The most important question?
Although Lag Wagon sings that the kids are all wrong, they do sometimes have something brilliant in their simplicity. With kids, I naturally mean very young ones, nearly babies. They have an endless curiosity and usually will continue their question barrage of whys after you’ve just finished answering the initial question. Of course, after a while it will always get irritating, but I still think Why? is the most important question I have in my life.
Having worked with marketing for my whole working life, from selling computers to being a marketeer to an entrepreneur to a planner, I’ve always been able to break down “ultimate” concepts and raise very simple ideas to the pedestal they belong with a single question – Why?
There are always so many whats and hows, they are the simple part. It feels like not many people want to even ask themselves the question of why to do something – in a way I can understand it. It’s much more fun thinking of the hows and the whats. Sure, with the how we can find totally new directions of methods to do stuff by using some totally rad new flash technology or even augmented reality that I really like and will have very interesting applications in the future, or the whats where you can just pour your heart out doing something really cool design work or other pretty pictures.
But if you do it before knowing WHY you are using this new technology or design aesthetic, you will fail.
Why?
Once you ask yourself why enough times, you’re down to bare basics. You walk through facts. You use numbers. Even though it’s really, really unsexy. Many times, however those numbers and facts give you a very strong foundation that is an impenetrable fortress even for the most retarded client, because the concepts that come with strong foundations can be simple and they are based on fact.
Not feelings, colors, trends or opinions.
It also makes project management and pretty much everything in life so much easier. Why? Because you are not showing how to do stuff, or what tool to use. You make people understand why they are doing what they are doing. Then it’s just a matter of doing it.
So, the next time you start designing something – be it cooking or planning for an evening out, or just doing a web concept – ask yourself why a few times and see where you are heading.
Related posts:
- Euphemisms of Markus
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