Elitism in Design: Challenges and Path to Inclusivity

Designers often prioritize perfection, but elitism can hinder creativity and accessibility, emphasizing the need for collaboration and kindness.

### The Elitism Problem in Design: Understanding and Overcoming Creative Industry Challenges
* 👑 Creative industries have a long history of celebrated figures exhibiting elitist behavior, often tied to the **pursuit of perfection** and the **need to sell ideas before they exist**.
* 🎨 Designers often face the challenge of balancing **confidence and ego** to sell their ideas effectively, particularly when clients must invest in a vision without **tangible proof**.
* 💼 The competitive nature of design, reliance on subjective judgments, and focus on appearances (like awards) can contribute to **elitism and exclusivity** in the field.
* 🌐 The internet has played a significant role in challenging traditional design elitism, **democratizing access to information** and **fostering more inclusive creative communities**.
* 🤔 While some level of confidence and assertiveness is necessary in design, it's crucial to maintain a balance and **avoid harmful elitist attitudes**.
* 🌍 The push for **more inclusive and accessible design** is gaining momentum, challenging traditional elitist norms and promoting a **more diverse and empathetic approach to creativity**.

if you ask designers why they do their job, they'll usually say it's because they want to make things that improve people's lives. This is really confusing when you learn that so many successful designers are elitist jerks. So why are they like that, and do you need to act that way to be successful? So you know Gordon Ramsay, What is that? Where's the lamb sauce? Working in a design studio is kind of like that sometimes, and this really isn't a new phenomenon either. Frank Lloyd Wright was a famous American architect who had designed buildings that were horribly over budget, all while terrorizing his employees and even his clients. Yet he's one of the most celebrated architects in the world. Here's a story on one of my first days working in a design studio. We all pinned up our concepts on the wall for our creative director to review. The director pointed to one set of concepts that my friend designed and said, Some of these concepts are a little distracting to me. [Music] So he walks up to the wall, rips all of

my friends Concepts down and throws them on the floor, and this kind of set the tone for my experience in Creative Industries moving forward. I was a little hesitant to make this video because there are many designers who are respectful and professional, but when you get right down to it, creative Industries are brutal. I want to understand why some creative leaders are like this so we can work towards a more respectful profession. You can start drafting your rage comments now if you want, but just wait until the end before posting them. Now, there is one dirty secret about elitism in design. As a designer or creative, having an egotistical attitude can be very effective. Most of a creative person's job is constantly saying no, not good enough about their own work. That's how you improve and become great. Designers will go through hundreds or even thousands of Concepts on a project, but only one of them is chosen for the final design. Even this video has like 40 pages of notes, but only about 10 percent of that content made it into the final

cut a lot of your job is about field turning out anything that doesn't meet your standard. The best is all that matters. The pursuit of perfection in Creative Industries can often lead to becoming an insufferable jerk, and it bleeds into other aspects of your professional life. Take Stanley Kubrick, for example, who is notorious for making his actors do scenes over and over again to the point of absolute Insanity. In The Shining, actress Shelley Duvall had to perform this baseball bat scene 127 times before Kubrick was satisfied. What you're seeing on screen is probably not even acting anymore. I bet Duvall was feeling genuine hysteria at this point. I've worked with ultra-perfectionistic clients or creative leads, and I can tell you that the results are rarely worth the extra suffering. Endless revisions can actually make the final product worse because it's hard to do good creative work when you're tired of making constant changes. As a design lead, I limit my revision requests to just a few rounds to avoid frustrating my team.

