Podcast episode 16 | December 19 - 2023

00:00:08:01 – 00:00:13:18

Sylvia Wong

Today, I am joined by Kashan, who is the Creative Director at NVISION.

00:00:13:18 – 00:00:37:06

Sylvia Wong

We are talking about what makes good design Great. Now for design, I think it’s really subjective. A lot of people judge it as if it’s art. You like it, you don’t like it somewhere in the middle. But I think there’s a lot of objective things that can make design great. Kashan I would love to hear from you to start with. What kind of design do you typically work on here?

00:00:37:06 – 00:00:47:02

Kashan Nazir

Well, first of all, thanks for having me here Syl. it’s been a long time coming and I’ve I’ve avoided this for the longest time, but it looks like I can’t anymore. But yeah, it feels great to be here.

00:00:47:02 – 00:01:15:11

Kashan Nazir

At NVISION, we pretty much do all kinds of design we have done. Primarily we do web designs where we take our client’s existing branding and then we work with our copywriting teams and we work with our UX design team to come up with information architectures and then just basically create a design direction out of all those components. And once the website designs are done, we send them to our dev team who then basically create the final version and code it out.

00:01:15:11 – 00:01:39:06

Kashan Nazir

We also do a lot of logo design stuff. We have also done some branding projects. You were a huge part of that as well. We also do print stuff here. We are a digital agency, but just letting everybody know that print is a lot of fun as well. A lot of people in my team don’t agree, but you know, I’m trying to convince them that, hey, you know, print is still is still the thing and important.

00:01:39:06 – 00:01:56:01

Kashan Nazir

So we actually have done like a lot of large format print stuff where we have done tradeshow booth graphics and we have also done things that are as small as a client’s booklet or brochures, even. So, yeah, we’re pretty much equipped to do whatever we want.

00:01:56:01 – 00:02:35:08

Sylvia Wong

Yeah. I think like the way that we really approach design is like it touches every part of a brand for clients like that from a marketing side, we always say every single touch point should feel consistent to your end user to really express your brand, right? So I think that means like you’ve got a lot of experience in terms of like what makes design really resonate with that end client, whether it’s online or in like a physical touch format. To start with, what do you think is one of the elements? Anyone that makes a good design, great?

00:02:35:08 – 00:03:01:08

Kashan Nazir 

That’s a, that’s a great question, and I think a perfect way to start on that topic would be to actually identify like what a good design actually is. If we put all the theoretical aspects and Dieter Rams ten principles of good design aside, and if you just ask me as a user, not even somebody who belongs to this industry, a good design to me actually is the one that really empathizes with me as a user.

00:03:01:08 – 00:03:07:12

Kashan Nazir

It serves the purpose that it has been created to perform or achieve.

00:03:07:12 – 00:03:28:07

Kashan Nazir 

If I, as a user, am trying to do a certain task, a good design should make it almost perfect experience and frictionless for me to achieve it. That is, when you know the design has served its purpose and that is a good design. Not only that, it should be aesthetically pleasing, it should be good to look at.

00:03:28:07 – 00:03:47:22

Kashan Nazir 

There are many instances where you, you, you come across a design and then, you know, it just does not cut it. There’s not a good balance and then the users switch and they bounce. They, they close the browser window. You know how easy it is for, you know, users these days to just hop on and bounce off.

00:03:47:22 – 00:04:09:18

Kashan Nazir 

I actually have a very good example, like to go with this. Like I was recently at my car dealership for an oil change. So I went into the lounge area and I really felt like having coffee, and I saw like this really big shiny machine in the corner. And I was actually a little apprehensive to walk up to it because I had never seen that machine ever before in my life.

00:04:09:18 – 00:04:31:03

Kashan Nazir 

But I needed coffee. So I walk up to it, and when I reached it, it was so straightforward. I knew exactly the right buttons to push. I knew exactly where the pods went. In less than a minute, I was able to walk away with a fresh cup of coffee without having any prior knowledge of that machine ever. So that to me right there screams good design.

00:04:31:03 – 00:04:51:15

Kashan Nazir

It was intuitive. It was like a seamless experience for me, helped me do exactly what I set out to do. On the contrary, like the other day, I rented a car and I’m not going to name any brands like I don’t want anybody. I don’t want I don’t want the big corporations coming after me or anything. But it’s considered like a good luxury car.

