Design for quality
Back in 2010, we were still at the dawn of our profession, figuring out interface patterns and when to use the radio button versus the checkbox. 15 years later, it’s safe to say that most of the interface design is solved, we’re rarely confused about what UI pattern to use unless we intentionally want to come up with something new.
After the basic UI patterns were established, we turned our attention towards people interacting with our designs, and User Research mania started. We were trying to wrap our heads around highly theoretical frameworks that were popping up like mushrooms after rain: design thinking, personas, JTBD, the list goes on. Over time, they proved to be quite detached from reality, which is ironically the very thing they were made for (remember empathy maps?). We realized that the essence of all those complicated frameworks is simply talking to users and getting their feedback, the more, the better.
Then, as we became increasingly disappointed in these frameworks and costs of doing research became harder to justify to business, designers decided to switch sides. In order to battle the existential crisis and prove our worth, we rushed into PMs territory, digging into business metrics, learning about retention and engagement, and eager to launch as many A/B tests as possible. And that was precisely the moment when the downfall of quality started.
As we started measuring our work by business metrics and trying to maximize the increase, we began to cut corners. “Growth design” was born, focusing on micro-optimizations of existing products. Designers, together with PMs, started to squeeze the juices out of software products and come up with questionable solutions, bringing short-term gains at the cost of hurting the overall experience.
When designers finally found a tangible way to evaluate their work, they went mayhem. Finally, the existential crisis was over, and every designer could measure their worth in metrics increase and number of successful experiments. The criteria for design have changed, now the great designer is not the one who brought value to the customer by delivering an exceptional experience, but the one who brought the most cash to the business. After several years of designing with this mindset in mind, internet became a very treacherous place trying to suck your money out on every corner.
I don’t mean that bringing more money to the business is inherently an evil thing. In fact, I think it’s designer’s primary job to create software that people would buy and bring money to the creators. But we swayed too much into designing cash cows and forgot that in the long run, people won’t be inclined to buy products that are constantly trying to trick them. Such an approach ceased to work in sales since Di Caprio’s times, why did we start to employ it in software?
Luckily, I see the tide slowly changing. Companies like Linear recognise that high quality design is able to attract customers and drive them from old growth-hacked products to something that was meticulously crafted with great attention to details. This proves that quality is valuable to people if they are willing to put effort into moving to another product and pay for it.
Linear’s example shows what designers should focus on: making software exceptional. This is the exact added value we bring. Stop arguing and competing with PMs, trying to take a share of their responsibilities. Leave the business side to them and focus on what you are trained to do best: design.
How to design for quality
There are three components to high-quality software:
1. It’s useful. No matter how unique and beautiful your product looks, it’s doomed if nobody uses it for anything. Nobody will see these ✨ delightful experiences ✨
→ Make sure what you’re designing is valuable to people and find evidence for it. If you cannot (or not willing to) find the evidence to back your idea, then it’s definitely not worth spending time building it.
2. It’s reliable. Poor performance has ruined Notion and Arc Browser for me. Yes, those products are useful and have great design, but if they freeze or boot for 10 sec, I’d better go and find an alternative. It’ll likely have a worse experience, but at least I can trust that it won’t break at any moment.
→ Spend more time with your engineers and optimize your solution to suit the tech restrictions, have less breaking points and avoid solutions that will bring response time down.
3. It’s delightful. The only job that uncontestedly belongs to us. But for some reason, many designers doing anything but working on their execution skills. There’s no way around it if you want to create high-quality products, they all look and feel absolutely incredible.
→ Embrace your craft and start honing your visual skills: static UI, animation, illustration, image gen & 3D. Go beyond visual and employ sound and haptics in your design. That’s how you achieve delightful and memorable experiences that people will want to share.
Product design is slowly but surely becoming commoditized, and soon, people will be able to design software without the designer’s help. AI only speeds this trend up. However, as the need for routine UI execution diminishes, designers will focus on bringing quality and uniqueness to the work they create. Those who remain will create state-of-the-art experiences. And make huge money doing it.
