How You Communicate with Your Designer is important.
My daughter recently texted me from school. “Do you know your school password?” I didn’t, as it’s usually stored in my computer. So I told her no.
A few days later she texted her mother and asked the same thing. This time she also mentioned something about finals, so I got a hold of the school and they told me a form that needed to be filled out. So I took care of it.
The issue is that if she would have told me the goal (have all the forms necessary for her to take finals filled out) instead of some detail of what she thought needed done (remembering the password) this would have been taken care of a few days ago instead of on the day of finals.
I can hear the confusion- “So what does this have to do with graphic design?”. Well, it’s a good metaphor of a client talking to their designer. If you have an issue with whatever is being designed, talk about the goal, not what you think will fix it.
Here’s an example. A message isn’t quite apparent, and you decide it’s because a title feels cramped- there’s something about it that’s bugging you. You have two options.
- Can you move that title up three clicks? Now down one? Maybe move it over a little- no, now back- Maybe the font's too big…
- I don’t think the message is getting through.
In case you’re wondering, the answer is two. Your designer has been trained in these things, and knows how to fix them. It may be the exact same solution you came up with , but often it’s something totally different. Maybe a picture needs to be moved to a different area of the piece. Communication is vitally important, and micromanaging can often lead to a big mess as all the separate pieces are moved around without looking at the bigger picture.