If you can’t sell your idea or talk about your design with a client, it’s a lot harder to do your job well. As designers, we often have to present our designs in front of a large group of people. But as we progress in our careers we may have to do even more public speaking, such as giving an inspiring speech about the importance of design to business people. That’s a lot more difficult. It seems that most people do not like public speaking, no matter what level there are at (managers included). Here are a few links that contain tips on presentation skills:

Learn to Wow ‘Em Like Steve Jobs
Presentation Zen

I thought the lessons in this article about NetFlix were important because it’s not just about NetFlix: it’s about every business. As a matter of fact, the article reminds me very much of my daily job.

“Five Lessons From the Netflix Startup Story”

As designers, we cannot afford to think one dimensionally. A company is not just it’s website. It’s the entire experience. Our jobs are not just to create appealing looking websites and brochures. Often, we have to solve business problems as well.

The way the NetFlix envelope functions is actually more important than the way it looks.

Good customer service is essential because no matter how many people try your product because the advertising is flashy, if you don’t have good customer service: your company won’t survive.

As NetFlix evolved, they were constantly revising things and trying to make their services better (there have been 150 versions of that envelope).

The goal is to design the product so it makes people’s lives easier, then it is guaranteed to have value. That’s where we, as designers, can have the most impact to the success of a business.

Blogs, blogs and more blogs! People talking about what cereal they ate for breakfast or what color t-shirt they wore today. I wish that if I am looking for a blog on a particular subject, I could instantly find one that is well-written with intelligent, credible content. This is one thing I don’t think even Technorati will be able to do

Every day, brochures get turned into brochure-ware websites with the content that is written for the wrong target audience.

Enough already, I say! If companies are trying to gain business or bloggers are trying to gain a loyal following, they should pay more attention to the content that they publish on the web.

Shouldn’t they know if their customers or readers find their content useful or interesting? Asking readers opinions or surveying them is a great way to improve your site and increase traffic.

I think more websites and blogs should use rating systems like the 5 star rating NetFlix uses for it’s movie suggestions. Amazon asks “Was this review helpful to you?” Digg lets it’s readers vote on which articles they enjoy and is entirely based on reader feedback.

Now if the search engines could just do a better job of sniffing out quality content…

Today this article by Derek Powazek on Alistapart.com reminded me how far I’ve come in my career. At previous jobs I would wait until I had received the content from the client before I would start a design. Then I would get SO frustrated when the content that I received was not well written or appropriate for the audience. Often it seemed the content wasn’t truly thought out. At one point, I vowed never again to work for a company that did not have a full-time writer on staff.

I felt that I if had worked so hard to do a great job with the design, the quality of the content should be just as good. Sometimes I felt like I was building this beautiful container for people to just dump crap into. It made me feel disillusioned and hopeless.

But then it all changed. Many years ago, shortly after I started my current job, my manager called me over to his desk and said “I need you to design some pages for this new website.” “Sure! Where’s the content?” I asked. He told me to make it up. I was shocked! We had writers on staff. Wouldn’t they be involved? After all, that was their job, not mine. But it was conceptual work. The real project hadn’t started yet. I soon got used to making up my own content as I went along when quick conceptual sketches were required.

Now when I design, I ponder every last little word. Not only do I think about color and type hierarchy, I also think about what each and every little word communicates to the user. Content is equally as important as design. One supports the other. The two go hand-in-hand to communicate a message. You will see it during usability testing. Content can be as much of a usability issue as a bad design. Perhaps a user didn’t know what a tab name meant. Or they didn’t understand the instructions for how to use a new product.

I totally agree with Derek Powazek that user experience is not just visual design, but content as well. As you are crafting your next design, think about how the user will react to the words that are being chosen. Will they understand how to navigate the site and where to find the information they need?

Don’t be afraid to make a suggestion if you think that something could be communicated more clearly. And if you aren’t given any content? Think of it as a gift! This is your opportunity to craft a new strategy for the site, perhaps taking it in a new direction by creating an entirely new experience for the user through both words and design.