Wurkit

Efficient Iterative Design

2012-12-26T17:00:36-05:00

There’s a right way and a wrong way to go about iterative design. And the difference between the two can add up to the difference between designing something that really works and something that just doesn’t quite hit the mark.

Now, I’ve gone on record before with my belief that iterative design is the best method there is to reach an elegant design, but it can actually be an obstacle to success if you don’t already have a good grasp of the problem you’re trying to solve or what you’re trying to build.

And while I agree with Joshua Porter’s discussion of how design can either be about building interfaces or solving problems, I think this sidesteps the real issue at play.

The main obstacles that face designers who use an iterative approach are:

We iterate blindly, trusting in sheer numbers to result in the best solution
We don’t develop theories in the best possible way
We don’t iterate with customers early enough

In short, to iterate properly and reach a truly elegant and effective design, our iterative process must be (1) planned, (2) diverse, and (3) early.

Am I blindly iterating?

The Design Staff blog recently got me thinking about prototyping applications. Their recent post on the topic covered a very important piece of the puzzle that is consistently missing from most iterative design processes. Here’s what they do: On the second day of a five-day process, they take the time to identify as many possible solutions that fit what they know at that time. Most design processes rush through or even skip this step in a rush to build an interface around the first or easiest solution that occurs to them. But it’s actually one of the most vital steps a design team can take.

Mocking up a design or building an interface helps us understand the real complexity of the problem. It forces us to adjust our strategy and recalculate when and where we introduce certain concepts to the user. This is great! We should do this A LOT, because it gives us an increasing number of opportunities to learn and think creatively about the problem before us.

But if we’re unclear as to how we even want to solve a problem it could take dozens of these iterations to chip away and reveal an elegant solution.

There’s often a badge of honor that comes from dozens or even hundreds of iterations. It’s not hard to find a designer bragging about how many paths they took to get to a solution. There’s a point where iterations like this go from due diligence to procrastination. Brute force is rarely a good way to do things, and neither is sheer quantity of meaningless experimentation.

Without a theory and a clear evaluation of whether or not it’s valid, an iteration isn’t much better than gambling. You might work out something better, you might not. You might do something great and not even realize it. Your trash pile could be a gold mine of elegant solutions to problems that you didn’t even understand at the time, and never got a chance to embrace because you didn’t properly develop your theory of the problem in the first place.

Update: my favorite illustration of this idea is in Des Traynor’s blog post Wireframing for Web Apps. It does a great job of making the distinction between refinement and exploration.

So how do I properly develop my theories?

Like a lot of designers, I have a deep-seated hatred for two common evils of the modern workplace: meetings and the need for consensus. But both can be useful when exploring a problem. With complex problems of the kind we’re talking about designing for, even the most expert among us should make a concerted effort to get outside of our own heads and use the brain cells of others — yes, others — to reach a viable solution.

Nothing works wonders like a diverse team. Getting multiple people with overlapping expertise involved is a great way to poke and prod at your ideas, play devil’s advocate, and force you to dig a little deeper. Most of us try to convince ourselves we can do this on our own, but it’s too easy to rationalize your own ideas as correct and end up sabotaging your work. Don’t let that happen.

On the matter of consensus, I don’t mean consensus around the final choice. I mean consensus around which theories are legitimate to pursue in the first place. It’s usually not that difficult to propose 872 different approaches to a problem. The hard part is identifying which of those approaches are attached in any way to reality. Use other people’s brains to help you identify which handful of theories are truly worth pursuing.

Once you’ve developed 3 or 5 legitimate paths to a solution, you can compare and contrast them in a way that reveals their potential value much more clearly.

When do I iterate?

Now that you’ve chosen your handful of workable theories, it’s time to choose the one with the most potential and start building. But — and this is the really important part — once you have something worth using, get it in front of some customers and start validating your theories with real people. Now is when you need to iterate like crazy — keep tweaking your design based on the feedback you receive until you feel as though you’ve taken that theory as far as you can.

Remember, now that you’ve thoroughly explored your first theory, your other theories should have more context and you can better judge their value. If you want to abandon your first theory, you will most likely already know what theory to pursue next. If not, stop iterating, step back, and find some better theories to pursue. Don’t iterate for the sake of iterating.

Iterate like you mean it!

