Designing Good to Great

by Chris Arnold on March 19, 2010

One of my favorite things about SXSW Interactive 2010 was the passion I found no matter the direction I looked. It's easy for creatives to slump into a lusterless career path, but it was nice to see talented designers and developers discussing craft, client relationships, and goals for the future. A lack of passion was hard to find.

Perhaps one of the most candid conversations I had the pleasure of taking in occurred not in the grandiose Austin Convention Center, but in a smaller room in the neighboring Courtyard Hotel. Led by Ian Coyle of Superhero.es in Portland and Duane King of BBDK in Santa Fe, the discussion focused on bettering ones design abilities; moving from good to great as professional creators.

As creative leaders, we must strive to get the best from our clients and continuously heighten our ability to execute the final 10% of projects, where most stall or faulter. Personal projects, they contested, are also a terrific way to learn more about your own skill set while expanding upon new ideas and innovation along the way.

An important topic relating to client interaction was also addressed and discussed openly among the crowd. How is it that we find and maintain strong relationships with clients? It's a tough question to answer, and not one with any single solution. What I took from the conversation, however, is that there's a core starting point.

The point where both the creative team and the client must have mutual, amicable respect for one another is highly important and perhaps debatably critical for a design project to turn out as successfully as it possibly can. Without respect—without a sincere desire for both parties to succeed—a design project can fail quickly.

The suggestion to work with clients that like your processes and work seems easy enough, but it's been interesting to find over the years that such a case might not be immediately assumed. In the instance of referrals, for example, I've seen potential clients not even look at a prospective design firm's website, let alone their body of work!

Designing good to great encompasses no magical solution, but it does start with a commitment to a client's vision, providing your own insight and knowledge to help lead a project to success. If the tools are present, and the right motives exist, you're on your way to bettering both sides of that coin. The path to creating that next success will be off on the right foot.