00:04:51:15 – 00:05:16:11

Kashan Nazir

And, you know, there’s a certain expectation that comes with brand. And as a user, I got the car and I was sitting in and I turn it on and and silly. I kid you not for the 5 minutes. I could not figure out why I can’t get the car moving. And then I looked at the dashboard and the brake light was on and I could not find the brake release button anywhere that I’m used to as a user.

00:05:16:11 – 00:05:34:00

Kashan Nazir

I literally had to take out the manual from from the dash, from the glove compartment, and then I figured it out. But if we go by what you know, father of user experience, Don Norman, says if a design is not straightforward and if you as a user are not able to figure it out, it’s not your fault.

00:05:34:00 – 00:05:57:03

Kashan Nazir

It is actually the design that has failed you. We don’t realize that in a lot of instances, especially, you know, a lot of companies who come up with solutions for clients. And if the clients come back with more pain points and dissatisfaction with the end product, pretty much the companies go, well, this is what you approved, and we can’t do anything about it because we have your approval on it.

00:05:57:03 – 00:06:13:01

Kashan Nazir

Zero empathy. There is no care that is put in place with the actual use cases. And in that case, I’ll have to side with the clients. It’s not the client’s fault. It’s the designer who has put it together and who has fallen short in fulfilling the purpose of that design. 

00:06:13:01 – 00:06:18:11 

Sylvia Wong 

You really have my wheels turning here because I’m like thinking about the fact that first, like, everything has a design, right?

00:06:18:11 – 00:06:36:15

Sylvia Wong

Like, everything that surrounds us, everything’s got a design and a purpose and like, an ease of use, like all the knobs that you have to use, like the chairs that we’re sitting in. And for the most part, like a lot of consumer goods, come with a manual. When you say a coffee machine for the first time, if you got to run water through it, you’ve got a button to push and whatever.

00:06:36:15 – 00:06:57:13

Sylvia Wong 

But when it comes to web design, there’s there’s never like a user manual. Like, I don’t I don’t think like we’re we’re not really at the stage in which, like most of us enter websites where it’s like, here’s how you do things. Here’s what you’re meant to press. There’s a lot of defaults or like assumptions that are built in our minds, right?

00:06:57:13 – 00:07:20:08

Sylvia Wong

And I mean adjacency, like in marketing, we work a lot with design, but, you know, we already as like, as as marketers have the words for these things where I think sometimes our end users aren’t necessarily at that level where they know something is called a hamburger menu or like a header or a footer or a fava con.

00:07:20:08 – 00:07:37:23

Sylvia Wong 

Like I think these are these could be foreign words to a lot of people. They just kind of know visually what they are.

00:07:24:16 – 00:07:25:13

Kashan Nazir

What is a grid system? 

00:07:25:13 – 00:07:37:19

Yea, like, what is a grid system right. Like, why are all these these things in place? And like, what are the assumptions that you’re kind of inheriting and you have to work with no matter what it is that you’re designing? 

0:07:37:19 – 00:08:00:12

Sylvia Wong

And for for us being majority web designers like that’s the majority of our export to our clients, we have to work with a certain set of assumptions around user interfaces, right? What are some of the challenges that you’ve found with having to work with, you know, like grid systems, everything on the web currently and and how you have to structure your work around all of that?

00:08:00:12 – 00:08:20:08

Kashan Nazir 

Absolutely. I still remember the time when we we never we didn’t have access to these amazing prototype tools that we now incorporate. And then back in the day, you’re right. It used to be so difficult to to meet the expectation of the client in terms of, you know, what they expect an experience for getting a new website design.

00:08:20:08 – 00:08:38:20

Kashan Nazir 

It was very, very hard for us even back then to kind of explain that this wireframe that you’re looking at, this black and white wireframe structure is not your final design. It is not in no shape and form the final look and feel of what the brand is actually going to be. But yeah, like to answer your question.

00:08:38:20 – 00:09:04:17

Unknown

Yes, there are challenges because clients, when they do come to us, they have a lot of knowledge about what has worked and what hasn’t worked for their web space. But at the same time, there are things that they are very passionately married to like, Yeah, we designed my my uncle designed this logo 15 years ago and we don’t want to change it.

00:09:04:17 – 00:09:25:00

Kashan Nazir 

But yeah, I agree. But you got to realize that if you are going for a web solution that is going to be catering to your audience that is familiar with, you know, some basic principles of aesthetic, they’re not going to you don’t see the relation between your brand artifacts, your logo with the new design direction that you’ve taken.

