Sarah was excited about helping her mother prepare Thanksgiving dinner.  She watched as her mother cut both both ends off the ham before putting it in the pan and then into the oven.

“Mom, why did you cut off both ends of the ham?” Sarah asked.

“That’s the way my mother always did it, so that’s how I do it.” said Sarah’s mother.

“But why?”

“I don’t know.  You should ask your grandmother. “

Sarah walked out of the kitchen to find her grandmother.   “Grandma, when you prepared ham for baking, why did you always cut off both ends?”

“That’s what my mother always did it,” said Sarah’s grandmother.

“But why?”

“I don’t know why.  She taught me to cook and I have always done as she did.”

Sarah was even more perplexed by this.  She found her great-grandmother in the living room and asked her.  “Great Grandma, when you prepared ham for baking, you always cut off both ends.  Grandma and Mom do the same thing but couldn’t tell me why.  They said they do as you did.  So I’m wondering, why did you cut the ends off?”

“Well,” Great-grandma said, “when your great grandpa and I were young, we only had one pan and the pan was too small.”

Do you know why?

So much of what we do as designers and developers becomes habit.  We do much of the same thing day in and day out, driven by process, influenced by experience.   There is a great deal of comfort and safety in process.  It allows us to control our development.  It allows us to review and create repeatable events and reusable deliverables.  It helps us become more efficient.   But it also strangles us and encourages the use of blinders.  Process can hinder and hamper and kill your projects.

Too much process is a bad thing

In an effort to become efficient, we have created a culture of non-thinkers and non-questioners.   We do things because we were told to do it a certain way or because that’s how it’s always been done.  While I am a big proponent of process, I am not a proponent of blind process.  Blind process is what happens when we rely so heavily on templates and the expected workflow that we forget to analyze, discern and improve.

No project is exactly the same as another.  No client is exactly like another.  No two needs or requirements are exactly the same.  The business need behind a technical requirement may be different which would require the implementation to be handled uniquely.  The audience may be different, requiring special handling or treatment.  If we rely on our repeatable processes and templates so heavily that we forget to think and envision and question, we are cheating ourselves, our clients and the audience who will be using the product, the website or the application we are creating.

Don’t get stuck

It’s important to question the whys and hows to make sure we are considering all options.  Processes and templates are tools meant to assist, not stifle.   The way it has always been done is not a one-size-fits-all solution.  Sometimes the reasons have changed or technology has progressed.  Perhaps there are ways to solve business problems or design solutions  that weren’t considered or weren’t possible in the past.  Even if something was determined out of scope, out of consideration, outside the realm of the possible, revisiting those whys is worth at least a passing glance.

Challenge the idea that it has always been done a certain way and get to the reasons behind the whys.  And if your pan is still too small, it could be time for a bigger pan.

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A quoi ça sert? (What’s it for?)

Asked by President Jacques Chirac of Prime Minister Tony Blair upon being shown the Millennium Dome – which has no discernible function.

Born to question

That I am an analyst is a predisposition, being both genetically imprinted with some random mutated analysis gene and further etched by the environments in which I have always existed.  My mother says I was always asking who, what, how and why so it started quite young.  My choice of careers (I’m on number 4 at this point) has also continued my grooming and maturing as an analyst.  I was encouraged to ask questions and to delve into the inner workings of things which suited me just fine.  It probably annoyed a lot of my family, but that curiosity and need to understand has served me well.

• Why is it done that way?
• Who decided it needed to be that way?
• How is this supposed to work?
• What are they trying to do?

Questions are good things in my line of work.  They are meant to spark discussions, to inspire, to energize and excite.  They are used to dig and probe and uncover.  Answers are meaningless without understanding the questions that lead up to the revelations.  When you’re designing things like products and websites, those questions and answers are the foundation for your work product and eventually, the realization of someone’s visions and dreams.

So I often ask myself – am I asking the right questions?

No stupid questions

We’ve all heard it and frankly I disagree.  There are stupid questions.  Asking the wrong question is asking a stupid question because it won’t lead you to the heart of the matter, to the golden nugget of truth that you need.  Pointless, stupid questions are irritating and distract us from the truth.

One of the questions I view as being rather stupid is “Why”.  I know it was my favorite when I was about 3.  It was always my mother’s least favorite question, although it led to what I believed was her favorite response: Because I said so. Asking my favorite question always seemed to lead to my least favorite response.

Let me explain about asking why.  Why stirs up a rather base instinctual need to defend our position, our choice, our feelings about what we want, need or believe.  Asking why doesn’t bridge a gap, it widens the gap.  Asking why puts you on one side and your client on the other, forcing them to defend their reasoning. And more often than not, asking why doesn’t get you to the answers you really need.

Engage to Envision

I engage in order to envision the need for, the usage of and the emotions behind the design.  Questions should not answer themselves.  They should lead to more discussion not less.  Questions should be starting points for visualization and creation.

I believe that design wraps around function which complements design.  This fusion of ideas should evoke positive emotions, be intuitive, useful, usable and beautiful. Many clients get emotionally attached to a certain way of doing things, the particulars of navigation or placement of text or an image that has always served them well.  It’s my job to use that emotion to inspire new ways of thinking, to broaden their reach, to heighten their awareness of how others think about and respond to something as simple as the shape and placement of a button and its corresponding text.  For me asking why doesn’t serve my clients and it really doesn’t serve me.

Asking the right questions, engaging and creating an environment in which ideas are brought to life is the very foundation of solid design.  The ideas and emotions I capture are handed over to the artists who breath life into the words and sketches.  To make it work I have to know I have gotten to the very core of the processes, thoughts and emotions.  I don’t want to find myself in Tony Blair’s position of needing to explain what something is for because it means I have missed the mark.

Refining the questions asked and the tools used to encourage and support the communication and creativity is part of my on-going evolution as one who seeks to make things better.  Reaching out to others who do the same is part of that process.  So I ask you: What questions should be asked to avoid those A quoi ça sert? moments?

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