the key is defining what you want from the start with yourself before you involve anyone else. But Kubrick's movies are masterpieces, so maybe his obsessiveness was the key to their success, or maybe they would have been even better if he hadn't been so controlling. We'll never know for sure, but it does take a certain level of entitlement to push others beyond their limits in that pursuit of perfection. And it goes even deeper than that. I mean, designing creativity is not just about saying no to your own work. A lot of the time, other people will say no to you, so you'll have to stand up to influential experts. And it takes kind of a big ego to push through that resistance. If you don't believe in your ideas with unwavering confidence, nobody else will. I interviewed my friend Rafi Menacion about this. He's been a designer for like 40 years, and here's what he had to say about it. So when you make that presentation as a designer, the people that are listening to your presentation

and looking at the object they're looking for clues as to whether you believe in it or not. When you pitch your services to a client or a patron, you're convincing them to pay you a bunch of money without seeing the final product. I mean, sure, you can show them some of your past work; that can be a good indicator of future success, but it's no guarantee. So, with no concrete proof of your ability to deliver, you have to fill in the gaps with your ability to convince. Being supremely confident and elitist can actually be really helpful in this context. We're selling the future, and because the future doesn't exist yet, we're asking people to have faith in what we believe in. And so, to do that, we have to be convincing. The designer might have a vision in their mind of what the final product might look like, but the client has no idea. Even with sketches or rough drafts, it's hard to judge new creations in their early stages. So, most people just don't understand the value of an idea until it's already finished.

so you need to be able to tell a great story. You don't have to be elitist or narcissistic to be confident, but the traits do tend to correlate with each other. However, being a great storyteller can come at great costs if you go too far. One of the problems with being a really convincing storyteller is that you begin to believe your own lies. And to some extent, as a designer, when you're drawing a concept, if you really look at it from a fairness perspective, a concept is a lie because it doesn't exist. It's not a truthful representation of an object because a drawing on paper is just a drawing on paper. It doesn't exist. You have to lie to people about what you think it could be, and you begin to believe that. A lot of times, people get comfortable with lies. This is why we hear about Silicon Valley billionaires that were able to take other people's money to build a concept that just had no hope at all. Now, there are levels to this. There's a huge difference between

defrauding investors on a completely impossible idea versus making a good sketch that proposes a plausible concept. These two things are different, but they're born from a similar intent: it's the shaping of new realities that leads to your success in Creative Industries, and it's the avoidance of actual reality that leads to your downfall if it's taken too far. And another point is that it's only natural for you to look inward to yourself when pretty much all media celebrates individuals rather than teams. From a branding and advertising perspective, it's easier to point to a single person rather than a team. A big part of western culture is about focusing on the Triumph of the individual, but creativity isn't really like that. As much as the media and Brands want to point to one person, creativity is a team sport. On that note, YouTube channels are a team sport as well. They're only as good as their community. So, I'd love it if you subscribe to my channel. It's totally free; you got nothing to lose. So anyway, if you're famous, creative, and you keep

hearing over and over again that you're the one solely responsible for your Studio's work. You might start to believe those lies. Plus, if you're super egotistical, you'll start to surround yourself with only people who agree with you. That's how super-famous designers have completely warped realities. I mean, look at this passage written about this famous designer. Like, what even is this? An angel from heaven? A proselytizer of a new golden age? Now look, I have no ill will towards the designer they're talking about. I'm sure he's a grounded nice guy, and this wasn't written by the designer. It was written by a journalist. But is it really surprising that some creatives develop a distorted sense of self when they hear this level of Praise said about them constantly? I think the biggest indicator of whether you're being elitist has to do with where your focus is. If your focus is on yourself rather than on your creation, the quality of the work will eventually suffer. Making new things requires freedom and can be mentally exhausting. The creative

process involves navigating self-doubt, dead ends, and unwarranted praise while also dealing with skeptics who are ready to pounce on any misstep or sign of vulnerability. That pressure can be absolutely overwhelming, especially when you're trying to have confidence in something that doesn't even exist yet. Creatives with delusional confidence or narcissistic tendencies often handle this pressure better, but eventually, everyone has to face reality. The creative process often leads to elitist thinking naturally, but it's also influenced by the need to fit in with your peer group. Being a designer is like being part of a club, and clubs are naturally very exclusionary. There are very specific rules to that club which dictate whether design is good or bad. This is considered bad design. Most designers would say it's low brow, low quality garbage. I mean, sure, it's relatively inexpensive and kind of kitschy and cheesy, but is it actually bad design if you have children who are picky eaters and need some fun?

