The collaboration between product managers and designers is crucial for product success. Design is key to achieving product goals and solving problems.
Over the years, I’ve been part of many product teams. I’ve seen good and bad examples of how product managers work with designers. Today, I manage product teams. The way I structure them and lead them are heavily influenced by my past experiences, and it boils down to three core tenets:
- First, I focus a lot on thoughtfulness. I look for how deeply people think about products they work on and use. This applies to both designers and product managers; especially designers. A good dribbble profile doesn’t mean anything, but a solid take down on some product’s design tells me a lot. Good designers are great observers and thinkers.
- Second, I make sure that they work very very closely with each other. Not a single thing gets done without both of their involvement. Of course, engineers are also part of it, but these individuals can’t miss anything, period. They’re always thinking about the product, they’re our design and experience czars.
- Third, and most important, I have three rules for operation: be thoughtful, be opinionated, be fearless. If you as a product team think X is right for the user even though Y is more popular, then have the courage and conviction to go with X, and lead the users there.
These are the cultural tenets I’ve always wanted. I’ve seen some bad situations. Some product people view design as a feature, something that can be bolted on later. Some believe it’s an expensive habit that some companies like Apple have the luxury for. And this is the worst case: hiring a designer who designed a similar product before, and bombarding them with dribbble links to achieve a certain outcome. This happens a lot, and I pity those designers; they’re suffering inside.
Fundamentally, design is problem solving. Everybody is designing things all the time, whether they realize it or not. Design is a loaded word — some say it’s how it looks, some say it’s how it works. But to me, it’s being thoughtful. When I see a careless login experience, I think that this person was either not thinking or thinking in the wrong way. When I see something obvious, I wonder how much thought went in.
Good design is an outcome of a design thinking culture, not the output of a single designer
Good design is an outcome of collaboration between product managers and designers. They approach problems from opposite ends. A product manager brings intimate knowledge about the problem, context, and the user — they come from the problem end. A product designer brings intimate knowledge about the solution and approaches — they come from the solution end. Together, they can arrive at a good solution they’re both happy about. It requires a lot of thinking, brainstorming, prototyping and experimentation.
To that end, I find it silly when people ask if design is worth it for their audience or problem space. Usually, people who ask this question don’t understand design, they think design is Apple or a hundred million dollars. I also find it stupid when product people bombard designers with dozens of references. These people are just lazy. It’s important to look at examples. In fact, they are an important part of design research. But simply asking a designer to make something look like something else doesn’t work. It’s like asking a jazz musician to do rock music.
The difference between good design and bad design is thoughtfulness (or lack thereof)
Good design is thoughtful
I don’t know a single Tesla owner who obsesses about their gas savings or is proud about their contribution to the environment. They obsess about its design and experience. Both the Model S and Model X are beautiful cars. They’re sleek, stylish, sophisticated, and intelligent.
My neighbor has a Model S. We get a kick when it comes out of the garage by itself, pulls out the door handles, automatically adjusts your settings by detecting your profile from the key fob, and is ready to go! This car has dozens of small, thoughtful things — powered by software and hardware — that make it a worthwhile purchase.
Tesla knew design was key to success. Rumor has it that for the Roadster, Elon Musk himself did the design (not surprising). But for the Model S, he hand picked Franz von Holzhausen, an auto industry veteran. Franz worked at Volkswagen, General Motors, and Mazda before joining Tesla. He led the design of the Mazda Kabura, Pontiac Solstice and Saturn Sky. He was also instrumental in designing the New Beetle.
But none of those cars look as stunning as the Model S. Why? The obvious answer is: he started out from scratch on a clean sheet of paper. But if you know Elon Musk, the real answer is he had the freedom to build anything. Together, they set out to build a beautiful electric car. It was just them and a tent behind SpaceX. No baggage. No bullshit.
“It’s one thing to design a car but it’s another thing to design the first vehicle of a company that’s going to be growing for years and years. My goal: do that through the power of design.” — Franz von Holzhausen
Did he accomplish that goal? Awards and accolades aside, more than a hundred thousand people ordered the Model 3 without even looking at it. So yes, I think so.
Good design is opinionated
Apple is widely known for making, as Steve Jobs used to say, insanely great products. But what they really make is products they think people would love. Apple is a classic example of what design success means — and it means knowing what people want before they want it. Apple makes opinionated products, many of which become popular.
Products like the iPhone, iPad, Model S, Model X — they’re inspiring and uplifting. They’ve introduced many ideas that just make sense. In many ways design is like music — some get it instantly, some take time, some never get it. I’m sure there are many many people that don’t like the iPhone or the Model S. Good design is opinionated.
This one video explains everything we need to know about the Apple mindset; three most inspiring highlights about Steve:
- He treated the process of creativity with a rare and wonderful reverence. He, better any anyone, understood, that while ideas ultimately can be so powerful, they begin as fragile, barely formed thoughts; so easily missed, so easily compromised, so easily squished.
- He didn’t confine his sense of excellence to make new products. He believed that there was a gravity, almost a sense of civic responsibility, to care way beyond any sort of functional imperatives.
- Despite all his successes and achievements, he never presumed, he never assumed, that we would get there till the end.
Good design is fearless
Medium is the best place to write on the Internet, period. It’s such a joy to write here. I’m sure thousands of people who would otherwise never write started writing on Medium. In a way it’s like the iPod — it captured writers that were thirsting for design.
This is a very opinionated team. They obsess about every single detail. They waited for two plus years to put the share buttons you see on the left. They got rid of center alignment. They are one of the few product teams who’ve removed features over time.
But that’s not what makes them special. What makes them special is they’re fearless. They’ve decided to put an end to ad driven media. They’re betting their future on consumer appetite to pay for quality and depth. Since January, many armchair analysts have written their obituary. But they don’t care.
I didn’t think for a second before subscribing to Medium. Time will tell whether they’ll succeed or not, but I hope they do. The world needs more products like Medium.
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