I’m Not a Designer, but I Know Good Design When I See It

There's a skill called "taste". It's separate from design capability, and it's not important to every business. The Google homepage, for example, survives on 100% pure design; no taste is required in its evaluation. But if your business requires beauty, then it's not enough to meet the rules of proper design. You need someone who can make pretty things, and someone "in management" (preferably the CEO) who can hire that person and protect their work. You need a team with taste.

Why is it that every single thing on picnik.com looks so pretty? Why does mint.com make people want to hug their monitors? Why do Apple devices cause people to offer forth their wallets in glorious tribute? Its because their leadership has taste, and they hire designers with great taste, and it flows from there.

The problem is that people aren't very good at self-evaluating for taste. Which is why you hear a lot of the title phrase of this post.