Once you stop using iterations to discover a solution and instead apply it as a tool for validating theories, your iterations will become much more efficient. Only iterate with an expected result that you can verify. Use your previously tested theories to inform future theories. And, for the love of God, get in front of customers as soon as possible.

You're reading Efficient Iterative Design, a post from the Wurkit blog. If you enjoyed this post, you can follow @danritz on Twitter for more design related thoughts.

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Designing a Lever

2012-12-26T17:04:23-05:00

“Give me a place to stand and with a lever I will move the whole world.” – Archimedes

Simple and powerful interfaces have a few things in common:

visual hierarchy that makes the most important action of the page the most noticeable
context builders to help people predict the results of taking an action
previous actions are reiterated through the results

If you were to think about this process as a feedback loop, you would want it to be as small and tight as possible. The ultimate goal is for everyone who uses the interface to know exactly what to do, be confident in the things they do, and know exactly what caused the results. It should be as simple as pulling a lever to get some candy (sorry, I have a sweet tooth).

Even though some of the most basic systems typically require more complex interfaces than a lever, they should still have the same clarity of purpose. Large books, when well edited, can have a clear and simple lesson. Why can’t we do the same with complex interfaces?

Develop a strong plot

When relevant but unnecessary design elements get in the way it’s a lot like a book sharing too many details. Every hero eats, bathes, and sleeps. That doesn’t mean people need to see everything she does to understand the plot. Be careful with what you share and ruthlessly cut out any design element that doesn’t contribute to the primary goal of the interface.

Regularly show you’re interfaces to others, ask them what they think it does, and carefully listen. If they can’t identify the main idea/theme/goal of the interface within a few seconds, there’s a good chance you’ve lost your way. Distractions from secondary features are strong indicators you’re providing too many details and obscuring the plot.

Foreshadow all the things!

Building expectations and meeting those expectations will make your customers feel as though they’ve mastered your application. There is always a big twist in a great suspense story, but that’s the last thing you want to do to people using your product. They should be surprised by the quality of the content or results, yet find the process totally predictable.

With every design element, take the time to hint at what might happen when tapped/clicked/swiped. For example, if someone is in a multiple step process, call out the next step and reveal how many steps are left. Don’t leave them wondering what to do next and how long it will take.

Don’t skimp on the celebrations

When something significant happens, don’t think of it as a simple checkbox or another table row. Take the time to show your customers what happened, why it matters, and give them credit for doing it. Powerfully closing that feedback loop is a great way to give closure and build confidence.

Make sure your customers know how they impact their own world. In complex interfaces, important events can easily get lost. If they do something that makes a difference and don’t realize it, you’ve lost an opportunity to make a meaningful connection.

Simple and powerful, just like a lever

If there’s anything that should be good inspiration for a designer, a lever should be right at the top. It may be an impossible goal, but it’s definitely worth working towards. Pushing for clarity, building expectations, calling out results, and closing that feedback loop is great place to start.

You're reading Designing a Lever, a post from the Wurkit blog. If you enjoyed this post, you can follow @danritz on Twitter for more design related thoughts.

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Scientific Advertising by Claude Hopkins

2012-10-01T22:08:01-04:00

This book was a big surprise. It was in my reading list for a long time because I kept hearing about it, but I never cared enough to buy it. What lessons could a designer learn from advertising? I didn’t expect much.

After enough people recommended it I looked it up and noticed it was a very short book. What the hell, let’s give Scientific Advertising a shot. Now I wish I read it the first day I heard about it.

Almost everything Claude Hopkins wrote seems to align with the way I think about design. It was like he was telling me things I already knew, only with much more clarity and purpose.

To start, much of what bothered me about marketing websites was summed up in just a few sentences:

“Don’t think of the people in the mass. That gives you a blurred view. Think of a typical individual, man or women who is likely to want what you sell. Don’t try to be amusing. Money spending is a serious matter. Don’t boast, for all people resent it. Don’t try to show off. Do just what you think a good salesman should do with a half-sold person before him.”

Then he articulates why most marketing messages don’t resonate with customers:

“The maker of an advertised article knows the manufacturing side and probably the dealer’s side. But the very knowledge often leads him astray in respect to customers. His interests are not in their interests. The advertising man studies the consumer. He tries to place himself in the position of the buyer. His success largely depends on doing that to the exclusion of everything else.”

