Slide Notes
Designer and Developer Teamwork Ensures a Successful Website
A website is a product of close collaboration between the design and app developer team. A disconnect between the two gives rise to issues that are detrimental to the design and development of a website. It’s important for them to be on the same page, otherwise the overall efficiency and functionality of website can be compromised.
This is why effective communication between the two is of paramount importance and it can be facilitated if certain aspects both technical and otherwise are kept in mind.
Sharing Exhaustive Documentation
It’s funny that people, who should be acutely aware about the importance of an adequate level of documentation, ignore it. Designers believe that advanced custom software development technologies make the preparation of exhaustive documentation almost redundant, while developers think sophisticated design platforms lessen the need for a developers input during the process of design. For both designers and developers, it’s important to sit together, do in-depth brainstorming on the project and identify the levels of documentation required for the particular project. This leads to less confusion during the project development stage.
The importance of UI
This is an extension of our earlier point. If there is one ‘documentation’ that is a better bet than most others, it’s the User Interface. A well-defined, clearly designed UI offers developers a definite idea about data placement and its formatting. It also helps define the functional flow of the website, which in turn ensures an error free coding structure. The idea behind offering developers a clear UI is that they will know the shape of the website, software or application and determine what needs to be done, to ensure that this shape is brought to fruition.
Avoid a Wavering Mind
Taking a decision and standing by it is the key to facilitating reliable collaboration between designers and developers. Take for example the case of a designer who has fixed the height of navigation and informs the developer of the same. The developer takes a note. But certain changes in design mean you need to change this height. This is something that should be avoided at all costs. The problem lies in the fact that as compared to development, design is more subjective. This is why when it comes to making designing decisions, it’s important to have conviction. If you keep changing your decisions, it just creates problems during website development as developers will need to keep making changes to their own decisions.
Implementation of only those Features that Matter
Effective collaboration is a result of choosing only those features that are important for the user. Developers hate working on features that nobody really would like to use, and the blame for this lies solely on the shoulders of designers. It’s important that designers are completely focused on the needs and requirements of users and not offer some extra features that are just going to increase the development time. More importantly, if it’s a complex feature, as a designer, you will need to discuss the same with the development team to get an idea about its feasibility, technical complexities and the time required for development.
Staying Involved
Both designers and developers need to be available for a discussion, whenever needed. There are plenty of issues that crop up during the development stage and more often than not developers are hard pressed to match data with the design mockups. So, there will be plenty of back and forth happening and reliable and open communications lines area must between the design and development teams. Also, both need to be involved with the website development right up to project completion. This is very important because as a designer you might spend endless hours, tirelessly crafting a fantastic UI, but what if the developer doesn’t realize your concept fully? Your countless hours are wasted. So, it’s of paramount importance that your involvement with the project, whether as a designer or a developer, never diminishes.
Keeping in mind these aspects will definitely ensure successful collaboration between developers and designers.
A website is a product of close collaboration between the design and app developer team. A disconnect between the two gives rise to issues that are detrimental to the design and development of a website. It’s important for them to be on the same page, otherwise the overall efficiency and functionality of website can be compromised.
This is why effective communication between the two is of paramount importance and it can be facilitated if certain aspects both technical and otherwise are kept in mind.
Sharing Exhaustive Documentation
It’s funny that people, who should be acutely aware about the importance of an adequate level of documentation, ignore it. Designers believe that advanced custom software development technologies make the preparation of exhaustive documentation almost redundant, while developers think sophisticated design platforms lessen the need for a developers input during the process of design. For both designers and developers, it’s important to sit together, do in-depth brainstorming on the project and identify the levels of documentation required for the particular project. This leads to less confusion during the project development stage.
The importance of UI
This is an extension of our earlier point. If there is one ‘documentation’ that is a better bet than most others, it’s the User Interface. A well-defined, clearly designed UI offers developers a definite idea about data placement and its formatting. It also helps define the functional flow of the website, which in turn ensures an error free coding structure. The idea behind offering developers a clear UI is that they will know the shape of the website, software or application and determine what needs to be done, to ensure that this shape is brought to fruition.
Avoid a Wavering Mind
Taking a decision and standing by it is the key to facilitating reliable collaboration between designers and developers. Take for example the case of a designer who has fixed the height of navigation and informs the developer of the same. The developer takes a note. But certain changes in design mean you need to change this height. This is something that should be avoided at all costs. The problem lies in the fact that as compared to development, design is more subjective. This is why when it comes to making designing decisions, it’s important to have conviction. If you keep changing your decisions, it just creates problems during website development as developers will need to keep making changes to their own decisions.
Implementation of only those Features that Matter
Effective collaboration is a result of choosing only those features that are important for the user. Developers hate working on features that nobody really would like to use, and the blame for this lies solely on the shoulders of designers. It’s important that designers are completely focused on the needs and requirements of users and not offer some extra features that are just going to increase the development time. More importantly, if it’s a complex feature, as a designer, you will need to discuss the same with the development team to get an idea about its feasibility, technical complexities and the time required for development.
Staying Involved
Both designers and developers need to be available for a discussion, whenever needed. There are plenty of issues that crop up during the development stage and more often than not developers are hard pressed to match data with the design mockups. So, there will be plenty of back and forth happening and reliable and open communications lines area must between the design and development teams. Also, both need to be involved with the website development right up to project completion. This is very important because as a designer you might spend endless hours, tirelessly crafting a fantastic UI, but what if the developer doesn’t realize your concept fully? Your countless hours are wasted. So, it’s of paramount importance that your involvement with the project, whether as a designer or a developer, never diminishes.
Keeping in mind these aspects will definitely ensure successful collaboration between developers and designers.