00:09:25:00 – 00:09:55:05

Kashan Nazir

So it it is a bit of a challenge to convince the clients to detach themselves from just the form of something and convince them on the function that because to me and to any sane person who is in this industry, form and function go hand in hand and sometimes it becomes a challenge. Yes. To explain it to our clients, but in most cases they do listen to us because I think we do a really good job prototyping and convincing them, right? 

00:09:55:05 – 00:10:22:20

Sylvia Wong

I think so, yeah. I think you bring up a great point too. And like form and function, those two opposing or those two elements that have to marry each other. Very often design is seen very much for the form and the function is forgotten. I speak in generalities about how it’s often perceived where, you know, we we are approached to create something beautiful.

00:10:22:20 – 00:10:51:21

Sylvia Wong

But at the end of the day, things have to work around these preexisting assumptions, around how people know how to use the web, around how they know what is a clickable element around when to scroll and not. And all of those functionality bits are very important. And I think it takes not only experience over time but also keeping up with how, you know, innovation is happening across the web in order to find that balance.

00:10:51:21 – 00:11:03:06

Sylvia Wong

Do you find that with clients iIt’s sometimes challenging to explain like that that function not not takes priority, but that it it is equally as important as form?

00:11:03:06 – 00:11:18:00

Kashan Nazir 

So that’s a great question. And we deal with this questions at a personal level like every day. And you brought a very good point before I get into this. Like you brought up such a good point in the start, which is we interact with design every day all around us.

00:11:18:00 – 00:11:47:12

Kashan Nazir 

And if we go by like, you know, one of the greats of our industry, I believe it’s Don Norman who said this again. I keep on quoting Don Norman like, I love his book Design of everyday things. If anybody hasn’t read it, please do very, very enlightening. So he says that you know, a good design or almost every time goes unnoticed because it does its job at the back of the scene and then you’re done with it.

00:11:47:12 – 00:12:07:20

Kashan Nazir

Imagine walking up to a door that has a very good push and pull signifier on it, and then you push it and you just walk out. Now imagine walking up to a door that doesn’t have anything like that that is going to scream its inadequacies at you at such a loud pitch that it is going to stand out to you.

00:12:07:20 – 00:12:30:19

Kashan Nazir

Now, coming back to your point about form and function. Yes. How do we how do we avoid like these pitfalls where we’re not giving enough visual identifiers with our designs to user the cues that humans pick up on? And you’re right, as human beings, we do go by a lot of assumptions and sometimes more than enough, those options are wrong.

00:12:30:21 – 00:12:51:16

Kashan Nazir

If I am putting a paragraph together and there is no understanding given from me to a user, you know, in a in a designed out module for a website, that there is some action that they can perform at the end of it, then it’s my fault, then I have failed. There is a function that exists for it, but the form does not communicate it properly.

00:12:51:16 – 00:13:20:09

Kashan Nazir

And I see form and function are completely intertwined with each other. One cannot have value without the other. For example, there is a very famous or now or very infamous juicer machine. Like I totally forgot who the, who the designer is. I might, it might be Philippe I think, I think it’s Philippe. I’m so sorry. I totally forgot his name.

00:13:20:11 – 00:13:30:22

Kashan Nazir

So it’s a very it’s a famous thing where it’s a very nicely designed out juicer. It looks like a fantastic piece of art. But try using it to extract juice out of it. 

00:13:30:22 – 00:13:37:22

Sylvia Wong

Are you talking about that thing that’s like a yes, a tripod? Yes. And it’s got like a spike at the top, like three spiky legs.

00:13:37:22 – 00:13:38:11

Kashan Nazir

You got it. 

00:13:38:11 – 00:13:56:21

Sylvia Wong

And so, like, if, if user’s can picture this, it’s like a tripod of three legs and it’s got almost like an egg, like Spike with its very pointy in the center. So you put a cup under the tripod and then when you do something like kind of trickles down the, the egg like thing, right.

00:13:56:21 – 00:14:05:09

Sylvia Wong

Yeah. No, it’s very fascinating because when you say it’s like an art object, it’s like, what is that until you use it that way. 

00:14:05:09 – 00:14:15:10

Kashan Nazir 

Absolutely. And once you once you realize like it and obviously, you know, the kind of audience that is catered for it, it’s not a mother who’s preparing lunch every day and then is going to be using that.

00:14:15:10 – 00:14:41:01

Kashan Nazir 

But you never know, like, you know, something that kind of appears like it doesn’t come with a warning that hey not to be used by this. And this person like a good design is inclusive. A good design offers itself. It opens itself to people to come and interact with it. You cannot be like, hey, this, you know, Les Paul is only for guitarists who have 20 years of experience playing guitar like, no, no.