Followed up by what messages effectively persuade people:

“The ads are based entirely on service. They offer wanted information. They site advantages to users. Perhaps they offer a sample, or to buy the first package, or to send something on approval, so the customer may prove the claims without any cost or risks. Some of these ads seem altruistic. But they are based on the knowledge of human nature. The writers know how people are led to buy.”

And, finally, he drives the point home with something people seem to so commonly forget:

“People can be coaxed but not driven. Whatever they do they do to please themselves.”

At this point I had to put the book down for a while. I needed to digest the ideas. I decided not to come back to the book that day and sleep on it. The first thing I did the next day was tell everyone I worked with to read it.

That night I continued with what effort is involved in creating great advertisements. The research and focus aspects of his advice seemed to reiterate everything I care about with design, only better. This guy was starting to piss me off.

On taking the time to find your core audience:

“What you have will interest certain people only, and for certain reasons. You care only for those people. Then create a headline which will hail those people only.”

Then validating and verifying your assumptions through showing and testing your work:

“All guesswork is eliminated. Every mistake is conspicuous. One quickly loses this conceit by learning how often his judgment errs – often nine times in ten. There one learns that advertising must be done on a scientific basis to have any fair chance of success.”

Followed up by calling out your weak arguments:

“To say, “Best in the world,” “Lowest price in existence,” etc. are at best simply claiming the expected. But superlatives of that sort are usually damaging. They suggest looseness of expression, a tendency to exaggerate, a careless truth. They lead readers to discount all the statements that you make."

This was the second time I had to put down the book. It’s a tiny book. I bought it for a quick read. Why the hell is this taking so long? I don’t feel like I’ve read anything I haven’t read before, but it still feels like I’ve learned a lot. It’s amazing how ruthlessly editing and refining an idea can produce something so awesome.

The next pass revolved around being personal and direct:

“We must consider individuals, typical people who are using rival brands. A man on a Pullman, for instance, using his favorite soap. What could you say to him in person to get him to change to yours? We cannot go after thousands of men until we learn how to win one.”

While maintaining some dignity and inspiring respect:

“Give samples to interested people only. Give them only to people who exhibit that interest by some effort. Give them only to people whom you have told your story. First create an atmosphere of respect, a desire, an expectation. When people are in that mood, your sample will usually confirm the qualities you claim.”

Then further educating your customers with a positive and appreciative approach:

“Show a bright side, the happy and attractive side, not the dark and uninviting side of things. Show beauty, not homeliness; health, not sickness. Don’t show the wrinkles you propose to remove, but the face as it will appear. Your customers know all about wrinkles.”

In a nutshell, it seems like Claude Hopkins is advising us to really dig deep and understand our customers, talk only about their needs and desires, and treat them with respect. If we can do that, we’ll gain their trust, loyalty, and business.

Hopefully all of this sounds obvious. Which is exactly why you need to read it. Go get Scientific Advertising right now!

You're reading Scientific Advertising by Claude Hopkins, a post from the Wurkit blog. If you enjoyed this post, you can follow @danritz on Twitter for more design related thoughts.

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My Startup Quote Adventure

2012-12-26T17:00:27-05:00

I’ve always been a huge fan of learning by doing. If there’s a skill I want to explore, I dive in without seeking outside help. When I enjoy it I turn on my radar and seek out as much relevant information as I can find. When I don’t enjoy it I move on and have a basic sense of that skill’s purpose and how difficult it is to gain expertise.

Unfortunately, no matter how much I try to avoid unnecessary information, it always sneaks it’s way into my life. Usually it starts with a quote that, when alone, barely makes sense. When a colleague seems to base a strategy on a dubious quote I ask for clarification. Then, before you know it, we’re neck deep into a totally irrelevant conversation.

If you haven’t heard, there’s a website called Startup Quote for doing exactly that! Some quotes are great while others make my blood boil. Let’s take a quick adventure through some quotes I’ve discussed with colleagues over the years, starting with the one I hear the most.

“If you are not embarrassed by the first version of your product, you’ve launched too late.” – Reid Hoffman

I love the advice of launching early, but don’t see why you need to be embarrassed. If you’re prioritizing speed and quality at the expense of quantity of features, are you embarrassed about it being too simple? But isn’t that point of launching early? I don’t get it.

Could this be about prioritizing speed and features at the expense of quality? Launching a shitty product is embarrassing. Is that what Reid is recommending you do?

