In the creative world of design, whether UX, graphic, or service design, there’s always a popular new buzzword: empathy, innovation, human-centredness, inclusivity. These concepts are undeniably valuable. But there’s one fundamental element designers regularly overlook: time. And as the old saying goes, time is money.
It’s interesting that an industry dedicated to optimising experiences often struggles with optimising its own processes. The issue isn’t a lack of capability. Designers have immense talent, creativity, and strategic insight. Instead, the problem lies in a habitual tendency to prioritise everything else ahead of efficiency and managing time.
The Hidden Cost of Ignoring Time
Design processes often expand far beyond their original scope. Designers pursue perfection, produce endless iterations, and debate subjective details long after meaningful improvements have stopped occurring. While refining design elements can result in outstanding outcomes, there’s always a tipping point where these incremental enhancements become insignificant, yet costs continue to rise significantly.
Consider this: do those extra user journeys, additional personas, or repetitive rounds of A/B testing genuinely deliver proportionate value, or are they simply burning through valuable project hours?
The Efficiency Blind Spot
It’s not unusual for designers to view deadlines as flexible recommendations rather than firm constraints. This attitude typically arises from a genuine desire to achieve quality. No designer wants to deliver work they consider unfinished or substandard.
Yet there is a crucial difference between being meticulous and simply inefficient. Exceptional designs solve problems elegantly without adding unnecessary complexity. Similarly, the best design processes create solutions efficiently, not just thoroughly.
Cost-Consciousness Creates Better Design
Designers who significantly impact business success are often deeply aware of the financial implications of their processes. They understand that extended discovery phases, excessive prototyping, and overly lengthy feedback loops don’t just add days; they add costs. Being cost-conscious isn’t about cutting corners. Instead, it’s about recognising value and delivering solutions quickly.
Design leaders must encourage their teams to consistently ask: “Is this step genuinely necessary? Will it deliver measurable value, or are we adding complexity just to satisfy creative curiosity?”
The Path Forward: Balancing Creativity with Accountability
The solution is straightforward yet powerful. Introduce a culture of accountability for time management with the same rigour you apply to creativity, usability, or aesthetics. Educate designers in basic budgeting of their creative hours. Empower them to distinguish between meaningful iterations and perfectionist distractions. Provide training in lean or agile methodologies to instil a mindset of iterative efficiency instead of exhaustive exploration.
Celebrating efficiency and clarity in decision-making as core design values can significantly improve processes. It encourages precision and decisiveness, attributes every designer should develop.
Efficiency Isn’t the Enemy of Creativity
It’s time for designers to view efficiency as a beneficial creative constraint, not a limitation. Constraints can lead to innovation, clearer focus, and ultimately, better design outcomes. Time-sensitive thinking doesn’t diminish creativity. Instead, it sharpens focus, encourages smarter decision-making, and leads to stronger solutions.
Designers should acknowledge the true value of time and stop treating it as unlimited. By doing so, they’ll save money and consistently deliver better results, faster.