00:14:41:01 – 00:15:00:02

Kashan Nazir

Again, so like, I’m coming back to the form and function if I am on a website similarly, and it has such a big form, but there is absolutely no CC or no visual hierarchy, there’s no gap between the fields. Yes, it’s a good function. It’s going to go to the right place. I’m going to put my information. Somebody is going to give me a call back.

00:15:00:02 – 00:15:17:10

Kashan Nazir

Yeah, that’s fine. But as a user, what kind of feeling is it leaving me with? It is leaving me a little bit, you know, feeling not too great about the brand that I’ve just interacted with. So to me, form and function totally go hand in hand. One cannot exist without the other. 

00:15:17:10 – 00:15:30:06

Sylvia Wong

Yeah. I think the average consumer, the average user may not realize that they know bad design when they know it.

00:15:30:06 – 00:15:49:22

Sylvia Wong 

Like it’s when you are on a site and a pop up comes up and you’re just like, where is the X? Like, Where do I close it, right? How do I swipe away from this thing? Or it takes up your whole screen and you’re like, Well, how do I minimize this? Or when you fill out a form and you finally get to the button and you’re like, Where’s the button?

00:15:50:03 – 00:16:13:19

Sylvia Wong

Or like, you’re not sure. You’re not sure like how to submit. Yeah, it looks like one of the fields. Yeah, like there’s just like a little things that sometimes, like, you might not have realized. You always knew that in your, like, back of your actual cognition or your consciousness that you’ve already committed to memory that, like, I know that when text is in this certain kind of blue and it’s got an underline that that is clickable.

00:16:13:19 – 00:16:34:01

Sylvia Wong

Right? But that’s something that’s like once you go to enough websites, you read enough online, you’re kind of like, yes, that is that is by a standard that who knows who said it over time. But we all know that. And psychologically, it’s embedded into us that that is how design should be. So when it’s not like that, it should be something that’s noticeable to people, right?

00:16:34:01 – 00:17:09:08

Kashan Nazir 

Absolutely. And you bring up a very good point. It is a very dated feel, you know, having an underlying underneath the link. But let’s use it because there is a big population that is accustomed to it. If I’m catering to a client, let’s say, who deals in retirement plans and insurance, retirement insurance and everything, I want to build in some consistencies that that age demographic is used to because they have interacted with Web way different than a millennial who is interacting with, you know, a site like Wealthsimple, for example, that caters more to them.

00:17:09:10 – 00:17:29:20

Kashan Nazir

So absolutely, some assumptions I think should be, you know, used and leveraged and even made better, whereas there are some assumptions that if, like you say, a pop up opens, just click outside somewhere. It doesn’t work every time. No. So and again, keep all those considerations in mind.

00:17:29:20 – 00:17:33:06

Kashan Nazir

And one thing I would like to mention here is accessibility.

00:17:33:06 – 00:17:58:00

Kashan Nazir

Accessibility here at NVISION is a big, big thing. You know, it has always been with us a big thing, but now ever more so you got to realize that there is as an assumption that a white color on orange looks bang-on beautiful. But you’ve got to realize that there are people who are probably not who are probably not going to be very comfortable looking at it or even miss some of that information.

00:17:58:00 – 00:18:09:17

Kashan Nazir

So we take a lot of the consideration, consideration in mind, making sure that our design is sustainable. It is it is accessible as well. So there’s that aspect to it as well. 

00:18:09:17 – 00:18:22:17

Sylvia Wong

Yeah, and that’s a great that’s a great point because we have your, you said on our accessibility committee here it at NVISION and just talk about all of the, you know, the accessible colours like the contrast that we have to have for things to comply.

00:18:22:17 – 00:18:40:19

Sylvia Wong

And it’s a huge part of what we do in order to make things accessible by everyone, you know, And it’s it’s not just regulation, it’s just simply making it so that like content is digestible because, why create something that any percentage of the population can’t really use?

00:18:40:19 – 00:18:54:00

Sylvia Wong

Are there ever challenges that you have with regards to the ideas and concepts that you have that are really great but limitations with the medium that we’re using, especially on web or print, either either direction?