“Learn not to add too many features right away, and get the core idea built and tested.” – Leah Culver

Leah gets it. Speed and quality. Do it fast, and get it tested. No reason to be embarrassed.

“Create something simple. Let the market pull you in.” – Brad Burnham

Brad is all over it. Get just enough built that enough people can pull you towards the right things to do. Talk to your customers and use them to refine your future plans and identify an ideal customer.

“When you have to prove the value of your ideas by persuading other people to pay for them, it clears out an awful lot of woolly thinking.” – Tim O’Reilly

Tim gets it, too! Too many untested features could reveal you didn’t actually know what you were doing. That’s another reason to be embarrassed. Getting your solution too far ahead of the known problem is dangerous.

“You have to solve a problem that people actually have. But it’s not always a problem that they know they have, so that’s tricky.” – Joshua Schachter

I admit. Sometimes you have to arbitrarily guess. Although, it should never be an uneducated guess. If you’re that far away from the problem, you should probably do some more research. It’s much faster than blind iterations.

“Customer research produces bland products. We’re producing a piece of art.” – Michael Arrington

Seriously? Who let you in here? Customer research has nothing to do with building a product. You can’t blame building a bland product on customer research. Research isn’t about getting answers, it’s about understanding the context of your problem.

“Do things that won’t scale; it will teach you.” – Brian Chesky

Brain probably likes a little research here and there. Doing things manually is another form research. Really, deeply, intensely understanding the problem before you automate it. You’re odds of doing it right the first time jump dramatically when you have first hand knowledge of the situation.

“We need to accept that we won’t always make the right decisions, that we’ll screw up royally sometimes – understanding that failure is not the opposite of success, it’s part of success.” – Arianna Huffington

If you’re doing something that’s never been done before there are no guarantees. No amount of research, hanging out with you’re potential customers, or even product iterations will guarantee success. This is damn good inspiration for only going as far as you can based on educated guesses. The larger your commitments, the greater the odds an error could be a death blow.

“You need to fail quickly. If you think you know what’s going to work in any aspect of your startup, you are wrong.” – Chuck Gordon

Boom! Chuck has a good grip on reality. Work as though failing is the most likely situation. Be optimistic, but assume you can never really get the most elegant solution on your first try.

“Usage is like oxygen for ideas. You can never fully anticipate how an audience is going to react to something you’ve created until it’s out there.” – Matt Mullenweg

The only real confidence you can have in your product is when you see people using it and loving it. You have to build the most meaningful things as quickly as possible while avoiding features and interfaces that get in the way.

“Every feature has some maintenance cost, and having fewer features lets us focus on the ones we care about and make sure they work very well.” – David Karp

What features you choose to delay building or remove altogether should be just as high of a priority as adding new features. Every new piece you add to the ecosystem requires your customers to recalculate and relearn how to get the most out of the product. Adding can be just as invasive as removing. If something isn’t extremely valuable anymore, it may be doing more damage than good. Don’t be afraid to wait or remove.

“Every time you make the user make a decision they don’t care about, you have failed as a designer.” – Aza Raskin

I hear the phrases “tech debt” and “design debt” a lot. These phrases seem to be more focused on the problems of the company. We need to start thinking about a form of debt we put on our users when we require them to make unnecessary decisions. Low value features and poorly designed interfaces do exactly that.

“It became an exercise to reduce and reduce, but it makes it easier to build an easier for people to work with.” – Jonathan Ive

As much as I love the idea of dedicating time to reducing complications, it makes me wonder how we let it into the product in the first place… Where did it come from?

“It’s simple until you make it complicated.” – Jason Fried

Now we’re back to building too much, too fast. We’re the ones introducing complexity. We’re doing it to ourselves! Maybe slowing things down and dedicating more time to doing simple things and keeping them simple will pay off.

“Customers want new functionality, but they don’t want the traditional complexity that has marred products in the past.” – Marc Benioff

People have expectations of a similar outcome with similar products. That doesn’t mean they want it done in a similar way. Time spent figuring out a simple approach, instead of duplicating another’s approach, might actually be the short-cut we’re all looking for.

“In many cases, the more you try to compete, the less competitive you actually are.” – Kathy Sierra

This quote is wildly ambiguous. I think her intentions are to encourage you to do something awesome for the sake of doing something awesome. Once you’re attention has focused on your competition, you’re much less likely to do something awesome and become another average product among average competitors.

Which leads me to my final and favorite startup quote of all time.

