An article in my newsfire inbox caught my attention today from Malarkey titled Advocating the quiet revolution. The upshot of this is rather than whining on about people standing in the way of web standards and the revolutions on the web; just do it and let the bonus effects speak for themselves.
For me in my current environment as a solitary web designer this speaks to me and is what I have been having reinforced lately. For instance, the client today didn’t get even a mention of how their site would work (a usual standard for choice in my company) – as I was dealing 100% with them I purely focused on the what rather than the how. You know what, this worked too. By focusing the client on the objective of the web site rather than dazzling them with “do you want css / web standard”, which did usually result in the lengthy explanations of the the above; today it was so much easier.
With my experience today I thought it was rather good timing for this RSS landing. I feel that maybe the days of bashing my head may be over and although there is the danger of being a web mummy I am not concerned. One thing that web designers seem to have got wrong; me included is that we ask the client how they want it to be done. Ultimately this is so wrong. The habit I have gotten into through various companies drumming the customer is right and give them the choice into my brain is one I have offically broken. I do not remember when or where this started, but I think it is all wrong. After all, I do not recall ever asking a plumber how they are going to fix a leaky pipe – they just are asked to and do.
Web design appears to be littered with so many self confessed “experts”. Reminds me of the Harry Enfield character and the persistant catch phrase of that time “you don’t want to do it like that; you want to do it like this”. Companies are riddled with people who have opinions about how and what the web design should be. Although I do not advocate blind following of any designer – how about we just let them do their thing and trust that if they are experienced maybe they actually know what they are doing?
Today has proved to me that when you just do it (aka nike) you might actually find life that little easier. Replaced today was the usual jargon bashing and interpretation that normally pervades into a client meeting at my company. Rather they gave me what they wanted it to be, I took this on board and now I am working on what they want. Simple really. I might be lucky enough now as the manager to make such decisions; but I think that anyone in web can do it and maybe just have to as the article suggests be a little bit braver. Web designers should “fight for the right to design to standards”. This is a not a soap box moment, you will have more effect with a passive showing rather than a waggling finger and lecture.
