10 habits that lead to great results for every designer
I think the quality of your design career is determined by the quality of your habits & thinking. With these habits you can grow your career at next level.
So Here i share 10 habits which i notice in every successful designer and also share some valuable tips from my personal note book.
1. Empathize People
Engage with People/User/Clients in dialogue to understand their perspectives.Don’t assume that your viewpoint/idea is the best one.Understand whole scenario of the problem and solutions & also understand user and business side.
Always appreciating viewpoints that are different from ours. Through empathize people/problem/user we understand them better & better and gain new insights in our minds as well. So how to being empathetic by doing the following :
- Ask better questions
- Understand core of conversation (think about what other person trying to say or cover)
- Position your self with your words
- Notice people behavior, Always try to find out what they trying to figure out.
- List down all fuzzy things and be clear about it
2. Stop assuming : Uncover & Understand things
Stop assuming that whatever you believe,do and say is right. Ignore your uncovering habits & Develop intellectual ability to recognize pattern of what you know and what you don’t know .
This habit will open your mind and give you new direction to seek to learn more, develop your intellectual abilities and expand your knowledge, and gain a healthy awareness of the limits of your knowledge.
Always try to Find out alternative sources of information that represent perspective you have never considered. Build New mindset and Explore new beliefs and be open to new insights.
Make a list of things you do not know and know about to related your skills/projects. Show your list other designer/mentor/employee and ask them to see how accurate you are , what improvement you needs , how him/her help you to grow and see what insights will emerge.
3. Way of Thinking
Our thinking usually seems clear to us, even when it is no.Here is simple way to clarify what other people are thinking, ask them to restate their point and give examples.
Now you can Summarize in your own words what others are saying. Ask them if you understood them correctly.Figure out the real meaning behind what people say.
Look on and beneath the surface. Figure out the real meaning of important of stories or problem.Be careful to neither agree nor disagree with what anyone says until you clearly understand what he or she is saying.
Tip To practice better way of thinking, learn to state one point at a time. Elaborate on what you mean. Give examples that connect your thoughts to life experiences.
4.Know Your Purpose & Process
Thinking is always guided by human purposes.Your thinking goes wrong when you aren’t clear about your purpose
It is important to examine the Purposes & Process that guide how we achieve something and what we are trying to solve? that also helpful for understanding project/life goal in a much better way.
To know your purpose & process, first you figure out what you are after and how you are seeking it.Remember things always go wrong when you have unrealistic purposes, have contradictory purposes, or don’t stick to your expressed purpose.
See if your goals are interwoven or in conflict with each other, or are your real purposes different from your expressed ones. Figure out what your family members, associates, and friends are after. Examine personal goals, career goals, project goals,business goals Make a list of your important goals and see if you find inconsistencies in them.
Breaking down a large project /problem into manageable chunks.Use this process to define the steps needed to tackle each project.
You need to doing this 2 things.
1.Track your progress everyday
2.Scaffolding- break your goal into smaller bite sized
5. Ask More Questions
Thinking & problem solving is driven by questions. The quality of your questions determines the quality of your thinking & experience.
We all know Superficial questions lead to superficial thinking. Deep questions lead to deep thinking. Creative questions lead to creative thinking.
Questions also determine the intellectual tasks required of you. Questions layout different, but specific, tasks for the mind to work through. Learn to ask powerful questions. Good thinkers ask questions to understand and effectively deal with the world around them. Question the status quo. Go beyond superficial or ‘loaded’ questions. When you also understand the questions people are asking, you can better understand their thinking and behavior.
When you have a complex problem, formulate the question you are trying to answer in different ways until you hit on that which best addresses the problem. When you plan to discuss an important issue, write down in advance the most significant questions
6. Think Through Implications
Consequences are what actually happen once you act. When you consider implications, you explicitly choose the consequences that happen to you.
