Because i designed it doesn’t mean i like it

Clients find it hard to believe that I am telling them that I personally don’t like the work I have designed for them.

After initial shock the next statement from their mouths is then why should I, fair enough!

The answer is simple, I don’t really care if you have a personal dislike because personal taste is subjective and it is about your market’s response to it rather than yours.

If you are a Baby Boomer male and your business is talking to Gen Y females you shouldn’t like what I would present to you. What you should like is the rationale that we present to you about the design. Here we give our recommendations based on research and our knowledge as to why Gen Y females will like it, (and you won’t).

Here you have to leave your personal taste at the door and take on the persona of the market we are talking to, and this goes for any good designer as well.

Of course it is even harder to do this when you are the offering yourself, as in an architect for instance. The difference here is that you naturally have an influence in your product, being the style of architecture you create and therefore your clientele.

You will be designing projects based on your area of interest and taste, and clients who come to you, come because they have a wish to utilise your style.

So it makes complete sense to have your personal taste taken into account in the design in this instance, and we will implement it appropriately. This information is obtained through our discovery process and becomes part of our brief from the strategy guys.

The case is to look at it from an objective business view point, and not to take it personally, which goes for us designers as well, no Prima Donna’s here!