Discuss: In Defense of Difficult Clients
by Rob Swan
- Editorial Comments
2 Stop to think
A lot of that rings true. (Not the bits about multi-million mega-buck contracts, but the other bits).
Those of us who work in web design every day, and who have embraced web standards, accessibility, usability and new technologies can become so used to applying best practice that we forget why it is best practice. For those of us without a natural ‘gift of the gab’, it is easy to get caught out by these basic questions.
Yes, we all know that using descriptive link text improves search engine performance and makes it easier for people scanning the page quickly to home in on what they are looking for. But when put on the spot by a difficult client, how many of us can swear that we wouldn’t be reduced to stuttering about people not using clicking devices, or printing the page?
posted at 01:12 pm on November 14, 2006 by Stephen Down
3 What if you work for the unenlightened?
I loved this, and it is entirely true that if you were to let your evangelism of standards-compliance and all things sacred (like removal of frames/tables for layout, semantic mark-up, etc.) lapse that you may lose the ability to convince someone of their importance.
However, the dilemma that I face is that I have come a little too close to being fired for trying to convice the very company I work for of the inadequacy of our design. So, how would you suggest that one takes the enlightened messages of Web 2.0 to the company for which you work? Is there information or research out there to affirm that the change in philosophy actually comes with improvements to the bottom line?
This, to me would make it all worthwhile: having concrete data to backup my preaching.
Loved the post.
posted at 01:44 pm on November 14, 2006 by Luke Dary
4 Re: What if you work for the unenlightened?
Is there information or research out there to affirm that the change in philosophy actually comes with improvements to the bottom line?
I certainly hope so! (But I’m not going to provide any links here).
You’re certainly not the only one in your position. I used to work for a company where we were perpetually in your position. Those in control of the budget didn’t understand why we wanted things to change.
What we found was that carrying out real usability and accessibility testing on the website in question provided pretty gosh darn good evidence for almost everything you’re preaching.
First hand evidence is often a lot more persuasive than just quoting from someone else. If you can’t find or produce evidence then you need to really question your ideas.
… and as long as I’ve got you either looking for evidence or questioning your beliefs then my work here is done ;)
posted at 02:11 pm on November 14, 2006 by Rob Swan
5 Your article not only concerns webdesign
What you wrote is true for any customer relationship in most businesses. There are people you can convince and there are people who have opinions solid as rock. But it is up to you to decide what want to do, quit the work or doing what the customer wants, allthough you know it better. But in second case you have to inform your customer what he gets.
posted at 02:33 pm on November 14, 2006 by Katja Schiemann
6 Re: Your article not only concerns webdesign
But it is up to you to decide what want to do, quit the work or doing what the customer wants, allthough you know it better
You’re certainly right that the article concerns more than just the web design industry.
But I think there’s more to it than the two choices of quitting the work or doing what the customer wants.
We need to make sure we do a lot more than just telling clients they should listen because ‘we know better’. If we’re really ‘right’ then we should be able to basically convince anybody and everybody of that fact. I fear that sometimes we give up all too easily.
Sometimes we fail because we’ve forgotten even the most simple and persuasive arguments. Sometimes we might fail because we’re not actually right. Admittedly sometimes we might fail just because the client won’t listen to a well structured argument… but I think that’s actually quite rare.
Whichever way we succeed or fail it still helps us understand why we are or aren’t right.
posted at 03:30 pm on November 14, 2006 by Rob Swan
7 I like it
I think everyone will have a difficult client more than once in life. It’s difficult to handle their questions, but it’s a good training for yourself. Since we had our first I never go to meetings without a good preparation before.
Thanks for this article made up my day!
posted at 04:10 pm on November 14, 2006 by Silvan Hagen
8 Lovely article!
I thoroughly enjoyed reading this, and I’ve renewed my resolve not to resort to physical violence when the client requests reggae music in the background and garish splash pages.
posted at 04:49 pm on November 14, 2006 by Beth Long
9 First guess is usually right
As someone once said, “Usually your first guess is right”.
In the case of the web, “click here” was the first guess for how to tell people about links. There’s still some merits to it in the right situation. Though, I still think it needs to be in the right situation and not saturated through a site.
Cheers,
John
posted at 05:21 pm on November 14, 2006 by John Bertucci
10 Good job
I can only echo what others have been saying here; great article, Rob! Nicely written and with a good point to make. Though, really… is beating a difficult client to death with a philosophy book all that bad? :)
posted at 06:23 pm on November 14, 2006 by Andrew Collington
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1 Nice one
Excellent notion to push, Rob. I hope your writing skills serve to inspire – I can’t help but fear they may serve to induce the notion of, “Yes, that’s exactly what excellent designers should do, and I’m an excellent designer – therefore…”
The causality in that ‘extra 0’ analogy works all over the place!
I think the point should be made to all designers who get blinded by the light of standards: these things are only beautiful for their reasons. If you wield ideas in the face of adversity without fully grasping their cause, they are no longer torches. They are bludgeons.
posted at 11:56 am on November 14, 2006 by Barney Carroll