Amazon projects a 79% increase in demand for digital workers by 2025

According to recent research from Amazon (AFR, 18 Feb 2021), Australia will need 6.5 million more digital workers by 2025. To place that in perspective, that is a projected increase of 79% in the next 4 years. Along with skills in technology, cybersecurity and AI, the demand for design skills to deploy digital products, services and offerings will be in high demand.

According to Dr Fraser Thompson, Director of AlphaBeta, the company who prepared the Amazon report “The challenge is huge, but the pay-off would be tremendous in terms of stronger economic growth, higher incomes, and a more equitable and resilient economy.” As designers, most of us get out of bed to contribute to this vision of a shared future.

The challenge of creating the conditions that will consistently deliver high-quality product designers and teams is something that I have spent 20+ years exploring. What I found might surprise you, it may challenge you, and it will for sure give you what you need to become — and prove — that you are an exceptional designer.

#1: To be valuable, don’t be an exceptional designer

When I ask a room of designers about what they consider makes an exceptional designer, the conversation usually buzzes with stories and anecdotes of amazing visual, interaction, and UX design. The elements of design that make design visually appealing, beautiful and delightful to experience. The important and necessary parts — but not the sufficient parts.

Perfection is not what will make you a valuable designer. Getting your work out the door before you fall in love with it will

Psychologists have shown that people who are above average in looks generally fare better than those who rate ten out of ten. In the same way, a product that is visually a seven out of ten will probably perform (in terms of revenue and engagement) just about as well as the ten — only it will get shipped faster. Perfection is not what will make you an amazing product designer. Getting your work out the door before you fall in love with it will make you a valuable designer.

#2: To be valuable, don’t fall in love with your designs

The truth is, that this is as hard to achieve as breaking a crack habit (* so I deduce from watching Breaking Bad). Every artist loves their art, and yet, to be a cracking designer (pardon the pun), you have to have detachment. You have to be happy to ship your work before it is perfect. You have to be happy to iterate, deconstruct, and reconstruct the work to service the user.

Loving your designs will not make you a valuable designer. Designing to make life better will

To be a valuable designer, you need to understand how to make your future customer’s life better. You need to get the fact that the site visitor who landed on your website already makes 35,000 decisions a day, and if you don’t make it easy for them to choose you, they will go to your competitor, who is only ever one Google search away. To be a valuable designer, to make life better, you need to perfect the art of forming a relationship with a complete stranger on Internet Street.

#3: To be valuable, design for digital relationships

In the analog world, we largely understand the parameters for what makes a great relationship. In the digitally enhanced analog world, while the rules have changed slightly, we also understand what makes a great relationship.

On Internet Street, we need to form a relationship between a total stranger (your new site visitor) and your brand. This relationship exists in the digital world only — there is no other human that is shipped to your house when you buy a pair of shoes to have this new relationship with. Even your perceptions of how great the experience is of owning the new shoes is mostly derived from the relationship that you form with the brand in the digital world, not from the shoes themselves.

Learn the art of designing for relationships

Once you start approaching your design practice with the mindset of designing for relationships rather than transactions, everything changes. You will find yourself creating products that consistently deliver higher returns, and are more loved by the customers you serve.

Loyalty generates 2.5 times more revenue (HBR). Designing for relationships makes you a valuable designer

Up to 90% of spend goes towards advertising, yet the single, most powerful impetus to buy is someone else’s advocacy

To design products that are loved and recommended, you need to master the craft of designing for digital relationships, and not overfocus on perfecting the art of design. A seven out of ten on looks will generate marginally less revenue than a ten out of ten — yet it will ship disproportionately faster. Designers who can demonstrate their ability to consistently design products that outperform industry average conversion rates will be able to write their own tickets.

This is what will make you a more valuable designer.