The Burger

A sketch artist can prevent expensive misunderstandings.

I’m still in awe about how differently developers and designers can look at the world. If I were to ask a developer to design my house, I’m fairly certain he or she would show me a blueprint where the toilet is in the living room facing the TV wall. Because, you know, it’s practical. (This is actually inspired by a similar conversation I had with my dad, one of the most right-brained people I ever knew.)

In the following scenario, a “person in charge” asks a team of “builders” to make something. This could be applied across many different domains, where the person in charge could be a business sponsor, a product owner, a CTO, or simply the shop owner, and -in most cases- the one who signs the check. The “UX Designer” in the story could be a full-time staff designer, a UX contractor or consultant, or a front-end developer who just happens to know how to draw and has an instinct for asking certain kinds of questions at certain points in time.

For the sake of simplicity, this story features a Business Partner, a Developer Lead, and a UX designer. But at the end of the day, it’s all the same: Person A with the checkbook enlists Person B to make something Person A can’t build by themselves. Person C is the wild card, embodying the cautionary voice from the front part of our brains that governs future thinking and self-gratification. Ideally, Person C hows to draw, and if you’re really lucky, possesses the diplomatic skills needed to keep Person A and Person B from screaming at each other once the sketches reveal how far apart they are in their ideas about what can be built for the budget.