To practice thinking through implications, always choose your words carefully. Look at your life as a set of moment-to-moment options. Each and every act, and every pattern of action, has outcomes. What outcomes do you want? What must you do to anticipate likely outcomes? When faced with a problem, list down implications and then act in the way that is likely to lead to the outcome you want.
Think about the implications of the way you are living your life now. Make a list of implications you probably will face for continuing to live as you are. Ask yourself: Will you be satisfied with those implications?
7. Mindset
You need to open your mind to the possibility, at any given moment, that you might be wrong and another person may be right.
One of the hallmarks of a critical thinker is the disposition to change one’s mind when given a good reason to change. Good thinkers want to change their thinking when they discover better thinking. In other words, they can be moved by reason.
You need to be willing and able to change your mind when the situation or evidence requires it. Recognize that you don’t lose anything by admitting you were wrong.
8. Join Design Communities To Make The World Better by design
Select a local or international organization groups, big or small, that is working to make the world better by design and join it also join on online community or forum website & Share your knowledge and expand your network.
It doesn’t matter if all you do is contribute money. At your workplace or at home, find ways in which you can get others to contribute or help/reach out to those who need it. Work to create environments where people help people, even in just your own circle.
You must create value for others.
Work not for the money but for excellence.
Nurture these three values — innovation, competence and unity
Make serving others your motivation.
Great ideas can come from the people you least expect. Learn to recognize seeds of greatness
Discover your strengths, and use them to contribute. If you are good at copy writing, you may write copy for the editor or small pieces to highlight topics of interest or urgency.
9. Educate Yourself
Commit yourself to lifelong learning. This is the only way you can truly become a good designer or problem solver. Place the cultivation of your mind at the heart of your personal values. Begin to develop a plan for lifelong self-development. Study your own behavior.
See through the shallowness of celebrity and status, pomp and ceremony. Recognize that deep learning of new ideas is the key to an educated mind.
Identify opportunities to be with people who want to improve their minds. Read widely. Create a library. Become your own historian, sociologist and economist. Understanding what is really happening in the world requires broad reading from multiple sources and perspectives, as well as reading the works of the world’s best designer and minds.
10. Plan Your Day
Make a list of books you want to read.
Consider keeping a daily journal.
Figure out how you can continue to enhance your problem solving or creative skills
Commit yourself to applying a new idea per day or per week. Set aside a certain time each day for self-development.
Build your pattern of learning creative skills and solving more and more problems.
Here i share some of my notes which i taken from Stephen R. Covey book and i think these notes help you more and provide high value.
Notes :
1. Six Core Drivers to Execution
👉Clarity.
👉Commitment.
👉Translation.
👉Enabling.
👉Synergy.
👉Accountability.
2. The Four Disciplines of Execution
👉 Focus on the wildly important.
👉 Create a compelling scoreboard.
👉 Translate lofty goals into specific action.
👉 Hold each other accountable all of the time.
3. Find your voice
👉Recognize and develop your true nature.
👉Express your voice through vision, discipline, passion and conscience.
👉Inspire others to find their own voice. Live and set an example of what you have learned.
4. You can develop the four intelligence by assuming the following:
👉 For the mind — Assume that the half-life of your profession is two years; now prepare accordingly.
👉For the body — Assume that you have a heart attack; now live accordingly.
👉For the heart — Assume that everything you say about another can be overheard; now speak accordingly.
👉 For the spirit — Assume that you have to attend a one-on-one meeting with God every quarter; now live accordingly
5. Rules of Your Leadership (You also use on Social media, as community member)
👉 Modeling (conscience/spirit) — Setting a good example.
👉Path finding (vision/mind) — Jointly determine the course.
👉 Aligning (discipline/body) — Set up and manage a system to stay in course
👉Empowering (passion / heart) — Focus on results, get out of people’s way,give advice when requested.
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👉Reference & inspired from : Stephen R. Covey, Linda Elder and Richard W. Paul,icons from thenounproject.
