Look around you right now and you’ll be hard pressed to find something that wasn’t designed.  If it was designed well you probably don’t notice all the small details which went into it to make that item flawless.  And it’s even more unlikely that you haven’t noticed the work that went into it in order to make that item work so well for you.

On the other hand, if you have something that isn’t designed well you can see the flaws instantly.  You look at that item and think “wouldn’t it be great if ____  was different”.  You can tell that not much thought went into it.  Sometimes you even wonder why anyone would want to buy that thing at all.

That’s why I believe that it is important to take the time to design things in your life. Whether that be career choices, what you want your team culture to look like or just how you’re going to manage your time better, taking the time to design what that will look like will help in the long run.

To guide this process, I believe in using some design thinking tools. At its most basic, it’s a process of defining the problem, coming up with solutions, testing them out and then refining until you’ve developed the correct solution. As it is iterative in nature, it encourages experimentation and tailoring solutions to meet your specific personality and needs.  Also, at its core is a need to spend time defining the problem as most of the time we are solving surface level issues instead of digging down to the true source.  

Now, I know some of you are reading this and thinking this sounds extremely daunting, and it doesn’t have to be.  There’s nothing wrong with having part of the design come about organically.  There’s a story that stuck with me about a developer who built an amazing office complex but didn’t include any sidewalks when it first opened.  Their thought was to let people walk across the grass and see how they moved through the complex before they put the paths in.  So, a year later they came back to the site and saw brown lines along the grass indicating the paths people wanted. By leaving some flexibility in the plan, they developed something amazing.

Sure, without taking the time to properly design where you want to go, you might get there eventually, but with a plan you’ll get there faster, take fewer detours and probably be much happier with the final result.