Fire the “web designer”

What a load of crap. Graphic design is to print what web design is to the web. You cannot take a print designer and expect him to design websites. It is two _completely_ different fields.

Design has specialties, and it just so happens that the term graphic designer has evolved into describing designers that are good at working with the physical print medium. On the other hand the term web designer described people that are good at working with interactive display-based design.

Web designers, because they are working in an interactive medium, is expected to know UX design theory. It is part of the job. It is one of the many things that sets them apart from print designers. If they can't handle it perhaps they are just a crappy designer?

I think this should be a non-issue these days. If a designer has been working consistently for the past 15 years, I suspect they would have transitioned from print designer to a web designer. Either that, or if they are newer to the field, wouldn't they have learned web design.

UX is a completely different animal, though I see many designers who like to get involved and understand UX because it has a huge effect on what and how they design.

Expanding the term web to website - creates: 'website designer'. And it reads as someone that can design websites. It doesn't even imply that they can create or implement them!

I think of the expression in more holistic terms. But I don't know many individuals who are experts at all the parts. Finding a team of people with a blend of skills that complement each other, is the holy grail in my opinion.

Two print designers, come web designers I have worked with have both been excellent contributers to web projects. One heavily focuses on the look and feel, html and css. The other is gifted in the looks department and is a competent programmer. It took them both a while for them to get the hang of a new medium, but they love it. It does take a while for print designers to understand the elasticity of a web page, some find it hard to relinquish pixel perfection.

I can realise a site design from paper based mockups, bitmaps and vectors. I'd struggle to create a visual design myself but can work with an artist that understands 'web design' principles.

While it may be a nice idea to create 'out of the box' designs, you are still bound to your medium. Understanding that medium's strengths, weaknesses and conventions is very important.

So I'd like to emphasise the point again, that a mult-disiplined team can all contribute something good to a site. That's certainly my experience anyway. Someone without a clue about html or css, may still be the perfect person to organise and map content.

I remember back when the "UX" guy was a freaking human-computer interaction psychologist who did lab testing...

It all depends on how motivated the "print" designer is in becoming a "web" designer. If it's their choice, they can be successful. "Usability, information architecture (IA), and user interface (UI) design" can be learned as long as the web designer knows that this is a whole different ballgame than the print world.

The answer to better user interfaces isn't having another "expert" in the office with a fancy title. It is making everyone in your company into a "user interface expert" by bringing in the real expert, the user.

Maybe on the corporate level where money is wasted and meetings are plentiful. But down here in the real world (trenches) it's unnessary if the "web designer" in question knows his/her shit.

All this guy is doing is splitting an existing profession into two sub-professions. You can do that with almost any job.

Example: Fire the painter! What you really need is a guy who paints and another guy who tells him where and what to paint (a paint experience designer?)

In my opinion a product designer should be able to create visually appealing designs that are usable. They should have an understanding of user experience and HCI issues - but not necessarily be an expert or have a PhD in the fields. They should be able to prototype their designs in HTML, CSS, and JavaScript and do some minor back end coding to get things working (they don't necessarily have to do this all the time, but they should have the ability to do so).

FWIW, this is what Facebook's product design team does (from my understanding of it, anyway)

For example, with my startup I'm trying to be as cost conscious as possible. Sure it would be nice to have one person in charge of UX and one person doing the graphics (people who are great at graphic design aren't always great with usability).

The problem is that adds money and time. Instead I hired someone who is good at UX, graphic design, AND can implement their design with CSS etc..

Why not, maybe some people are good at both things? Also I would have expected good graphics design to also be about good user experience.

There are many average designers who do not understand interaction design, but there are zero amazing web designers who dont care about UX.

One additional benefit is that if the graphic designer has less of an idea of the restrictions on design that web-design impose then they are more likely to think outside the box and come up with creative designs...

This blog post sounds like: "Hire a software architect that can build Interfaces for programmers to implement."