The big problem (for me, at least) is that wireframes are typically presented to clients and require a sign-off before proceeding to visual design. This linear process is flawed on many levels. In my experience, clients more often than not have don’t understand what they are really looking at in a wireframe. They see boxes and a layout that kinda sorta looks like design to them and I find that they become easily confused trying to decipher what it is they are supposed to be seeing and signing off on.

Wireframes are essential to an internal project team. When the team works through the flow and irons out issues that are revealed through the wireframes and other diagramatic tools, the path to design becomes more clear and accessible. Visual design often reveals more hidden issues that will need to be worked out by the team. This team calibration is not a linear process; it requires an agile environment where everyone is working together to understand the whole of the problem (this is particularly true with applications).

When we show wireframes to the client, not only do we risk having them not understand what we need them to see but we also show them an idea that has likely not been properly vetted. My preference is always to show a designed prototype (if it’s highly interactive, try to make it clickable so that they get a sense of the experience). I’ve never met a client who didn’t get excited by seeing a designed piece with their brand on it; it’s like a tiny glimpse into their future and such an easy way to instill trust.

This isn’t to suggest that clients are kept in the dark; salivating with anticipation. There are other methods of communicating the flow and function of an application or site. I know colleagues who present in narrative form, others show diagram flows that are highly visual in expression, showing how pieces interact to create the whole experience.

There has to be a better way. Same thing goes for usability testing. If a client struggles with a wireframe then your target audience is likely to struggle. And what are you testing? This says to me that design is superficial, a visual “skinning” that can be cleanly segregated from the real work of architecture.

My role: Define a visual strategy that would carry the Old Mutual brand while giving Old Mutual Capital its own presence. I was also responsible for the information design of a myriad of charts, interactive tools, and complex data and making sure design styles were consistent across the architecture of a large site. This was the first project where I worked alongside developers in the Agile process.

My first exposure to the concept of crowdsourcing was three-ish years ago when I was contacted by Amazon Mechanical Turk regarding an open interactive designer position on their team. Mechanical Turk is a platform of tasks (called HITS – Human Intelligence Tasks) where individuals are paid for fulfilling a requested task. A task may be to categorize meta data (i.e., terms in a recipe, terms that fit a provided image), transcribing audio or writing a blog about a given term or topic.

Crowdsourcing is powerful because the success of the fulfilled tasks depends on collective answers from many rather than an individual. Netflix also used crowdsourcing when they wanted to improve their DVD rating system. They offered a $1,000,000 prize to anyone who could design a better rating system by at least 10%. By bringing many minds to focus on this problem (to my knowledge no one has yet reached the 10% metric), Netflix is leveraging mass engagement. The person who reaches the 8% mark might not get the $1,000,000 but their contribution just might make it possible for someone else to reach a solution that changes the way we think about how we choose a movie. Sucks for 8% guy perhaps, but maybe he can learn from the crowd and correct his mistakes in time to sweep the prize. Who knows, but in this context, I see crowdsourcing as a powerful tool.

Last night I checked out a consulting group Web site owned by some friends with whom I have been considering a working partnership. Right before my eyes was a blog posting about how this group had “crowdsourced” the design of their company logo.

Let’s be clear. There is a difference between crowdsourcing and spec work. Crowdsourcing is engaging a collective group to help solve a problem while speculative work is simply asking someone to do a bunch of work for free. It’s interesting that in addition to the free work up front, if one is so blessed to have their work accepted, more often than not they are awarded with a piddly fee. The reward for the logo was $250 and I believe the home page was $500.

I’m less interested in adding to the dialog about how wrong this is for the design field; AIGA has done a much better job; read their formal position statement here. I am more concerned about the damage that this type of spec work does to business.

Despite what some seem to think, designers are not those eccentric, black turtle neck wearing types who wander into client offices with attitude and crayons to make things look pretty. We are creatives (and yes, some of us may be eccentric but that’s another story) and business strategists who are deeply invested in helping our clients define solutions based upon business goals and needs. I cannot design an identity system or a Web site until I have a deep understanding of your brand. And more often than not, it becomes my job to help clients more deeply understand their brand and how to leverage a branding strategy across all touch points.

A good designer is a great strategic partner. I cannot help you connect your business objectives to your brand and your visual presence if I only have a two sentence paragraph excuse of a design brief carelessly cast out onto a contest site. If you are a business owner looking to these contest sites for a cheap logo or Web site, well, you get what you pay for. And what you end up with is something empty (it may be pretty) with no connection to a broader strategy.

So, back to crowdsourcing. What if this company whose name will not be mentioned here had still posted a brief to the contest site but rather than a shallow request for a redesigned home page, had requested an interpretation – or a reinterpretation – of their brand…based upon an analysis of the current site. Given the close relationship to the creative community it would have been nice had they first gone to the people who know them best…but let’s not split hairs. Let’s say that the deliverable is a proposal to define a strategy for a site redesign. The winner of this proposal is awarded the contract to head up the redesign of the company site. I’m not sure if AIGA and some designers would be on board with this approach and it’s not the most innovative solution (personally I feel that they blew a huge opportunity to leverage this idea of crowdsourcing…but I can’t talk about that without revealing their identity) but it would have been a brand building exercise (engaging your main audience – the creative community) and might well have garnered some free press and good will…oh and it would have been honest (not to mention what they may have learned from the crowd).

I created this concept for Susquehanna University. The idea is to create an interactive experience that immediately engages prospective students and others through storytelling.

©2008 BigBad

©2008 BigBad

Worked iteratively with team to develop and evolve prototypes based upon user testing.

For those of us immersed in social networking (blogging, flickr, facebook, [insert your addiction here]), Flock provides a unified launching pad from which to share our every passing thought with the universe at large. It’s akin to speed-dial: see a site you need to share with your friends…you are one button away; a brilliant observation jumps into your head as you google "how to make bread baskets"…schwwwhaaa…two buttons away from getting it on your blog.

Whether this is a good thing (probably not) is not the point. I read somewhere that Flock creates a new paradigm with this browser. I don’t believe it is creating anything new, rather it is voicing an already pulsing trend in how we choose to communicate with one another. Though it isn’t new, it is exciting.

As design lead, I worked with a team to design an innovative site that is highly interactive and pragmatically functional. My approach to defining a visual strategy was to differentiate Dex from their competitors by stepping away from the stereotypical marketing site (rife with real estate stealing marketing photography and buzzwords) and rather focus on creating a highly visual, informative interactive experience that helps align Dex as a business partner to their customer base. The end result is a site that acts more like a Web application than a passive Web site.

(copyright 2007, Molecular)