“Nothing works better than just improving your product.” – Joel Spolsky

You're reading My Startup Quote Adventure, a post from the Wurkit blog. If you enjoyed this post, you can follow @danritz on Twitter for more design related thoughts.

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Critiques: Can You Really Trust Them?

2012-12-26T17:00:56-05:00

Critiques from your peers and yourself are a huge part of becoming a better designer and creating better products. Unfortunately, the point of view of the person giving the critique, including the designer, rarely has the same point of view as the person using the interface. To top it all off, the designer may be putting everything they hear through a flawed and dysfunctional filter.

This makes life tough for a designer…

Who do you listen to? Who do you trust? Under what circumstances should you listen to one person over another? Can you trust yourself?

Peer critiques

Even under the best circumstances, someone who doesn’t represent the audience for the discussed interfaces should be listened to with suspicion. It’s not they’re wrong or poorly informed, just that they can’t fully evaluate how effective something is without genuinely applying it to their own goals. To help mitigate this risk, it’s a good idea to move the critique to a place and time that’s more appropriate to the problem.

If you’re working on an application to monitor someone’s diet, ambush a friend or colleague right before lunch. Ask them if they want to lose some weight (most people do). Then ask them to use your application to find a healthy meal.

Did they easily complete the task? Did they realize something useful about themselves or their own behavior? Did they enjoy using it?

A little bit of improvisation at the right time could be just what someone needs to empathize with the intended audience. This will help the person providing the critique give quick, candid, and honest feedback without getting mixed up in all that “design thinking” crap.

Critiquing yourself

When critiquing things for yourself, it’s easy to get caught up in your own assumptions without realizing it. For example, when you’re evaluating a potential music purchase you’re listening to it in a way that doesn’t match how you would listen to it in your daily life. You might listen to it while working, reading a book, or driving your car and never give it more than a small portion of your attention. This makes you’re own methods of preemptively evaluating what music you might enjoy suspect.

For me, I can’t focus while someone is singing and when I give ambient music my undivided attention I find it extremely boring. So there’s no way for me to know if I’ll enjoy listening to ambient music while I work until I actually listen to it while I work. I’ve wasted more time than I’d like to admit listening to lame ambient music while I work to see if I enjoy it.

As a designer, don’t assume that when you enjoy the “design” of an interface that you will also enjoy using that interface. The less likely you are to use the interfaces you’re making, the less you should trust your own judgement and rely more on your peers and users. You really need to take the time to use what you make, form a better understanding of what people experience, and use that perspective to better inform your choices.

Interpreting critiques

Critiques of any kind have value. Getting that value in a way that can be reasonably trusted is where things start to get complicated. If the designer doesn’t realize when his own judgement and the judgement of others providing feedback is potentially flawed, the odds of creating an elegant solution are slim.

Spend as much time using the product as possible. Spend as much time observing people using the product as possible. Spend as much time talking to people that are using the product as possible.

Yes, it’s time consuming. It’s worth it. You won’t regret it.

You're reading Critiques: Can You Really Trust Them?, a post from the Wurkit blog. If you enjoyed this post, you can follow @danritz on Twitter for more design related thoughts.

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Design as Art by Bruno Munari

2012-12-22T09:06:14-05:00

After years of debates with designer and artist friends about what is design, what is art, and what’s the difference; I didn’t think I was ever going to hear a new perspective. Bruno Munari changed that with his book Design as Art. Hands down, his book on exploring the differences and similarities of design and art isn’t just the best book on this particular conflict, it’s one of the best books I’ve read for either topic.

From the preface, he punches you right in the face.

“And if the aim is to mass produce objects for sale to a wide public at low price, then it becomes a problem of method and design. The artist has to regain the modesty he had when art was just a trade, and instead of despising the very public he is trying to interest he must discover its needs and make contact with it again.”

Then in the first few pages, he draws a line in the sand.

“It must be understood that as long as art stands aside from the problems of life it will only interest a very few people. Culture today is becoming a mass affair, and the artist must step down from his pedestal and be prepared to make a sign for a butcher’s shop (if he knows how to do it). The artist must cast off the last rags of romanticism and become active as a man among men, well up in present-day techniques, materials and working methods.”

But, shortly after, doesn’t hesitate to keep art intensely coupled to design.