00:18:54:00 – 00:19:20:05 

Kashan Nazir

Absolutely all the time. You know, there is so much inspiration that’s out there now, and especially with air tools that generates art boards and after outdoor art boards of ideas and everything. And a lot of, you know, young students who are coming out of college and everything are are leveraging these tools. And let’s just say it’s way more easier to create portfolio pieces today than it used to be when I graduated. 

00:19:20:05 – 00:19:41:19

Kashan Nazir

But you got to realize design is there to solve very specific problems for clients who hire who hire us to create websites for them. Every crazy idea that looks good cannot be implemented because you have to realize that you might overload the browser capability to run that design when it’s coded out.

00:19:41:19 – 00:19:44:21

Sylvia Wong

My SEO team has something to say about slow sites, right?

00:19:44:21 – 00:20:14:11

Kashan Nazir

Absolutely. We have those conversations all the time and then we try to course correct ourselves all the time. We have a very passionate team of designers here who want to push the envelope a lot and they come up with many, many great ideas. But right at the execution level, yes, there is a challenge. Sometimes we have to roll back a little bit because we got to keep the site efficiency in mind, like how it performs, because that is one promise we make to our clients as well and we want to stick by it.

00:20:14:11 – 00:20:39:19

Kashan Nazir

If it’s a design that is too layered, it takes way too much time to load. If there is a parallax effect that has four different levels of depth to it, it might be a challenge. Who knows, somebody might be running our website, you know, somewhere where, you know, the internet speed is still a luxury and then, you know, they won’t be able to interact with us with our work.

00:20:39:19 – 00:20:47:17

Kashan Nazir

And like I said, a good design is the one that’s inclusive as well. So we want to make sure we achieve that perfect balance between.

00:20:47:17 – 00:20:58:20

Sylvia Wong

To load for like 2 to 5 seconds is an eternity these days, right? So it’s just like the amount of patience someone has to even wait for a site to load is kind of a limitation in itself.

00:20:58:20 – 00:21:15:01

Kashan Nazir

Absolutely. You, got maybe Syl, and you probably know it better than anyone. You got like you have the clients on your site and 4 to 5 seconds is the most that they’re going to give you. And if nothing is happening, it’s broken. Yes. Goodbye. Yes, absolutely. 

00:21:15:01 – 00:21:32:11

Sylvia Wong

Well, I think you’ve told us so much about design, not just on web print, but as well as the real world and how design really is approached in all things. What in your eyes as a conclusion takes good design to great?

00:21:32:11 – 00:21:52:14

Kashan Nazir

Oh Wow. We ask ourselves this question every day. And I think if I really like, think about it in very plain terms, like we’ve established what a good design is, it serves a purpose. It it achieves what it set out to do. It’s, you know, it has that visual layer to it.

00:21:52:14 – 00:22:20:03

Kashan Nazir

Absolutely, a great design is where is the one that goes way beyond even these two things agree design is the one that touches the user at a very, very emotional level. Like we’re talking about not even customer loyalty, but we’re talking about advocacy where somebody who sees something, they just cannot stop thinking about it and they have to share it and they have to be like, my God, I came across something like this today.

00:22:20:03 – 00:22:43:23

Kashan Nazir

Like, I remember I saw Leo Burnett’s website, their corporate website, when they did it back in 2004, Flash was still a thing. And then they had this like pencil effect that used to scroll as you would navigate the site and then it would create sections. And it was so magical that I had no money and I wanted to work for them and without, without a salary.

00:22:43:23 – 00:23:03:10

Kashan Nazir

And I wanted to pay them to make something like that for me. So I guess the point I’m trying to make is it transcended from being just a site that serves you information about what a company does. It went way beyond it, took that extra care. It’s like Tesla. They have a, you know, a beautiful product. It’s a very good car.

00:23:03:10 – 00:23:33:19

Kashan Nazir

But they realized that charging a car takes a long time. So what do they do? They install video games in there for you so you could play while the car charges if they hadn’t done it, nobody would have cared. But they did it. So it’s a design that transcends way ahead of these two things. And a design that becomes a new standard that others follow. A design that can stand test of time is a design that is just not good. It’s great.

00:23:33:19 – 00:23:47:13

Sylvia Wong

That’s amazing. Thank you. Kashan Thanks so much for your insights on everything, design and all of your background that you shared with us. I love talking to you, so I think you did pretty good for your first episode. Come back soon okay?

00:23:47:13 – 00:23:49:12

Kashan Nazir

Okay, will do. Thank you so much, Syl. 

00:23:49:12 – 00:23:53:17

Sylvia Wong

Thank you. Okay. Same conclusion as last time. Bye!