encouragement to eat their food. This design could actually be pretty useful. The problem is that many designers spend too much time trying to impress their peers rather than making things for real people. Even if you disagree about the dino Taco holder's usefulness, there are many famous designs that function terribly but get praise from the design Club. I mean, think of all the designer chairs that look cool but are uncomfortable to sit in, or this juicer designed by Philippe Stark. It's a cool object that provokes a lot of conversation, and I actually think it's really cool, but it barely functions as a juicer. Plus, this thing is like a hundred and ten dollars, and the Diamond know Taco holder is like under 15. So, what most designers consider good design is Out Of Reach for the average customer. Maybe you think the dyno Taco holder is bad because it's cheap and will fall apart. The juicer is much higher quality and will last a lot longer, and that's great. We should try to make things that

are lasting and durable, but once again, it's a little bit elitist. You hear a lot of designers say that the best kind of environmental sustainability is buying a high-quality object and keeping it forever, and I've even said this before, but high-quality items are expensive, and not everyone can afford them. I actually find it really sad that craftsmanship and care are considered luxuries these days, but that's another topic entirely. Not only is a lot of design that's celebrated very exclusionary in terms of price and accessibility for the average person, but most of what's considered good design is very narrow from a cultural perspective. If you look at the designs that get a lot of attention and praise in the industry, they tend to have a very specific kind of aesthetic. Most of it's inspired by European designs from the mid-20th century, with maybe some Japanese influence sprinkled in there for good measure. There's a heavy emphasis on modernist design principles, you know, form follows function, as little design as possible, you get the idea, and

that's one reason why the dino Taco holder is considered bad design, but this aims bird is considered good design. I mean, just look at the smugness in those eyes. It thinks it's better than us, and you can look, but you can't touch, because you're never going to be able to justify buying a 400 bird statue. Some designers ignore the beauty of other cultures and other perspectives that don't fit in with the club's agenda. This is clear as day if you open up a design blog or look at which designs win awards. They all have a very similar philosophy and aesthetic. It can get so bad that other designers will actively try to block opinions that fall outside of the minimalist eurocentric purview. Let's look at Luigi Kolani. He's a well-known designer in the 80s and 90s who would make crazy biomorphic designs that were both functionally and aesthetically pretty innovative. He showcased his work at an exhibit in a small German city, but instead of a warm welcome, he was

ridiculed and criticized by the local design school professors for his weird work. The professors even banned the students from attending the exhibit and said that they would fail their class if they disobeyed their orders. Now, this was over 20 years ago, but even at this exact University today, if you mention Kalani as an inspiration or put some of his work on your mood boards, it will be immediately dismissed as biomorphic [__]. Now, to be fair, Kalani was pretty arrogant too, yeah blah blah blah blah blah right, and his designs were also far from perfect, but the key lesson here is that design is like a club. If you don't play by the narrowly defined rules, you're not allowed in the clubhouse. Kalani actually had some innovative design work, but it didn't fit within the rules. This exclusionary culture just naturally breeds a certain level of elitism, and it's really sad because there's so much more to design than that. The good news is that in recent years, the culture of design is

becoming a lot more accepting of new and unusual ideas and processes, and there are also many celebrated designs that promote accessibility for everyone. A lot of these changes actually prompted my friend Rafi and me to write a book about the nature of creativity. The link is in the description of this video if you want to get notified of when it's published. But back to the video. Another big reason for elitism is that a lot of creative industries are very competitive, and it's hard to measure success. So rather than focusing on things that you can measure, some designers focus on surface-level things like account address or how to act. The power of your personality and the way you present ideas can make a big difference. It can all be very theatrical and performative. The way you talk about an idea matters. The way that you talk about an idea matters. The way that you talk about an idea matters. The way that you talk about an idea matters. So yes, I realize the irony of having a YouTube channel while complaining about the theatrical and performative aspects.

