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I just completed 5 years as a designer. Here are 9 crucial things I learned!
The month of June marked five years of being a designer. And in this story, there are the most critical and important learnings summed up.
As a designer you will go through various challenges throughout your career, and mind you, more as a senior than a junior. As a junior you still have the freedom and liberty to do some mistakes, and have a senior cover them up for you, but when you climb up the ladder and become a senior yourself, that liberty goes away.
Now you are not only completely accountable for your decisions, but small mistakes from your end, are no longer ignored. If you’re working with some junior designers, maybe you also have to take up responsibility for their screw-ups. Well, that’s a part of being a senior, and it comes with some pros and cons!
But what have I learnt as a designer so far? Here are the top 10 things —
1. The Identificational Quality
It’s really important to have your identity as a designer, because that’s what sets you apart from the others. Everyone can use Figma, everyone knows how to conduct a research or talk to the stakeholders, but what is it that sets you apart from the lot?
Do you have a stronghold on steering a conversation into the right direction? Can you provide more focus to the business meetings? Can you reduce time of useless meetings and increase productivity in the team? Something. Anything that you have over everyone else.
2. Even Your Seniors Can Be Wrong!
As a junior designer, you might not have the mindset to question anyone, or you might ‘accept’ that whatever the senior is saying is 100% correct, but as you grow into a senior designer, you start to understand that even seniors can be idiots!
As a junior designer, I have wasted precious…
