One of the first things that I taught my Design for America (DFA) design team in the Summer of 2009 was the mantra, “Kill Your Darlings”. Now I hear it come up again and again still in DFA teams, even two years later.
Illustration by fisserman via Flickr
I first heard kill your darlings in 1994. I was sitting in the video studio at Hewitt, running through footage with my video producer at the time. So much great clips! So many good quotes! We couldn’t keep it all and meet the total runtime goals of the project. So Bob sighed heavily, his hand hovering over the mouse, and exclaimed, “I’m going to kill our darling here.” A few mouse clicks and keyboard strokes later, we had a more concise and cleaner communication piece for our client.
Over the years, kill you darlings has come to mean something more to me as a designer in the ideation phase .
Kill your darlings is about not letting your enthusiasm overwhelm critical analysis when you are working in a creative team. We’ve all worked with someone who just is so in love–IN LOVE–with their great idea, that they just. can’t. let. it. go. Even if it would benefit the final outcome, product, project, whatever. Often these people try to push their idea through via their power in the group, sheer force of will, by holding their breath until the group relents, by wearing the group down until they are too weary to care much and just give in.
I will be the first in line to admit that I sometimes am this person.
We hear a lot about those times when that rockstar rebel with the idea prevailed, triumphant and waving a banner emblazoned with “I told you so!” The media LOVES those stories. But we don’t hear much about the times when that person has prevailed and the project crashed and burned or didn’t go anywhere because the rest of the team wasn’t interested in going along. (see Cue Cat or Cell Mate Headset)
Ever wondered if you are one of those people? Here’s some advice for you. If you are getting a lukewarm response to your idea in the ideation phase, kill it. Publicly. Announce your intentions, explain why you thought it was a good idea and why you feel it would benefit the project, and than massacre it.
If no one swoops into rescue it, use the rejection as information to figure out why. Possibilities?
- It might not be the great idea that you thought it was.
- Your team is not invested in it, which is just as significant.
Will there be any circumstance when you want to resurrect the idea? Absolutely. Some ideas are 7-8 steps of where things stand today and it is sometimes difficult for teammates to see the positive implications of pursuing them. In those cases, the fault doesn’t lie with the idea, the fault can lie in the case you are making for the idea–in connecting why it is important to what the group is trying to accomplish.
So work on building up your case, now that you know you need one. Make the connections for them. Draw it out step by step.
And if you can’t do that, even for yourself? Gives you something to think about.
(Also posted at Things I Like + Things I Write)
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