Trust Nothing, Murder Most

Q: I’m having trouble letting go of an idea I came up with. I still think it’s a great idea, I poured a lot of time into it. But we tested it and it didn’t work. Is there anything I can do to save it? Or do I need to let go?

To design is to solve problems. To be a designer is to be driven by the need to find something that needs solving (of which there is never a shortage), and to do the work of coming up with the right solution. Knowing if it is the right solution means replacing what wasn’t working with your proposed solution and waiting to see if the situation improves.

There’s a lot to love about that process. At least to me, and hopefully to you as well. But let’s be honest, it’s also incredibly frustrating. We come up with solutions all the time. We think they’re solid. We work diligently for that special “aha!” moment that makes all the frustrating moments worthwhile. And most of the time we fall short. It’s hard to love something that fails so often.

If you’re going to love something it needs to be the process of coming up with a solution. If you’re going to love two things, the other one should be that you’ve actually solved the problem. If you’re going to love three things, love the people you’re trying to help. (Bonus points for not referring to these people as users. Unless you’re actually trying to help heroin addicts. In which case — bless you.)

But don’t ever fall in love with a candidate. Not before you’re confident it will solve the problem. It will break your heart. And worse — it’ll hurt the people you’re trying to help. When you take your car to a mechanic you don’t want them to convince you the brakes are fixed. You want them to fix the brakes! When you are designing a safety feature, you don’t want to just make people feel safe. You want to actually increase their safety.

As a designer, your job is to distrust all potential solutions until you reach a high level of confidence, based in evidence. Whether they are your idea or someone else’s. But especially when they are yours. Your only allegiance is to the people you’re solving the problem for. (By the way, these are not the same people who write your checks.)

This is hard. And it takes a lot of practice to harden your heart. But it is possible. Here at Mule, we do research-driven work. We interview people, we gather data, we study behavior, etc. Then we start discussing possible solutions informed by our findings. And we hypothesize the value of that solution based on the research we did. Then, and only then, do we allow ourselves to start thinking of what this solution might actually look like.

If we start picturing the solution before doing the research we’ll look for justification. We’ll interpret the research to support our ideas. This is called confirmation bias. And it happens all the time.

If a colleague finds a flaw in your work— thank them! Then see if it can be fixed.

So if you’ve had an “aha!” moment and designed something you really believe in? Kick the tires. Ask your colleagues to kick the tires. If a colleague is kicking the tires hard on your pet solution, that person is doing their job. If a colleague finds a flaw — thank them! And then see if it can be fixed. If a colleague is telling you how wonderful your solution is without having the good grace to attempt to destroy it, that person is more invested in being nice to you than helping you be a good designer.

But I spent so much time on it!

That’s known as the sunk cost fallacy. If a solution is wrong, it doesn’t matter how much time you spent on it. It doesn’t matter if you worked all weekend on it. It doesn’t matter that you skipped a movie with all your friends to stay home and work. Don’t conflate time spent with goals achieved. Chalk that time up to a learning experience. No one can take that away.

Is your time worth more than the trust people put in you to solve the problem correctly? Is your ego so big that you’d rather put people in harm’s way than admit you were wrong?

If your solution is left wanting, as so many of them are, then be honest with yourself about it. Kill it then and there. Kill it before it has a chance to let down the very people you were trying to help. Because putting a flawed solution in front of people is not only a failure of the job, and a lost opportunity for those who needed it to work — it is unethical.

And fighting for an idea, not because of its merit, but because we don’t want to let go, because you don’t want to admit you were wrong, despite the evidence to the contrary, is not fighting for good design — it is zealotry.

Let it go. Your time is better spent solving problems, not salvaging practice rounds.

Mike Monteiro is a nice guy or a total asshole depending on your opinion. He is also the Design Director at Mule Design. And the author of Design Is a Job and You’re My Favorite Client.