Another year, another list of new design rules we must follow. Sigh.
The most recent entry to the ever expanding list of nonsense designers are asked to incorporate into their work is Fast Company’s 10 New Rules of Design. What’s particularly annoying about this one is that it is extremely short on design substance, and extremely heavy on political views held by the author and individuals he quotes. Even less so on solutions. Let’s go through the list.
Rule 1: Promote bipoc designers close to the wage gap
I’m a person who holds many liberal beliefs and I consider myself quite in tune with what is going, but even I had to google bipoc. The argument is that black, indigenous people of color should be promoted to close the wage gap. There is a wage gap, no one can deny this but it’s not as simple or as bad as you might think. A Harvard study found that the gender gap for women in unionized workforces is due mostly to what men and women value more.
Women value time away from work and flexibility more than men, taking more unpaid time off using the Family Medical Leave Act (FMLA) and working fewer overtime hours than men. When overtime hours are scheduled three months in advance, men and women work a similar number of hours; but when those hours are offered at the last minute, men work nearly twice as many. When selecting work schedules, women try to avoid weekend, holiday, and split shifts more than men. To avoid unfavorable work times, women prioritize their schedules over route safety and select routes with a higher probability of accidents.
Payscale does a yearly study on the wage gap and for several years now has come to the conclusion that when all factors are equal, women only make 2% less than men.
Study after study has shown that when all things are equal (location, education, family, etc) men and women are pretty close in wages.
In fact, when men and women with the same employment characteristics do similar jobs, women earn $0.98 for every dollar earned by an equivalent man.
Payscale has a similar study that finds the wage gap between people of color and whites is around 2%.
Our controlled wage gap shows that Native American workers earn $0.99 on the dollar in tech, while black and Hispanic workers make $0.98.
The controlled racial wage gap numbers are significantly smaller when we take into account various compensable factors.
The data on wages is pretty messy and there are a range of studies with various methodologies that show different disparages. What I didn’t find were disparities that the classic 77 cents on the dollar, women to men anecdote would have you believe. People take jobs for different reasons and salary isn’t always the primary factor.
Rule 2: End the ‘cultural fit’ it’s racist
“There’s a problem of ‘cultural fit’ signaled as the least offensive way to say ‘white supremacy,’” says Forest Young, chief creative officer at the global strategy and design firm Wolff Olins. “A hiring manager might say, ‘Well, you know, it wasn’t a cultural fit’ or ‘I couldn’t imagine you going out with a beer with this person.’ It’s like, one, maybe this person isn’t a beer drinker. Two, maybe they don’t like the same bar!
Okay, I’m on board. Culture is used as an excuse for ‘I didn’t like this person and I don’t have a better reason why’. I hate it as an excuse and it’s largely nonsense. Let’s go to the next paragraph.
“In art school, the student designer believes it’s all about the work. You have these ’60s and ’70s maxims from Dieter Rams about form, balance, tension. People think, ‘If I do these things, and my work is emblematic of these design criteria, then . . . my work will be successful in the world of commerce as [dictated] by these famous white men.’
Wait… what? How did we go from cultural fit of an employee within an organization to a critique of western design aesthetics? I’ve written about the Dieter Ramification about design but the reason why it’s popular is because people like it. People think Apple products are beautiful so their competitors are going to copy them (even a tooth brush company). It’s makes no sense to equate this to some larger point about racism.
Each culture has its own design aesthetic that’s rooted in history, values and beliefs. People are predisposed to the culture they were born into, and people within those cultures have preferences towards the things they are familiar with. That’s life.
Results showed a significant interaction between the source of the painting and the cultural group. For Chinese and Western paintings, a reversed pattern of aesthetic preference was observed: while Chinese participants gave higher aesthetic scores to traditional Chinese paintings than to Western paintings, Western participants tended to give higher aesthetic scores to traditional Western paintings than to Chinese paintings. We interpret this observation as indicator that personal identity is supported and enriched within cultural belongingness
We happen to live in a culture that prefers minimalist design aesthetics. Companies do not dictate what people like or dislike. Just ask Blockbuster. A smart business knows it’s audience. If Americans preferred eastern design aesthetics, our products would reflect that.
Ikea is a good example of how they had to tailor their products to the culture they are in.
IKEA had faced similar problems previously when it entered the United States. The company initially tried to replicate its existing business model and products in the US. But it had to customize its products based on local needs. American customers, for instance, demanded bigger beds and bigger closets. IKEA had to make a number of changes to its marketing strategy in the US. The challenges it faced in China, however, were far bigger than the ones in the US.
When it comes to website design, Asian cultures prefer designs with a lot of information, where as western designs prefer white space and minimalism. If you don’t believe me, tell me which design you prefer.
These are business decisions made based on the audience they cater to. If you are someone who lives in a western culture and prefer eastern aesthetics, there are options for you in almost any category of product.
