Be a Better Designer 5: Left/Middle/Right Rule

Any good designer worth his salt is not only about creating evocative and beautiful designs but is also a good communicator. There is no point in a designer creating these fantastic and unique designs if he/she is not able to communicate his intent or concept to see if it satisfies the client or boss’s requirements.
A lot of designers think successful communication is about selling your design well. The ability to sell ice to Eskimos eh? But how do you avoid being that so-so designer who some how is able to get away with hawking off his crap designs?

What many designers don’t know is that the process of communicating a design to a client also boils down to, not how your present, but what you present. The trick of getting it right is at the beginning during the concept presentation phase. This works with many “clients”, people such as bosses, engineers, marketing managers, and even your design lecturer!
The concept phase is not just about showing off sketches or your best designs, you need to be consciously and actively aware that you are communicating your design solution to your client. It’s not about hoping you hit the mark with your design or if your client picks your idea. It’s about knowing if your concepts are going in the right direction and fulfilling the brief or solving the problem set out. In other words, you are using the concepts to pick the client’s mind, and helping you find the design that is the right solution to the problem.
To understand this more let’s delve a little deeper into the design process.

Design is a reiterative process that strives to turn something intangible and subjective like a client’s brief, consumer problem, or concept into a reality. Thus it’s extremely difficult to get it right on the first sketch or by only showing one design. But by doing so you only sell yourself short as you will ultimately feel you have missed out on something. So do you now know why people always tell you to develop and refine your designs?Really at the end of the day, no matter what you do, detailed brief, extensive consumer research, the best-designed forms, no one really knows what design is going to work except the person that approves the design. Unless you are that person, it’s pretty difficult to know what that person wants!

Thus whenever I present concepts, I always adopt what I humbly call the Left/Middle/Right rule. Similar to the left/right wing concept in politics, I always present during the concept phase the most radical concept, a conservative concept that I know will be selected, and a concept that is the middle ground somewhere in between the both. By showing my concepts in this way I can get an accurate idea of how far a client is willing to go with his brand, budget, time, and even need for design.

By showing the radical design you have also shown the client that you pushed the design to the extreme end and came back. This is a great and subtle way to tell your client that you took the effort to develop the design as far as possible. This also is a way for the client to see that the grass is not always greener. I often find if you don’t show a radical concept, I always sense the client wanting more either because of curiosity or just plain to get more bang for the buck. At the other end of the spectrum, by showing the client the conservative concept you actually cover your behind. Many clients, despite what they tell you actually can’t stomach radical designs, or designs even slightly different from the norm. However, most of the client’s choices actually fall into the between category. As it’s a happy mix of both conservatism and radical thought.
One of the problems of this is that often you may have to discard a design, that is almost as good, in favor of a concept that fits this rule. But don’t forget that concept development is in your control, you can always introduce and combine the dropped design with the winning design. However, I often find, with the winning design, its often pretty clear cut in describing the direction you should take anyway so its pretty safe to drop that “almost as good” concept. Why not try it out in your next concept presentation and let me know?

Here’s to your design success!