“Instead of pictures for the drawing-room, electric gadgets for the kitchen. There should be no such thing as art divorced from life, with beautiful things to look at and hideous things to use. If what we use every day is made with art, and not thrown together by chance or caprice, then we shall have nothing to hide.”

Before I can stop cheering in my mind, he starts dictating how design should happen and what its goal should be.

“It is therefore up to us designers to make known our working methods in clear and simple terms, the methods we think are the truest, the most up-to-date, the most likely to resolve our common aesthetic problems. Anyone who uses a properly designed object feels the presence of an artist who has worked for him, bettering his living conditions and encouraging him to develop his taste and sense of beauty.”

The next thing that really surprised me was how quickly he broke into discussing the psychology of making a potential purchase and how design and art play a role. This is one of the areas most people tend to forget.

“He gives the right weight to each part of the project in hand, and he knows that the ultimate form of the object is psychologically vital when the potential buyer is making up his mind. He therefore tries to give it a form as appropriate as possible to its function, a form that one might say arises spontaneously from the function, from the mechanical part (where there is one), from the most appropriate material, from the most up-to-date production techniques, from a calculation of costs, and from other psychological and aesthetic factors.”

This was my first pause. I’m not a big fan of the perspective that form follows function. Although, I do feel strongly that a good designer should never completely rely on his or her own personal taste. And before I could reconcile these ideas, Bruno pushes me over the edge.

“A leaf is beautiful not because it is stylish but because it is natural, created in its exact form by its exact function. A designer tries to make an object as naturally as a tree puts forth a leaf. He does not smother his objects with his own personal taste but tries to be objective.”

I want to keep going (only on page 31 of 223), but I don’t want to give away all the gems without the great context he adds with his stories. I’ll just leave you with a twist.

“It is planning: the planning as objectively as possible of everything that goes to make up the surroundings and atmosphere in which men live today.”

It doesn’t matter if design or art is more important. You have to plan for something to become truly worthwhile.

If you like design or art, I can’t say enough about Design as Art by Bruno Munari. I doubt I’ll ever be able to have that design and art conversation again and keep a straight face.

You're reading Design as Art by Bruno Munari, a post from the Wurkit blog. If you enjoyed this post, you can follow @danritz on Twitter for more design related thoughts.

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Fixed-fee or Hourly?

2012-12-26T17:01:10-05:00

People can be extremely passionate about how they charge and why they think it’s the best way to get the most value out of their time. There are people on both sides with unshakable points of view. Unfortunately, there are enough pros and cons to each approach and enough variations in each project that it can still feel like a difficult decision.

Once you have the right billing method applied to the right project, you will seem more professional and put you in more control of your cash-flow. Also, as a really great side effect, it can alert you to what types of projects you should be seeking and avoiding. Getting it right is important.

Why you should care

Trust and respect are required to have a client feel comfortable paying you their hard-earned money. When your client feels like you’ve taken the time to understand their needs, the more professional you will seem. When you’re on the right path and making deliberate and meaningful choices, you will be followed.

Making money is great, but making consistent and predictable money is better. Once you’ve identified your value and how you intend to deliver it, the type of clients and projects you need to succeed will reveal themselves. If you’re having trouble, it should be an indicator that you might be working on projects that don’t fit your approach.

When to charge a fixed-fee

When you can see the predictable nature of a project, it should be a clear reason to charge for the entire project. Say, for example, a client has an understood problem with an understood solution and you have a rigid process is in place to accommodate it. There is little reason why a comprehensive estimate can’t be given with a guarantee it will be honored.

This may sound like a typical project, but don’t fool yourself! Getting all the required elements at the same time is more rare than you might think. Most projects have a fully understood problem without a fully understood solution, or the other way around. This will bring unpredictable elements into the picture and make it close to impossible to accurately estimate.

When to charge hourly

If you’re talking to a potential client about a project and it seems to become more and more unclear, you should consider charging hourly. Even if you can clearly define the deliverables and an appropriate timeline, you can’t guarantee that what you’re working on will be what the client wants without constant supervision. Regular communication is important, but after a certian point it’s counterproductive.

In this case above, the client may be looking for help identifying the problems that will inform the plan. This is where you’re deliverables become less valuable and your research, insights, and perspective take the spotlight. Even if you can predict the time and effort it takes to identify a problem, it doesn’t guarantee you’ve solved anything. It may just lead to another question. So don’t charge a fixed-fee for a solution until you know the problem and how to solve it.