Let’s move on to the rest of this rule
So, cool, it’s all about the work! But then BIPOC designers learned the hard way that there are all these compounding network effects, the transfer of actual capital and social capital, that are exacerbated by tier-one institutions, parental networks, and frats. [Asking] if someone went to art school [assumes] the fact they even know there is a thing called art school, and art school is a defensible pursuit of higher learning as opposed to becoming a doctor or lawyer. Because for a lot of BIPOC parents, art school is the least exciting proposition, since you don’t have an ROI on what you’ll be seeing professionally from a salary perspective. You’re also assuming your industry is not racist; it probably is.
Huh? Because parents of people of color don’t value art school (dubious) means the rest of us shouldn’t? What in the hell? I am very much on board with the idea that designers don’t have to attend art school, but this argument is just nonsense.
I’ve written about how tech is too homogenous and problems associated with that. The thing is, many people who are into computers are into computers because they aren’t people. Time and again I keep hearing from engineers that they like engineering because they don’t like people. This stereotype is true for more men than it is women. I’ve known plenty of more men who will spend an entire weekend tinkering with some small piece of code. Much like cultural design aesthetics, women just prefer to do different things. I’m not saying these women don’t exist, I’m saying there’s less of them. One important reason for that that, is women tend to have more marketable skills and more employment avenues than men, due the inherent differences in sexes.
To round off this awful argument, in a bit of irony, the author is saying that managers should promote people of color simply because they are people of color. This logical turd of a solution is extremely racist.
Rule 3: Design for communities, not individuals
“We’re living in a system that really is unequal,” says Ceasar McDowell, professor of Civic Design at MIT, founding member of the Algebra Project, and an expert in systematically marginalized groups. “As long as we continue to design things so that they fit what’s prominently on the market today, we’re going to continue to support that inequality.
“You kind of wonder: If Apple had had that kind of sensibility when they first started to think about the iPod, and music, but their notion was, ‘So many people who produce great music actually get marginalized . . . if we do this, how can we help benefit them . . . what would that technology look like in the end?’ It would involve redesigning licensing and a whole set of other things. But in some sense, Apple did just the opposite. It said, ‘How can we give the individual as much music as they can have in as small a space as they can have to be portable? Let’s let the market figure out the rest.”
I’m starting to think this author has never worked as a designer. There was a great tweet that has been lost to the internet about designers and the organizations they work for. The gist was that she (the author) was going to stop blaming bad designs on designers and instead start blaming organizations.
I love this for two reasons.
- Hell yea. It ain’t my fault!
- Designers don’t make business decisions. Ask me know I know…
Contrary to the beliefs among people who write about design, designers don’t have much power. I’ve worked in organizations where my designs were compromised due to lack of resources, WE’RE PIVOTING, or the evil goons in marketing wanted something ‘sexier’ or to ‘pop more’.
Business decisions are made for a multitude of reasons and each department has their own agenda, goals and problems. It’s the job of the executives to make sure these departments play nice and the company remains profitable. They juggle resources, expenses, personalities, shareholders, profits, and every other facet of the company. Sorry, but Apple is going to bring a designer with a crayon into a lawyer knife fight.
The best we can do is create something that is as close to solving the problem with the resources and tools at my disposal. In my case, we design software for marketing. We don’t design anything for impoverished communities. If we did, then we would be a charity. That’s fine but we are literally a software company that makes marketing software. Unless we pivot to helping the poor, that won’t change and I can’t possibly work on projects that help the poor. Just picture the following scenario:
Me: Hey boss man, I know you asked me to work on this embedded dashboard project, but nah bro. I’m going to take up this project for the homeless.
Boss man: Get out.
How else would this scenario play out? That my boss decides to chuck the latest project so I can work on something that has nothing to do with the business? Until we become a homeless shelter, this argument is nonsense because there is no way I can even follow this rule if I wanted to.
Rule 4: Give less experienced bipoc designers a chance
In general, I agree with this but it has a reality problem. As I explained earlier, the diversity problem within tech is has mostly to do with the people who actively want to pursue it as a career. Google hired a diversity officer in 2017 and she had to leave in 2018 following a diversity report that showed the company was still primarily white and Asian. Her problem was that the only people applying for those jobs were white and Asian.
What is the solution here? That she force bipoc to work for her? That form or ‘employment’ resulted in a civil war in this country and the good guys won.
The better ‘rule’ this author should have considered is that institutions that serve bipoc try to expand programs that get people interested in STEM earlier in their childhood. If this is important to you, then start locally and make sure your neighborhood schools offer such programs. This can be achieved by working with local communities, governments and school boards. That choice is up to you. That shouldn’t be a rule someone must follow.
Rule 5: Create products that leave people stronger, rather than dependent on you
“It’s one thing to design a water bottle for elite cyclists. It’s another thing to design interventions to make sure people leaving incarceration can get back on their feet,” says Durell Coleman, founder and CEO of DC Design. “I work on addressing systemic inequality in America: criminal justice reform, housing, education. How do we make these systems better for people they haven’t worked well for? The outcomes we get long-term come back to the process we use to create them.
