Every company has that product both employees and customers use. Most of the time, its design appears dated — and it will be your job to design it should the time come.
It can be hard to redesign a product that hasn’t aged well. You won’t always work on a product you enjoy, but the reality is that most evergreen industries are running out of options as viable industries continue getting disrupted by newcomers.
In a free market system, some businesses remain viable no matter the situation. Think of industries like hospitality, higher education, medicine, and public transportation.
These industries are constantly evolving, and they have products in use that are hard to replace. However, this leaves them open to disruptors, who come in and change the game.
To prevent this, companies are investing heavily in design. Companies investing in evergreen tech have seen a massive increase in design hires in just in the past decade, and it’s unlikely we’ll see this trend slow down in the near future.
So why does this matter? Many of the products you design might just be 10+ years old, since evergreen industries tend to innovate slowly. In addition, these products are often specific to the company and are often the company’s first product. This is why people commonly refer to them as legacy products.
My early design career introduced me to my first legacy product. Imagine the look on my face when I saw something that appeared to be from the 90s! (Turns out, the product was made in the 90s.)
It would occur to me that, according to my boss, there was no design system for this product currently in production — and I would be the only designer on a team of developers. I saw the challenges that would lie ahead, but my creative spirit would not allow me to give up.
This challenge was something I hadn’t encountered before, and it would force me to use both soft skills and design knowledge to overcome.
In this situation, I was clearly at a disadvantage. In a group of 7 developers, I was the only one whose job it would be to push boundaries. I had to learn the art of design advocacy and apply my insights to daily meetings. It would be a difficult process that would help me grow.
As an early career designer, you will face this situation and it will force you to do what is necessary — after all, the final product is a reflection of your design choices. This is why as a designer, speaking up isn’t just a choice — it becomes your responsibility. Without your insight, the product could end up exactly as it started, and your team will be none the wiser.
As the only designer on the team, it became my job to see things in ways others did not. This meant doing the hard stuff: disagreeing with people and expressing my reasoning as to why. It would later benefit me to have these hard conversations, and here’s why.
For me, it wasn’t easy to play this role. This was more than true in the corporate world. People were inclined to disagree less and agree more with someone who was at a higher level position of leadership.
This was something my boss told me once that really stuck with me. And the importance of this phrase applies just as much to little ol’ Junior Designer me as it does to you.
Realizing that no amount of disagreeing, barring the most extreme of examples, would result in me being fired, was both enlightening and relieving. I can’t say this for everyone, but in most cases designers are brought onto the team to offer a fresh perspective along with a unique skillset that is beneficial to the product’s success. So in this case, my different view on things was a benefit because I had a different point of view. I was able to offer a perspective that others simply didn’t have because they were mired in decades of experience with this legacy product.
But how was I to establish any level of credibility here? At this company that had been around for over 20 years? After all, some of these employees had worked here longer than I had been alive.
To succeed here, I had to think beyond that. I had to consider that my colleagues’ experience had no bearing on my design expertise and how I could build my credibility.
Responsibility.
That was the word of the day, and the word that defined the entirety of my early design career.
I’ll never forget the day my boss said to me, “you’ll be running a workshop next week, are you ready?” The look on my face said it all.
But it didn’t end at workshops — I planned internal user testing sessions, designed UIs, held meetings with management, and was talking product strategy with the higher-ups. There were truly no limits to what conversations I would be involved in as a designer.
As a junior, you’ll find responsibilities of all sorts thrust upon you. The roles you play in your workplace become interchangeable as you go from hearing user experience grievances to applying that same empathy to talks with developers.
As for myself, I found my role to be more of a “software therapist” than anything. I realized that when I spent more time listening and less time designing, I was able to better perform at my job.
Working on my first product was transformative.
And the lessons I learned from working designing 20 year old product were priceless. My mistakes were my greatest teachers because they informed me. They made my triumphs even more meaningful.
What do I want you to learn from my experience?
A design career is a growth process, not something you immediately flourish in. After all, if that were the case, everyone would find it easy to become and stay a designer. The tough part is landing a job, sure— but the truly difficult task is maintaining the same level of passion and curiosity for design that you had before you got there.
With time, you’ll play an integral role in your organization. You’ll also find your own design methodology and confidence in what works for you. That’s the sweet spot. The length of time it takes to get there may vary.
In the end, the journey what you’ll benefit from — not the destination.
I'm David Louis— a designer who works with startups looking to push creative boundaries