Creativity lies in the constraints: why small-scale design innovation is best
To approach design exploration efficiently, think like a plumber
One fear many designers have nowadays is losing creative control.
In an era focused on “Design needs to move product metrics,” along with fears around AI and tight budgets, you may wonder how much leeway you’ll have to explore creative solutions.
Nowhere is that more prevalent than with design exploration.
What used to be a deep dive to explore and find the best design solution now often comes with the stress of Product teams breathing down their neck to get things done fast and somehow move metrics.
To meet this ever-increasing demand, designers need to think less like rockstars and more like plumbers.
Jony Ive vs plumbers, or why being a Design innovator sucks
One thing that separates design (especially UX design) from pure art is that design’s value lies in the impact of our work.-Jane Li
One myth that Silicon Valley (and boot camps) love to sell is the idea of being a Design Innovator. You could be the next Jony Ive, Apple's Chief of Design and creator of memorable designs like the iMac.
Organizations sell this idea because it makes you work harder. After all, there may be another design you haven’t explored: a brilliant and innovative solution that makes both users and businesses happy.
So, become a workaholic and keep iterating late into the night and on weekends to find that mythical solution.
On the other hand, in The Design Method: A Philosophy and Process for Functional Visual Communication, Eric Karjaluto argues that Designers should be more like plumbers, using their standardized toolbox to address and solve challenging problems.
Compare being Jony Ive to being a plumber, and it’s no wonder everyone used to want to be a Design Innovator. But between burnout, a poor job market, and people considering a Life After Tech, trying to be a Design Innovator with tight budgets and timelines isn’t working for most people.
So, let’s examine what it’s like to be a “Design plumber” and how to approach these problems.
Changing user behavior and measuring with metrics
Let’s start by first breaking down the statement, “Design needs to move product metrics.”
I agree with this, and it’s not as harsh as it sounds. To explain why, let’s discuss attitudinal and behavioral metrics.
Those terms are just a fancy way of saying these two statements:
A way to measure outcomes/changes around what people say (Attitudinal)
A way to measure outcomes/changes around what people do (Behavioral)
From a business perspective, Design is about changing user behavior (or what people do).
If you’re redesigning something, it’s because of some undesirable user behavior. Whether users are canceling subscriptions, abandoning the checkout process, or getting lost, you’re redesigning the user experience to change how users behave.
New designs are similar. In these cases, by showcasing product value, you want to motivate a target user group to engage in desirable behavior (Activation), like creating an account or scheduling a demo.
After all, businesses define a project’s success or failure based on behavioral metrics (i.e., what users do). However, while they might know the desired outcome, they don’t always know much about the process.
After all, if you’re hiring a plumber, you might not know any plumbing details other than the toilet isn’t flushing.
So, Designers have two critical roles in this process:
Crafting design solutions that will most likely create user behavior change, which will be reflected in the metrics
But that doesn’t mean that every Design is entirely standardized: instead, creative solutions live in the fact that every project is slightly different.
Design exploration is about addressing small, unique problems
If you believe that plumbers never problem solve on the job, you’d be shocked.
Whether it’s figuring out how to work in tight bathrooms, tracing where a clog in a pipe might be, or more, no two plumbing jobs are ever the same.
Design exploration isn’t much different. Designing interfaces to change the behavior of twenty-year veterans in a field is hardly the same thing as designing for novices.
Exploring design solutions requires a deep understanding of current user behavior and best practices for improving the user experience.
Doing so might seem intimidating, but this is the other part of being a “Design plumber.” You’re not approaching these problems from scratch: you have a toolbox of standardized tools (i.e., your design system and components) to try and do this.
After all, according to the Jam Study, having too many available options (like a blank canvas) can be paralyzing. Working with standardized design components, a set design system, and limited options is much easier.
What’s more, by limiting your solutions to your standardized tools, you’ll save a lot of time and effort with design exploration and make things easier for others on your team, like developers.
This is how “Design Plumbers” can find clever solutions that don’t rely on rockstar innovation.
Creativity isn’t dead: it lives in the constraints
In this day and age, rockstar Design Innovators are few and far between. Even though it sounds great, you probably don’t see the long hours and late nights people must spend to innovate for the business.
Instead, focusing on small-scale, contextual innovations while sticking with conventional solutions can often be one of the best methods of exploring potential designs.
Understanding user behavior, the value users get from your product, and how to best use a limited set of tools is a creative endeavor on a small scale that helps you efficiently explore many possible design solutions.
So if you’re afraid that all of the creativity is being sucked out of Design, don’t be. It just may live in the details instead of being the “Next Innovative Solution.”
Kai Wong is a Senior Product Designer and Data-Informed Design Expert. He teaches designers to become effective communicators by leveraging the power of Data.