Things to watch out for

One of the greatest feelings is getting “in the zone.” When charging hourly, you’re so productive it seems like you’re throwing money away. This is a very valid concern, but charging a fixed-fee will not solve this problem, it will only make the time you spend “out of the zone” the place where you throw away your money.

Another powerful urge, when charging hourly, is to say that what you are doing will “take as long as it takes.” Not knowing how much something will cost can be highly stressful for anyone making an investment. Take the time to estimate parts of the project and do your best to hit them. This will build trust and make it easier for clients to incorporate you into their plans and budgets.

If you or your client aren’t confident in the approach, it’s a good indicator one or both of you isn’t fully understanding the nature of the transaction. When a project is in the grey area between hourly or fixed-fee, take the time to understand what the client needs and, if necessary, split it into two independent projects. Also, if a project is obviously ideal for an hourly approach, but a fixed-fee is demanded (or the other way around), you should be cautious—it’s a sign you may be getting exploited.

Tips and tricks

Always do both. If you’re on a fixed-fee project keep track of your hours so that you can identify the valuable projects and, hopefully, learn how to get more of them. If you’re on an hourly project, estimate as much as possible so you can understand your strengths, use them more, and raise your rates.

No matter what, always try to set delivery dates or deadlines. It may seem obvious on a fixed-fee project, but don’t slack off on the hourly projects. When you can organize your time and effort to match the expectations of the client, you will build a reputation for always getting the job done. This is a great way to augment your value and be an easier choice for people writing the checks.

Always test your value by regularly increasing your rates. It’s not just about making more money, it’s also about learning and growing into new projects where you can make a bigger impact. There are clients who only value a website at $200, and others at $2 million. There are clients who only value a designer’s time at $10 an hour, and others at $250 an hour. Figure out what you want, then figure out how to get there.

Conclusion

In short, if the time you spend figuring things out is what creates the most value for your client, you should charge hourly. On the other hand, if what you’re delivering an understood solution for an understood problem, you should charge a fixed-fee. Anywhere in between is potentially risky business.

Regardless of the method you choose, when the value you deliver has a clear relationship to the nature of the project, you can strengthen your professional relationships while making more money. If you can always show your client that you’re giving more value than you’re charging, you will be seen a good investment and they will come back again and again and again.

Planning and the Illusion of Solving

2012-12-26T17:01:20-05:00

One of the most difficult aspects of planning is staying focused on articulating the plan. Trying to solve a problem you identify while planning is always appealing and, in my experience, never really works out. A significant problem can’t be solved with past experience or historical data and requires a hypothesis that should be tested and validated.

A good plan needs to identify problems, contain the ways you intend to discover the solutions, and show which problems are dependent on other solutions. Even with just a few moving parts, this can quickly become unwieldy. Why add guessing to the mix?

A quick solution is usually a trap

With experience comes the urge to use it. When problems pop up while planning, the knee-jerk reaction is to look to your past, find a reasonably similar scenario, and choose to use a similar or better solution. Once that solution has worked it’s way into the conversation, people will rely on it for all future solutions.

The margin of error for solutions based on past experiences should be small. Unfortunately, when you start working on a plan that relies on several layers of perceived solutions the margins of error can multiply and a lot of skill and good intentions will still blow up in your face. What’s worse, is that it can be really, really hard to know what piece of the puzzle caused the failure.

Even when you’re working with the smartest people in the world, alarms should be going off when people are solving problems on-the-fly and incorporating them into the plan.

Momentum is better than speed

Taking the time to challenge assumptions, test theories, and validate assumptions can be time consuming. Fortunately, once you’ve identified a problem and verified the solution, there’s less to consider for each following problem. Even a slow team that challenges itself and validates their assumptions will eventually be more productive than a fast team who skips that part.

You're reading Planning and the Illusion of Solving, a post from the Wurkit blog. If you enjoyed this post, you can follow @danritz on Twitter for more design related thoughts.

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Creating Intuitive Interfaces

2012-12-26T17:01:29-05:00

A hallmark of good design is when the people using your application feel like you’re reading their mind. As strange and unpredictable as people are, this isn’t hard to do. All you need to keep setting expectations and then delivering on those expectations.

Over time, hopefully within a few interfaces, you have to primed people to think that a certain type of thing will be in a certain place. As they’re browsing and working and managing all the distractions of their day, they will eventually need to do that thing again. Instinctually they will look towards the place they have come to expect that thing.