“Look at the design of our welfare system…
Sigh. I don’t think this author has ever done anything than be writer. But since he’s a writer, maybe he should take his own advice? Instead of writing silly lists others must follow, why don’t you quit and start working for a non profit?
If someone works for a specialized water bottle company, that’s their prerogative. Same goes for someone who works for Lifestraw. Bursting into the bosses office and demanding that we pivot from elite cycling water bottles to [checks notes] criminal justice reform, the boss will likely tell me to leave and get a job with a criminal justice reform company.
“We need to shift away from, ‘I sit over here in a room, create things, and then sell them to you to extract economic value from you. . . . ‘
This is how capitalism works. You make a good or service and sell it to someone who needs it. If you don’t like capitalism, try going elsewhere.
Rule 6: Know there is no singular black perspective. There are multiple black perspectives
Finally! Something that makes sense. People of color are not monolithic. Democrats learned this the hard way with Latino voters in Florida this past election cycle.
Rule 7: Celebrate aesthetics beyond 20th century European design
First off, how does one celebrate aesthetics? Do I throw it a party? Who do I invite? And are they allergic to shellfish?
As I explained in Rule 2, here’s a better idea, design for your audience.
Rule 8: Recognize the business of design cannot be the business of colonization
I loath words like colonization when used to describe things other than literal colonization. The British used to destroy tall trees in places they colonized because tall trees were meeting places for many tribes (This was because visible destinations from afar and they provided shade and cover). It was a disgusting and brutal way to prevent human beings from the right to assembly.
Using colonization to describe things that happen in the tech sector or any sector in modern life is hyperbole that waters down the actual brutality of colonization. It’s like comparing anyone to Hitler or anything to the Holocaust. No one is like Hitler and nothing is like the Holocaust. It’s gross because it undermines what those people actually went through. Stop doing it. It cheapens your argument and makes you look unserious.
“The Bauhaus’s industrial design [and mass production] were super revolutionary ideas in the context of Europe. But when that travels to North America, to India, to Africa, even China and Japan, it becomes the tool of colonization.
This just isn’t grounded in any reality. Companies that enter Asian, African or Indian markets don’t last very long if they’re pushing western products. Do you know why KFC, IKEA, or BMW are successful in Asia? Because they changed their business models, products and designs to fit cultural tastes.
Rule 9: Hire not just for diversity of demographics, but diversity of experience
Again, this is correct but I’m becoming a broken record on this. The demographics of people who actively pursue tech as a career choice is specific because of the nature of tech. The solution to this problem is not through design.
Rule 10: Don’t conflate pity with empathy, and put in the personal work
“I come from a counseling and human services background, and I made a career switch into tech a few years ago,” says Vivianne Castillo, a UX researcher and founder of the professional growth network HmntyCntrd. “I remember being excited about tech, and how UX spoke to people being empathetic and human-centered. But after entering the industry, I learned most conversations around empathy are bullshit.
“There’s a fine line between empathy and pity. When you design experiences out of pity, you design things that not only aren’t sustainable, but often cause more harm. They’re not taking into consideration cultural context and how our unconscious bias can seep into design decisions.
“For me, I’ve always been amazed by, for how much our industry talks about being human-centered and inclusive, we talk little about the personal work that’s required and necessary to do our best professional work.
“Let’s have a conversation about the role of shame within [design] research, and how that changes your process and the way you interpret [information], and how that leads to design decisions. Let’s talk about how there’s a lack of curriculum on cultural competency. And how privilege plays a role in that.
“Working in UX and tech, in theory, we should be the most comfortable talking about things like white supremacy and systemic and institutionalized bias, and racism, because we talk about being human-centered. A lot of leaders who lead bias and thought work tend to be in the majority white, middle upper class, and a lot are men. You have a lot of thought leadership for the last several years or so driven by people in the majority with a lot of privilege who don’t necessarily have the awareness skills to drive inclusive [practices].
“Before COVID-19, for so long, we were able to get away with things like [people saying] “I’m human-centered!” instead of anything about putting in the work to understand that. After COVID-19, people are much more aware you can’t separate your personal life from professional life; they’re interdependent of one another.”
The great philosopher, George Costanza once said pity is underrated.
All jokes aside, I have no clue what the hell this section is talking about. I’ve read it three times.
I’ve been really hard on the author here and that’s mostly because he wrote it. However these are just a collection of quotes from various industry leaders or high profile designers. So they share a lot of blame for this silyness.
Some of the problems brought up in this list are real even if they are exaggerated. But none of them can be solved by designers. The solutions to these problems are complex and involve our communities and institutions. If these issues are important to you, there are real ways you can help. Writing this list and telling people to follow these rules ain’t one of them.
