When I tell people I’ma web designer, their response is often, “oh great, you can help me fix my printer.� Or, “oh, I have Dreamweaver, myself. And, they buy a copy of Photoshop or Dreamweaver and call themselves a web designer.
the term web designer is still relatively new. some people just havent grasped the concept that we want to be hired for our judgements in all aspects of it. so they dont care how many hours you spend on typography, they cant tell the
You definitely make a good point, Tiffany. I guess it just seems to me that the difference between the work of the hack and the serious professional is a way bigger gap than it should be. Your jeans example is a good one.
Great post, Jeff. I think that the model we should really be looking to is the Realtor model. There are lots of people who work in real estate, and lots of them even have a real estate license, but being a Realtor means (or is projected
Fair enough, and please pardon me for misunderstanding. As for universities, there are plenty with solid graphic design programs, but it’s true that few—if any—of them have an up-do-date focus on the web. It’s not shocking,
Jeff, good point that there is a vacuum in the world of educating clients about web design. Again, the AIGA is stepping up the pace in that department, and you’d be surprised at how many corporate leaders in tech and marketing read
how much effort should be dedicated to forcing these clients to unlearn what they “like� and start to like what is “good�? The real education problem here is teaching them that you are designer, not a web monkey.
@Christopher Fahey:. Excellent points—the notion that a standards body will save us from the perils of bad design is unrealistic at best. I agree it’s not a matter of businesses not ‘getting’ good design or good web practices,
I want to be on record as saying I think it’sa -great- idea in progress. My comment was in an attempt to brainstorm and highlight what might be good points to look at in refining the idea in progress. (As I’m not a web designer,
It’s probably because that client just doesn’t “get� good design. And you don’t want someone like that as a client, do you? I see your point, and I agree with it — but having been through it myself, I can assure you that some people
Shave and a haircut? I think that’s perhaps the best analogy out there, actually. The salon pros have to have tested well on their ability to understand the technical side of the business - they need to know a lot of chemistry,
The question: Once you’ve got the membership set up, what’s to make a potential client care one way or the other? Board Certification works for doctors because people are putting their lives in the hands of doctors.
Rob, you’re absolutely right, and I’d say any organization that served to educate clients and designers ought to work on getting better web education in schools, as well.
Oh, one more thing: This isn’t unique to Web design. My brother does tile work and they’ve got the same problems. As do tradition graphic designers, television producers, photographers, writers, etc. Not sure if it means much,
As an aside, I’m not sure that I agree with your assesment that it’s gotten harder to make a real website… Hasn’t it gotten much easier? Where it used to take weeks to debug a CSS issue, Goggle finds the answer in a second.
I also wanted to repeat (from my post at Mark Boulton’s site) that certification in other fields, like project management and computer programming, is to many hiring professionals in those fields pretty much useless at finding
I guess what I wrote must have been confusing, because you’re not the first person to misunderstand, but I am more interested in a group that served to educate clients and designers, not one that tried to certify them.
Masterfile seeks a Web Designer for HTML+CSS production in a multi-lingual environment. The Web Designer will also participate in clarifying requirements, UI design within brand guidelines, and testing. Requirements: 3 years experience
You can’t teach people taste, it seems. They either have it or they don’t. Just look around at signage in your hometown. Or flip through the phone book. Look at the logos. How many of them are well designed and how many are clipart?
In which I shamelessly ask Jeff to coerce WO to create a jr-level position. Jeff - I’ve said this before, and your comment sparks me to say it again - when are you going to have a jr-level design position at WO so I can apply? =)
