On Folk
It occurs to me that I’ve met a lot of really great people in the past year. It just so happens they’re designers too. Not very many designers are not great people. (Although, there are a few.) It’s almost like it’s a prerequisite: to be a good designer, you probably need to be a good person.
Designing can be thankless, taxing work. And a lot of the skills necessary to be good at this gig are part of being a good person: empathy, and, well, caring. I think that’s why I like this profession: it’s difficult and it doesn’t pay extremely well, so all the greedy and/or lazy folks that have delusions about instant fame or fortune leave quickly. And what you’re left with is a batch of really wonderful, hard-working people that care (sometimes too much) at the core of the profession. (Albeit, as a group we can have the reputation of either being sheepish, or self-righteous, or indignant, depending on the day.)
I’m tired of the word designer. Can I set an auto-replace on my keyboard to change the word “designer” to “good people that just happen to design for a living?” Can I change “creative” to “people who feel compelled to make, either by making new things, or by making things better?” Can I change “design thinking” to “creating ideas where one gives a rat’s ass about all parties involved?”
It might be dangerous to say that your career effects your world view, or that you view the world in a certain way because you’re a designer. You don’t see plumbers or stevedores saying that. Seems healthier to say that you view the world in a certain way, and that made you a designer. Carts don’t go before horses. People are people before they’re designers.
Most of the stuff you need to be good at this design gig are the same tools needed to get by in this world. Both are primarily concerned with people. Good, honest, hard-working ones at that.
Down with “designers.” Up with good people.
