104 - A Lifetime of Learning

What this episode covers

What's that one thing that turns a bad designer into a good one? Music and links from this episode No More Truth by ROZKOL Sacred Motion by staRpauSe End of the Line by H-LR Line-by-line notes INTRO When you talk about what separates a great designer from a bad one There’s lots of things that tend to come up Passion Intelligence Talent Location Desire But the biggest thing I think And one that some people don’t appreciate Is learning And committing to a lifetime of learning This is AADA and I’m Craig Burgess PLAY MID SONG Being a designer isn’t easy It’s so important to keep up with so many things, and lots of these change A LOT You’ve got to keep up with culture, to make sure the work you’re doing is relevant You’ve got to keep up with the news and current events, to make sure you can ground your work in reality And you’ve got to keep up with trends Trends can be one the hardest to keep up with, and one of the most time consuming Because trends are fickle I’m not saying that designers should make trendy design I’m the last person on earth to suggest that But it’s important to understand current trends To either implement them in your work Or completely avoid them So you can make your work look timeless but not old fashioned There’s something else though that’s really important to a designer And that’s technology Technology changes so quickly And designers need to keep up with it It’s revolutionised and some may say democratised the world of design once before With the introduction of the Macintosh And I think we’re currently experiencing a similar thing again With the rise of tablet devices And the potential that a tablet device opens up for all kinds of design work And rapid prototyping, just all sorts But to make sure we keep up with all this stuff We have to make sure we’re always learning In another way, you could call it curiosity Curiosity feeds a lot into this And to be an amazing designer Curiosity is really important The best designers I know are perpetually curious about the world they live in They don’t take anything at face value They don’t see a news story and think that’s the full story I think this is a thing of—and as much as I hate to say the term—being in marketing Because we’re used to working for companies and—let’s face it—manipulating the public image of companies We know and understand how easy it is to manipulate the public image of everything That leads most designers to be generally cynical of most things they see And that leads them to being curious to find out the truth Also, when designers see a new style of work or a new website or a new thing they’ve never seen before They want to know how to create it, and replicate it Staying curious is so important, because if you don’t, you fall behind, and slowly become a worse designer A designer’s journey is one that never ends Because a designer is always trying to improve And a designer is always trying to fill up their bank of ideas, and inspiration, and ways to solve problems Part of a designer’s curiosity and passion for learning Comes from this They know they need to keep seeking, keep learning, and keep wondering how things work Because it’ll make them a better designer. If you as a designer stay the same as the day you came out of college Over the years, you’ll just slowly shrivel up and die as a designer Staying curious And committing to a lifetime of learning Is the only way to stay relevant OUTRO  This was AADA. I’m Craig Burgess. Music featured in this episode was No More Truth by ROZKOL Sacred Motion by star pause End of the Line by H-LR For a line-by-line run down of this episode, go to askadesignernaything.com/ep104 I’m back tomorrow for another episode of AADA Support Ask a Designer Anything Ask a Designer Anything Website Twitter (@craigburgess) Ask a Designer Anything on Facebook Leave me a review on iTunes