Mastering Design Critiques

Checklists, framework, and learnings about running Design Critique over 60+ designers.

Critique is not a trivial thing

Getting design feedback isn’t a simple task. Designers in small teams struggle due to lack of structure, maturity, and time in the product development sprints.

Designers in large teams struggle with silos, disconnected projects, and bureaucracy. By applying Design Critique in our design roadmap, it was possible to connect projects, improve design quality and handoff, and empower a positive feedback culture in the team.

I led the Design Critique sessions at Itaú, working side by side with the Design Team. But it’d be unfair to say that I’m the only one responsible for this since the team has actively participated in the sessions and we went through this journey together.

So, I wrote down this article to tell you how we ran an effective Design Critique in Itaú’s Design team, sharing framework, experiences, and learnings.

In this article, we will go over

1. What’s Design Critique
2. What’s not Design Critique
3. Why you should run Design Critique
4. How to do it: Roles and Schedule
5. How to measure it
6. Takeaways

Preview Research

I gathered my experience with some nice articles: Scott Gibbons — Design Critiques: Encourage Positive Culture to Improve Products, Suelyn Yu- The practical guide to effective design critiques, and Braden Kowitz — GV Guide to Design Critique. If you need to dig into the subject, just read those materials. It’s all there.

What’s Design Critique?

It’s the process of giving feedback, improving, and bringing expert insight into interfaces, prototypes, brands, services, user journeys, or even technical difficulties in implementing a design. It’s usually run by a group of 3 to 7 people and can involve designers, developers, marketing analysts, or businesses.

“You could focus purely on branding elements, ease of…