Importance of Writing for Designers

Why is important for designers to write well?

I asked myself many times before when I need to write an essay, “WHY?” and complain “I don’t want to write!” Mind you, I still do, but I also learned to accept the fact that writing is important, even for designers.

There seem to be three ways to communicate: visually, verbally, and literally. For designers, we deal with the visual communication most often, so obviously that’s important. Many of us speak, but speaking well is different from just talking normally. At some point in our careers we will need to give a presentation, so verbal communication needs to be developed well, but that’s another subject. The topic of this blog entry is writing.

Designers can’t always visually communicate successfully with their target audiences, so to ensure they get it, we’ll need to write it out. The writing needs to be clear and understandable and it needs to be thoughtfully written, otherwise we’d lose our audience. There are copywriters for some jobs, but not always, and when we’re dealing with words all the time, it is especially important for us to know how to work with them.

Another major importance we designers need to write well—our resumes and cover letters. It’s hard to be employed (long-term or just freelance) if we can’t even write simple things well.

I find that reading improves writing skills, and the more I read (and write), the better I write, and the better I can write, the better my designs are. Writing is a creative process, so if we (designers) can write logically, we can also design sensibly.

Though I approve of bettering our writing, I absolutely reject the idea of writing when pressured to finish in a short deadline. The creative design writing course mentioned by Andrea Marks in “The Role of Writing in a Design Curriculum” is different because it is a semester-long class where the only objective is to write better; there are deadlines, but it is much easier to learn and improve when the focus is just writing, not writing and designing both at the same time.

Just my opinion. I know it doesn’t change the fact that I still have to do my research paper for my design classes, so the least I can do is whine about it...

There is much to gain and nothing to lose if you can write.
Read lots, write whenever, and design often! It only gets better.

Other reading sources:
“Better Writing Through Design”
Brand New. Very cool site!