The Art of Pushing Back

Something I found to be difficult as a younger designer and currently continue to have problems, but with less severity is the art of pushing back. It's easy to get into the habit of doing exactly what the client asks for over and over because it's the easy thing to do. This may be the easy way out, but results may suffer for both you and your client if you don't push back a little. Recently I was tasked with doing work for a pro-bono client. We were asked to create original designs without limitations. I was as giddy as a school girl when I started. Our client was thrilled and so was I with the new designs. I was slowly deflated as the project proceeded and the client asked to include more content and change the witty tagline and alter the imagery.  Instead of agreeing and doing what they asked for, I consulted my mentor and explained the situation. He helped craft a story with compelling details of why adding more content and changing out the tagline would not be a good idea. Because we took the time and supported our reason for why we thought our direction would work better, we persuaded our client to compromise and trust us to make the right decision. In the end, we got what we wanted and both parties were happy. As designers, we need to do more than come up with concepts and make things look nice. I'm not asking you to tell your client or creative director they are wrong, but I'm asking you to have reasoning for why you did something and prepare yourself to answer why you did what you did. They will be impressed with your confidence if you prepare correctly.