How to become a Web design expert

Do you want to talk to customers and get them to take your point seriously because it looks like you're an expert? If your answer is yes, then congratulations, there are many people like you. If you want to do it one day, you need to step back and think about why being an expert is so important to you.

Why do we all want to look like an expert?

We all want to be experts because we want our views to be taken seriously by others. To be respected, to be more valuable, and to satisfy one's ego, of course, the main thing is that we want to be the best and have our own unique and powerful way of acting.

Anyway, as we'll say next, becoming an expert is more than just letting people listen to us. If we can only do this it does not really reach our expectations and be recognized by others.

Being respectable is not the only expectation that we become experts. Some people think that perhaps the foster will give us more jobs and more power of speech. Unfortunately, in many cases, many experts do not know more than people, even in their familiar areas, and do not get more pay. Becoming a niche expert is not a big boost to your career.

Nevertheless, being regarded as an expert can help us work with our clients and give us the potential to create higher quality jobs. So, how do we become experts?

How to make us an expert?

In the book "Alien" (outliers), the author Malcolm Gladwell suggested that it would take nearly 10,000 hours of practice and practice to become an expert (master) in general. For most web designers who work full-time, this is equivalent to a full 4 years of unpaid 8 hours of work and productive.

I think 10,000 hours of doubt, I can see this theory to some kind of musical instrument training, or sports may be effective, but I am not sure to apply this theory to other such as web design. A 10,000-hour Photoshop experience doesn't make you a Web design expert, and at best makes you a good Photoshop player.

Of course, there is some truth in Gladwell's argument. To be an expert, you need time and experience.

Many people claim to be experts, but only a handful of people actually devote thousands of hours of effort. Picture Source Brett Jordan.

Time and experience

There is no doubt that professional skills must be achieved by spending time and holding them in a balanced exercise. Never a night of inspiration, no short cut to reach a high level of skill. With the continuous enrichment of experience, the more you learn, the more you will find that you need to learn more.

Of course, you can say that the field of web design changes very quickly, four years ago, knowledge is almost useless now. But I don't think it's a problem. In my experience, although technology is changing, people who use technology do not change. When you develop a Web site, you are always dealing with the details of the user or user experience. At the same time, years of experience can improve your ability to solve problems. Although the challenge is new, the way you solve the problem will become more and more proficient. The theoretical knowledge and workflow you have accumulated make you more outstanding. Therefore, the knowledge learned a few years ago can still be used today.

Paranoid Passion.

I'm not saying that experience is everything. For example, I don't think you should spend years giving someone a nine-to-five job to get enough experience. Instead, always look for something worth learning, a creative job in your business, and the most important thing is to have the passion to deal with what you have to note.

In my own case, my career started with IBM, and after a few years I felt I didn't have much skill improvement. A lot of people around me don't work with passion. Without passion, there is no desire or impetus to learn new things.

I believe that a paranoid passion for web design is necessary to become an expert.

In addition, my IBM colleagues are never willing to take risks. And the courage to try and the occasional mistake will be an expert must experience and learn

The importance of making mistakes

Being a real expert cannot avoid the fact that you have to be willing to make mistakes and make a lot of mistakes.

Unfortunately, we are not living in a social culture that praises failure. We need successful people. But success is not just a flash of inspiration, but the effort and the Han River. Winston Churchill said:

Success in business and becoming an expert is not just about having to go through one or two failures, it's the constant experience.

Failure is an important part of our becoming an expert, Charles Willson said:

Without failure, we cannot learn the best way to do things. You can learn a lot from the failure of others, but there is nothing compared to the failure of our own personal experience.

We need to overcome our fear of failure. When something goes wrong in a project, there are two of responses that people instinctively have. Some people are constantly entangled in it, otherwise the problem exists, unwilling to accept input but not output results, it is important to learn when to let go. Others, as far as possible, fled the problem and pretended that it had never happened. But that means you'll never learn from your mistakes. We need to spend some time at the end to look at the mistakes in our projects and learn from them. This is a difficult process, especially if you are dealing with a customer that has not been so fast.

And those who have never experienced failure may be reluctant to try, worry about others ' criticisms, or have no desire at all to succeed at first.

How to make sure you're already an expert

Sometimes not everyone agrees that you are an expert. It is not enough to have enough knowledge, and we need someone to agree with the knowledge we have gained.