Is it there?

If it’s not, prepare for a lot of frustration and confusion. If it is, prepare for a lot of suprise and delight.

It’s that simple. No magic. No Unicorns. Just consistent and disciplined interfaces.

Setting interface expectations

Inside larger and more complex applications, a wide variety of interfaces will show up. It can become really, really hard to set consistent patters and always put the same things in the same places. In the spirit of progress over perfection, a “gaze” may be a more appropriate the a super-rigid set of interface rules.

Imagine being fully focused on a task inside an application. Once you’ve completed that task, realized another task that’s a higher priority, or just plain screwed up, where does your gaze wander to? There’s a good chance you’ll reacte and move towards what you consider the safest place.

Adding something might feel like it belongs somewhere on the upper left side of the screen.
Searching for something might feel like it belongs on the upper right side of the screen.
Digging in deeper might feel like it belongs on the left side of the screen.
Editing/deleting something might feel like it belongs on the right side of the screen.

The more you can consolidate these assumptions, set expectations, and deliver with consistency, the more people will find you accommodating and intutitive. They may even think you’re reading their minds!

You're reading Creating Intuitive Interfaces, a post from the Wurkit blog. If you enjoyed this post, you can follow @danritz on Twitter for more design related thoughts.

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The Power of Good Design

2012-12-26T17:01:41-05:00

Accountants to landscapers have a basic understanding of the power of marketing. They need to build an audience! They need more people to want their stuff!

Is design understood that specifically? Is it something that we want because we’re certain it will affect the bottom line in a significant way? Or is it something we need because we’ve seen our competition use it successfully and hope to do the same?

To pass that threshold of needing (and resenting) to wanting (and loving) design, you need to understand three core parts of design: making things useful, making things usable, and making things desirable.

Making Things Useful

Putting together a collection of features and functionality to help people accomplish a goal is just as much a part of design as choosing a color scheme. It’s far enough away from seeing a beautiful interface that it doesn’t feel like design. Just remember, no matter where you are in the project, design is happening.

It may be appealing to leave the designers out of this phase for budget or time constraints, but don’t let that happen. Some features are complex enough to influence the feeling of the application. If you’re going for a lightning fast and highly enjoyable application, a complex feature will interfere with that plan.

A good designer can spot these inconsistencies in complexity and help you build a more consistent set of features and functionality. This is a very important part of setting the right tone and building a good foundation for the project.

Making Things Usable

If we can’t get the value that has been promised quickly and efficiently we will probably get cranky. We are all prepared to work for the value we need, but if confusion is getting in our way it can become very hard to to see this product or service as an ally. Using something can be difficult without damaging perception, but when it gets confusing there has been a huge failure in design.

Getting down into the nitty-gritty details of properly labeling form elements, buttons, icons, headings, micro-copy, error-copy, alert messages, and links is what it takes to make people feel comfortable and confident in their actions. It can take a lot of time, but it’s worth it. Once you’re out of your audience’s way, they will become more effective and give you all the credit.

When you intuitively know how to get somewhere and then instantly know what to do when you get there, a sense of confidence emerges. After you feel as if you’ve have mastered the art of using a website or application it will be nearly impossible for the competition to break through and convince you to switch.

Making Things Desirable

Building something useful is worth celebrating. Making something useful become easy to use is also a huge accomplishment. Unfortunately, there are many companies, teams, and even individuals that can take a project this far. You need to make it feel personal and meaningful to keep your audience engaged.

Desire isn’t just a nice look. Visual appeal will get some temporary attention that will quickly drift into the next distraction. A personality that continuously challenges, excites, and delights the audience is required to make them want to use your product or service. Although most of the design is done at this point, inspiring desire can be the most difficult part.

A great designer can help translate a personality into a look and feel that will reinforce the perceptions you want to build in your audience. This perception will help your content make more sense and give it an extra level of credibility. It can also resonate with people on an even deeper level if it feels similar to how they feel about themselves.

The Multiplier Effect

Something useful is valuable. When it’s easy to use it’s 10 times more valuable. When it’s fun to use it’s another 10 times more valuable. This is the power of good design.

You're reading The Power of Good Design, a post from the Wurkit blog. If you enjoyed this post, you can follow @danritz on Twitter for more design related thoughts.

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