of the design profession. There isn't anything wrong with putting your best foot forward and acting professional, but it can really go too far and start to border on elitism. Oh hi, I know this is a movie and Meryl Streep is playing a character here, but she definitely did her research on real designers. If you act mean and critical about other people's work, it implies that you have high standards and that you must be really good. You really don't have to behave like this, but it is a simple way to communicate credibility to clients who might not know any better. Another very theatrical and performative aspect of creative industries are Design Awards. Most of these organizations judging the designs don't have really very much context around the sales numbers, how the product will age, how usable it is. Some of them are just basing it on a couple of pictures, and in some cases, almost half the people who apply for an award end up winning. And then on top of all that, if you are selected to win an award, it costs

thousands of dollars to claim it. I mean, sure, you can call yourself an award-winning designer, which might be a good way to get clients who don't know any better, but it's pretty easy to see how charging five grand for the award-winning designer title is kind of ridiculous and very inaccessible. Just to be clear, if you won a design award, I'm not trying to put you down. The bigger point I'm trying to make is that creative professions are so focused on appearances that will happily pay thousands of dollars just for an award that is of questionable validity. So at this point, look, I've painted a pretty negative picture. Creative Fields often come across as elitist due to societal influences and just the nature of creative projects. Balancing an uncompromising Creative Vision with compassion creates a constant tension, but I actually think that elitism in design is slowly dying out, and it's for one simple reason: the internet. The internet pulled back the curtain on a lot of creativity. If I thought that I was unique and I put

together something and put it out on the internet in a fairly short period of time. People would come up with stuff that they could say, Well, his work is obviously informed by this, so this is super cool. But did you see what was done here 20 years ago by so-and-so? It's harder to be anonymously singular these days, and because of that, what happens is that people are trying to be more authentic about their output, so they're giving more credit. The internet does foster communities of inclusiveness. Now, don't get me wrong, the internet is like 99% garbage, but if you know where to look, you can get feedback from top design professionals from all over the world. I even have a Discord that does this; it's totally free. Plus, the internet allowed for the democratization of information. This made design education far more accessible and far less expensive. For the first time ever, I've seen people get design internships without a university degree in design, just by getting feedback and taking tutorials online. This is still really hard to pull off.

but it would have been absolutely impossible even five years ago. Probably the biggest thing, though, is the shift in mindset that the internet has created around sharing work. The internet and social media enable new perspectives to be shared to massive audiences without needing to follow the design club rules, which I think is great. Plus, creatives are far less reliant on huge companies or publications to promote their work. The internet has allowed creators to get support directly from smaller groups as well. On that note, I'd actually really appreciate it if you supported me on Patreon. There's some really, really cool perks there, whether it's early access to a ton of extra content in my rough drafts, or getting exclusive access to live streams where I can give you feedback on your design projects and portfolios, or give you advice that will help you land a creative job. There's just a ton of extra information that I can give you that just doesn't make the final cut of these videos, or you can just ask me random questions. If you care about making this channel even better, go

check out the link in the description for my Patreon. I'm also launching a book about creativity with my buddy Rafi, who's helped me a lot with his video, actually. So, if you want to hear about our in-depth experience of working in Creative Industries, you can click that link in the description below to sign up with your email to get notified of when the book launches. So, the link is down there as well. But anyway, the internet also fostered a more open-source attitude in software development. There's an understanding that something can always be improved, especially when it's shared with a larger group. Design culture isn't usually like that. If you criticize an iconic design or talk about how it could be better, you'll be mocked and ironically viewed as arrogant to think you could ever improve on it. A lot of this has to do with how software products work. You can fix digital products or add patches later. With most physical design disciplines, it's really not like that. Once you ship your design out into the world, that's it. It's almost