This may be a problem that you will often experience. You have completed your 10,000-hour study and learned from the mistakes. However, your client or boss does not agree with the knowledge and experience you have accumulated.

How can you persuade them that you are already an expert and should seriously consider your proposal?

Show some humility

The first step to do is not to show that I am an expert attitude. A real expert is often the last person to call himself an expert. In fact, experts tend to acknowledge the limitations of their knowledge and motivate others to accept their views better.

People are often suspicious of people who call themselves experts. Letting your own knowledge speak for you is more effective than taking the initiative to draw attention to others. It's not wise to say you're an expert, you can hint at it in a number of different ways. One of the most important methods is to use scenarios.

Show your strengths with a situation

When you take some modern art paintings from the gallery and put them in the primary school, it is possible to be mistaken for a child's graffiti. Because the environment affects the acceptance of things when the standard. Imagine that sometimes managers listen very carefully to the views of some outside consultants, ignoring the views of their own employees, even though they say the same thing. Because they pay more money for advisers, their views seem to be more valuable.

You may not be able to raise the price of your services; however, you can change your way of expression and let people improve their value identity.

Like the artwork in the gallery, your expertise will be recognised in some suitable situations. For example, it may be more weighty in a conference room than speaking in a conference room or just expressing a point of view in your own station. Similarly, if your expertise comes from certain books, it will be much more valuable than the rhetoric you have in the boardroom.

As an expert I often make mistakes because I stand on the stage. Photo source Marc Thiele.

Not everyone has the opportunity to book or speak at a meeting. If so, you can also do your own book, or do some podcasts, blogs, or participate in some open source projects. It's easier to show yourself as an expert than you think.

If you get a meeting or an invitation to write a book, it means your skills have been recognized by some people. Meeting organizers and publishers seem to be quality assurance, and if they identify with you, people will decide what you are going to say at the beginning.

Of course, the scene is not everything. What is more important is what you say and how to express your point of view.

Style and theme

Writing a book, a speech, a blog or a play is more effective than a simple conversation. Because these are more rigorous than the conversation, the structure and manner of expression.

The importance of expressing oneself. When something is clear to you, others may not see it that way, especially if there are recurring problems. When customers ask you to make their logo bigger or more white, you have to be careful with these little things. It's easy to get impatient or indifferent because it's always happening. But careful consideration of your coping style and strategy will make you more persuasive. Apart from the main thrust, your dialectical and communicative style is equally important. The expert should be full of confidence and be expressive and authoritative when talking. The audience will not be offended by your opinions, and they will change their point of view as long as they are properly expressed. If you want to be recognized as an expert, be aware of yourself, relax and express your confidence.

Unfortunately, sometimes the problem happens, because the other side has already prepared its own point of view.

Too much prejudice

It can be a challenge to start acting as an expert before your existing bosses and clients. Especially your former junior staff, their attitude to you will not change overnight. Fortunately, you can do some effective work to help you switch roles.

First, provide valid evidence for your point of view. When your boss is worried that your proposal is not on the table, show him valid evidence, such as the scroll bar behavior report below.

Quoting a research result can increase the credibility of your content.

Second, quoting an existing expert will effectively support your point of view, such as someone who has written about the case of the scroll bar.

These techniques will not only support your point of view. At the same time they can fully demonstrate that you have extensive reading and research. At the same time, you are doing this at the same time add your own credibility, like experts to think about the problem. You are a step away from the experts.

Of course, there is no way to quickly eliminate prejudice. This is very difficult for people who are always working with the same people. But through a period of time, the effective display of their expertise and use of these skills, they will eventually change their view of you.

The greater the capacity, the greater the responsibility.

The focus of this article is on how to become an expert, and before I conclude, I want to say what it means to be an expert when you really are.

What happens when you get respect from customers, co-workers, and bosses? Becoming an expert is not just a journey of self. It's more about serving others. When you become an expert, you will be better for your customer service, for your company to provide more value, to promote the development of your industry. If you just want to get the love and respect of everyone, you will never really achieve your goal. People will realize that you may be just trying to satisfy your vanity and ignore you.

In other words, we must take our work seriously. Good websites may get worse if not taken seriously. I'm sure you've had a share of the Web site more and more rotten because people don't listen to your point of view. But it may be more useful to talk about some of your stories about persuading your bosses and clients to take your point seriously.

Cover picture copyright: Aural Asia

This article is compiled from experience10.com, the original address.

Source of translation: smashingmagazine.com