established (and tested) conventions? Which problem did the designer attempt to solve, which wasn’t already solved? A designer may claim, “If I don’t change the position/color/size/etc, users will not notice the button”. Is this true? This is simply criticism of the status quo. There’s nothing wrong with that, but changing it takes time and effort. So what the designer probably needs to do, is to prove his claim by testing two designs: one following convention, and the “improved” version. Note that these things can be expensive and cause (temporary) friction in the user experience (because now all the buttons need to be changed). Change is not always worth the hassle, but you shouldn’t fear doing it.
As they say, everyone has opinions. Strong opinions should be treated as testable claims to truth. Write them on a post-it, if necessary with the critic’s name if you feel like it, and stick them on the work. If the critic has offered design improvement, test those as well. Put a little distance between you and the work. Let others stand on your shoulders, and vice versa. Whatever demonstrates the best user experience, “wins”. This should not be a battle of merit but a concerted effort to “discover” the best user experience through iterative design.
Many designers are married to their work, and take any criticism of it personally. This is understandable, but problematic. Sometimes, critics let a designer “be right” because the negativity just isn’t worth it. They’ll fake a smile and secretly hope the work bombs in the hands of the user, teaching the designer a lesson. And if it doesn’t, oh well.
Working with a creative team on a product should be like having a block of marble in the room with everyone holding a stone-carving tool. We all want it to be beautiful. By forgetting our ego and allowing others to come in from their unique perspective to voice concerns, we can perhaps escape the genius-driven mindset and zero in on something that is the multiplication of our talents, not the remainder after division.
Every design is simply a guess, a possible solution. It’s only a solution after it has sufficiently proved itself correct. We need to share the burden of discovering great design, without fearing adventurous ideas. Always be asking, “how can we make this better”. Aim to get it right, rather than to be right.