like you're not allowed to admit it could have been better, and this is a subtle mindset shift, but it makes a huge difference in terms of attitude. Interestingly, digital UX designers tend to be more humble out of most of the designers that I've worked with, and I think this is the reason why. So, do you need to be a jerk to be a successful designer? I mean, not really, but jerks do have helpful traits for creative people. In order to get the good qualities of jerks while avoiding their bad qualities, here's some things that have helped me. Creativity is often seen as a solitary pursuit, but you need to get that idea out of your head. Even solo creators are never truly alone; they draw inspiration from the world around them. I'm the creator of this video, but I had several discussions about this topic with others, and the final product wouldn't be nearly as good without their input. Recognizing the importance of collaboration and being grateful for the contributions of others will help your creativity. If you focus your attention outward, it will

keep you from getting too self-absorbed. Now, there are times when you'll need to stand firm on certain aspects of a creative piece. If you're working with a team and think you need to be strict about something, explain your reasoning to them. Maybe it's a feature that your user really cares about, or it's critical to an investor pitch. Providing that extra bit of context often helps the team to understand the importance of what they're doing. When working with a team, never ever publicly humiliate someone, no matter how much you think they might deserve it. If you need to give very negative feedback to a team member, do it in private, behind closed doors. If you're going to lead a team, you don't always have to agree either, but you should always listen to your team with genuine empathy. The key is to have a high standard while coming from a place of kindness and thoughtfulness. There's no place for selfishness in the creative process. Elitism in design can be a barrier to entry for some, but it's important to remember that design is

ultimately about problem-solving and making things better for everyone. So, with a little bit of introspection, we can create designs in an industry that truly serves and benefits society as a whole. I think the momentum towards inclusive and accessible design is already happening now, but let's continue to challenge elitism in design so that we can create a world where creativity is accessible and empowering for everyone. I appreciate you watching so much. Once again, I'd really also appreciate it if you supported me on Patreon so I can continue to make great content like this. Click the link in the description to learn more, and I just hope you have a great day.

Why Are Designers & Creatives Elitist Jerks?

Design Theory

The Elitism and Brutality in Creative Industries

Many successful designers exhibit elitist behavior, which is confusing given their stated goal of improving people's lives.

The pursuit of perfection in design often leads to a ruthless attitude, as seen in the practices of famous figures like Frank Lloyd Wright and Stanley Kubrick.

This culture of constant rejection and demanding excellence can create a toxic work environment, but some argue that a strong ego is necessary to push through resistance and advocate for one's ideas.

The Challenges of Selling Creative Services

Selling creative services involves convincing clients to pay without concrete proof of success.

Confidence and storytelling are crucial in filling the gaps and gaining trust.

However, the pressure to be convincing can lead to a distorted sense of self and elitism, ultimately affecting the quality of the work.

The Pressure and Elitism in the Creative Process

The creative process is filled with self-doubt, dead ends, and pressure from skeptics, making it challenging to maintain confidence.

Designers often prioritize impressing their peers over creating for real people, leading to elitist thinking and exclusionary practices.

The celebration of certain designs can be narrow and culturally biased, with a heavy emphasis on mid-20th century European aesthetics, resulting in a lack of diversity in design perspectives.

The Elitism in Design: A Critical Perspective

The local design school professors ridiculed and banned students from attending an exhibit by Kalani, whose innovative work didn't fit the narrow rules of the design club.

This exclusionary culture has bred elitism in the industry, but recent years have seen a shift towards accepting new and unusual ideas.

The competitive nature of creative industries and the focus on surface-level measures of success contribute to the performative aspects of design, including the questionable validity of design awards.

The Impact of the Internet on Design and Creativity

The internet has made it easier for creatives to share their work and receive feedback, fostering a sense of inclusiveness and authenticity.

It has democratized design education, allowing people to land internships without a degree and making tutorials more accessible.

The shift in mindset around sharing work and the open-source attitude in software development have also influenced design culture, challenging the traditional notion of criticism and improvement.

Humility is a common trait among digital UX designers, and collaboration is key to enhancing creativity.

It's important to provide context when being strict with a team and to give negative feedback privately.

Challenging elitism in design and promoting inclusivity can create a more empowering and accessible creative industry for everyone.