The other day I was doing my very important internet stuff to help me procrastinate when I found several quotes in thypographic images from Zerouno that claims to be "ridiculous" and made from "clients from hell" with some request that (I think) sometimes the client asks. The collection is named "What not to say to a graphic designer" and it basically explains why they struggle so much to find a job.
Now, I am not a graphic designer and I don't know squad about typography or colors or the whole graphic elements but I can relate to many graphic designers that sometimes could claim that their client or customers are hard to understand and harder to make them understand, but when you start complaining about everything that the customer do you end up losing something very important in this business: professionalism.
Avoid becoming such a negative freelancer and take a look at the following
 |
| © Zerouno. www.zerouno.org |
Remember this as a freelancer: You are hired to fit a business needs, a business that is not yours, with foreign ideas. When you become the CEO of your own company, you can lead those ideas but in the meanwhile show some respect to the people that pay you and trust you with the job.
 |
| © Zerouno. www.zerouno.org |
Sometimes the employer will ask you to do changes trusting that they are easy to do. If that is not the case you should explain why; you have to avoid situations where they add free work for you. You have to bee very clear because the employer doesn't know about the topic, you are the expert and you could tell if that only take a minute or not. Most of times the employer would understand you and then you could apply extra feeds to add unexpected work loads. Money!
But when it takes only one minute you should always do it. Shows professionalism, shows that you are very good at it and will make your employer more likely to work with you again. Remember: It's your job, you have to do it!
 |
| © Zerouno. www.zerouno.org |
They are offering something that many people died for: Freedom! And you get annoyed? No wonder why you still living in your parents home at your 30's. I just have no words for this one.
 |
| © Zerouno. www.zerouno.org |
So, the employer must know how to do a vector image with image processing software. Care to tell me what are you being paid for?
Most employers hire people because they don't know how to do that specific job! Many people with small business don't know how to use dedicated software and MS Paint or Word is the only thing they know. If they knew how to do it, you would have no job. The answer to questions like that is always "Any format is ok".
 |
| © Zerouno. www.zerouno.org |
As told before, never waste an oportunitty to demonstrate that you know about the sibject. When asked a question you have the responsibility to answer it so your employer is well informed to make a desition. He/she depends on you to scrap ideas that are wrong. If you disagree you have to make it crystal clear so it's understood and an error is avoided. When your employer is stubborn, you will have to suck it up and deal with it. Remember, it's not your business, it's not your idea and there is no room for your frustrated dreams.
 |
| © Zerouno. www.zerouno.org |
Classic, the boss gave you the "It's ok" So you signed the app in production and when you test it in a real device it crashes. The worst part? You saw it comming.
Having a moron employee is perfect. It's the ideal tester, he could warn you about so many things that you are not seeing from your perspective. Of course he can't see what you trained eyes and senses can so it's your responsibility to make it clear for him what is going to happen if you let something pass. If it crashes it's your fault and no one else's.
 |
| © Zerouno. www.zerouno.org |
When you work as a freelancer, you can find many bumps in the road like when nor your or the employer know what to do next. Your communication skills will sharpen everytime you sit with your employer and have a talk of what to do next. There is nothing wrong to ask "Ok, tell me your ideas and concerns". It's actually a prietty solid technique to create stronger bounds with your employer to find a solution.
"Try something else" it's a perfect situation to ask "What do you have in mind?" and smile.
 |
| © Zerouno. www.zerouno.org |
Ambiguous request are always there. Like in the previous image, you must master communication skills to become a professional freelancer. Don't just stare at your employers after an ambiguous request, say something! Say "I don't understand what you mean" but end it with "... but I think this works because of the following reasons...". If you fail in communication skills, quit. There is no hope for you.
 |
| © Zerouno. www.zerouno.org |
Whenever an ambiguous request comes, you can't say "ok" without understanding what's going on. That's lying and it's devastating for you and your reputation. When in doubt ask for additional information to make a whole. Your employers has a lot of context but sometimes they fail to give it because they think we already have it. It's your job to get it out from their confused minds.
Many other images are available at the author's webpage but I'm not against the author. I'm against narcisist and egocentric developers that also has many of this as their work habits. Remember that you are supposed to be a professional. You know your expertise area and it's always your job to handle the client in the most polite manner.
Stick to your expertise ok? The reason these quotes are the quotes from hell for a designer are as following:
ReplyDelete1.) Negative space is the empty or open space around an object that defines it. In layman's terms, it is the breathing room around the subject that determines how appealing it looks. The majority of people don't like it when designs are too crowded. Therefore, don;t give us suggestions such as this when our jobs revolve around knowing how to make an appealing design that will appeal to you audience. We know what were doing.
2.) Designs don't start in seconds. There is planning, from concept to the the realization of a design, and possibly tens if not hundreds of drafts in between to make a design perfect. We work within deadlines, but we don't work in seconds.
3.) This is one of the most hellish things for a designer to hear. This tells me, "I have no idea what I want to shoot for, and its open waters for you but be warned that I might have you here for weeks on end working to find a design before I finally say, ehh, its ok." Clients are notorious for not being able to make up there minds.
4.) Word format is reserved for word documents, hence, a research paper or such. If you're going to send someone a picture, (say, a logo) its in either a PNG or JPEG format. I don't think you understood that quote in the first place, as quite literally anyone can save a document as a jpeg very easily.
5.) Its not our jobs to get on our knees and beg for them to accept our idea, as you so easily seem to think. Its our job to design first, explain later to the client why what we've done is correct and help them to understand as of course, this is not their expertise. Bigger isn't always better, and rather than bow to a clients every whim as if they own us, we work as partners, explaining to each other how their side of the equation works.
6.) Again, you show how little you know about graphic design and how little qualified you are to comment on something such as this. What this addresses is when a client send you a very low resolution file which is very difficult to work with in a project. Lines are messy, words blurry, hence the client, inexperienced with design of any type states, "Low resolution? Looks fine on my screen." This has nothing to do with an app, which you would know, if you were qualified in any way to design anything.
7.) Now this one is a bit of a blurred line, and I actually agree with you slightly here. However, asking what a client has in mind is always the first thing you should do, you shouldn't have to do it 36 times until a client is satisfied. A client should know what they're looking for when the hire someone to complete their project.
8.) As you stated, this is where communication comes into play. However, this is more of that annoying moment in which the client seems to think they know better than you when it comes to the job in which they've hired you to complete. There are many nuances to designing anything, an its our job to deal with them. Certain colors invoke different feelings, hence, we'll use the colors that we feel will best impact your clients. Leave the designing to us.
9.) Again, this implies that the client knows better than the people they're paying money to to do a job. You've heard most of what I mean by this above, so i'll keep it short and sweet. We do this for a living. We know how to sway a market in your favor. So allow us to do so. That simple
Sidenote: This has nothing to do with being narcissistic or egocentric. This is our job market, and until you become a designer, you stick to your market. We know what were doing, we'll handle it to the best of our abilities. We are professional, but its people like you that drive us up the wall. You don't know everything that there is to know about our job, so you should stick to what you do know.
Good luck with your blog my friend
-An angry Graphic Designer