Don’t Confuse Technology with Talent
As posted on Linkedin
Creative professionals are connected to every industry and are tasked with bringing to life ideas that communicate with a certain depth. But not all designers are created equal.
The late iconic New York City designer Massimo Vignelli said that “there is no design without discipline. There is no discipline without intelligence.”
In an age where it is easier to create the illusion of discipline, style often gets confused with substance. Many mistakenly assume that if you have access to technology, you will be successful. Today, marketing techniques and software programs are accessible to anybody.
But when technology ceases to be only a tool, I believe we are in trouble.
For example, I was helping a local high school club with some of their marketing and branding efforts. They were a spirited group with good ideas. But there was an instance when a student (who meant well) simply kept showing me clip art from the internet as his ideas. Another example is while teaching a Media Literacy college class to high school students, I gave an assignment asking them to create their own startup. I simply wanted a name, vision and mission statement. They simply googled an industry and used names from companies that already existed. In both stories, what would they have done if there was no internet? What would you do if the internet shut down tomorrow?
How do these two stories connect? Both mistake the tool for the talent.
What I gleaned from the first story is about borrowing. We all do it. Certain types of borrowing is expected depending on the industry but there are some legal ramifications (copyright infringement). There can also be social consequences. Ever heard of Milli Vanilli?
What I gleaned from the second story is about lowered standards. The Self Esteem Movement started in the 1970s and said everyone is a winner. Today, many social scientists consider it a failure. The Millenial Generation has been raised with it and even Generation X (my generation) bear some of its markings. If you look close enough, you can see the negative effects: sense of entitlement, lack of motivation, etc.
Children need to learn about the world from a young age if they are to build resilience. They can only do this by giving your child a chance to make and learn from mistakes, and experience a certain amount of hardship.
–Psychologist Rebekka Tuqiri, Sydney’s Darling St Health Centre
My argument is NOT that people should not be able to create anything with technological tools. Technology is as old as humankind. However, believing that a Photoshop woodcut filter is just as valuable as an Albrecht Durier woodcut is fallacious. This may sound juvenile but I hear similar statements regularly. When I tell people I am a designer, this is often what I hear:
“I use Photoshop.”
“My middle school son does what you do.”
“I have my own website.”
“My phone has an app for that.”
Most folks mean well but sometimes it is enough to make me stop telling people I am a designer. LOL If someone shares with me they are a doctor, I dont say, “I nursed my son back to health last week.” (I usually say, I got this pain in my back and…)
But buried underneath the over reliance on technological tools in my field is a simple truth: a disciplined mind and eye is still a game changer. In graphic design, understanding the psychology of gestalt, font creation and kerning, composition, positive and negative space is a skill. It is borne out of spending tremendous time studying what others have labeled boring: fonts, shapes, images, art history, etc. This is craft and artisanship at its best. It means using my trained visual eye to see what others don’t see. This is why I upload photos of my creative design process to my website and social media. (Check out the sketches on the front page of my website.) I want people to see how my imagination informs the outcome of a project. A well written proposal is nice and necessary as well. But evidence that showcases your ability to direct and connect text and visual content is equally important. So, I take at least one folder to show my creative design process to potential clients.
Being an incessant borrower and/or lowering standards in the name of efficiency is not a crime and is not new. But technology is making it harder for us to identify substance. (Who hasn’t mistaken quantity or quality?) Let’s not pretend that these are virtues. These practices encourage mediocrity when they cross over into the professional realm.
Modern technology has become a total phenomenon for civilization, the defining force of a new social order in which efficiency is no longer an option but a necessity imposed on all human activity.–Jacques Ellul
The Jetsons are a good example of this. In the cartoon picture above, the family is about to eat a meal. The mom is using technology to order. Now, if the mom told you she is a fabulous cook based on her ability to push buttons, would you believe her? If she did not have that push button technology, would she still know how to cook? Isn’t this image exactly what many companies that manufacture prepared foods want moms to believe? Look at their brilliant commercials.
Even though I work inside deadlines, there is nothing efficient about my creative design process. Nor should it be. I make rational and irrational decisions based on inspiration, experience, aesthetics, reason and imagination for the client’s benefit. This is exactly why I champion talent, first, AND tools, second. And if the internet were to shut down, I would still be able to design for my clients. I would simply dust off my technical pens, bezier curves, protractor and compass and tell my client we might have to extend the deadline. 😉
Is technology replacing talent in your industry? How has this been good or bad?