While there is no magic formula for becoming a great designer and it is really achieved through a lot of blood, sweat and tears (read hard work). These quick hints will certainly help guide you on your way.
Passion – You’ve got to have it! Whether your passion is design in general, making a difference in the world or racing cars. If you don’t have passion, you are not driven and therefore won’t create amazing design. If you don’t have a passion for something get out!
Read (a lot) – its important for designers to be widely read across many areas. You should keep up with developments in more areas than just design. Don’t look only at pretty designs, keep an eye on the business world, politics, the stock exchange and your local community happenings (these are just a few examples, don’t stop there!).
Embrace Failure – there’s a fantastic saying that goes “fail faster to innovate quicker”. The more you fail, and learn from it, the quicker you can advance yourself, your career and your designs.
Be Curious – Curiosity may have killed the cat but if your a designer who isn’t curious about the world in some way, then forget it. My curiosity in the world manifest itself early in two forms. One was my favorite word being “Why?” and the second was pulling apart things from an early age to see how they worked. I still do these two things every day as a designer.
Push yourself – constantly push your boundaries and comfort zone (check out this article on tips to push you out of your comfort zone).
Find a mentor – a mentor can help you by continually making sure you do each tip on this list. They can also provide you with ’shortcuts’ in relation to failures, as in many cases they will have the benefit of 20-20 hindsight in relation to many situations.
Have a role model – a role model provides a bar against which to measure yourself and gives you something to aspire too. However make sure you always aim above what they achieved or else you’ll still only reach where they got to.
Set Goals – Australian long distance Olympic swimmer Grant Hackett constantly sets goals for himself. He writes them nice and big on a board on his wall and revises them regularly, this helped him win a bunch of gold medals. Setting goals will help you design something great.
Work with others – don’t hole yourself up in your office or studio. Get out there and connect with people. Remember that people are the reason you are designing. Whether you are designing a chair or a banking system, your design has an impact on peoples lives and experiences.
Bounce – find people you trust and bounce your ideas off them. Maybe its an old friend, your mentor or a lecturer you respect. Use them as a sounding board to test your thinking and ideas. Keeping your ideas to yourself all the time won’t get you anywhere.
Collaborate – Thomas Edison held more than 1,000 patents. He didn’t do it alone, he had a whole team of staff working for him. Now I am not saying you need a have a team of staff. But you need to work with others. Two minds are better than one (See this article on types of professionals you can potentially collaborate with).
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Very good and interesting tips.
Nice article, I like it
@ Product Designs & Sticktacular
Thanks for dropping by and taking the time to comment. Glad you found the tips interesting/useful.