How long do you take?

Conway

Conway

New Member
Hi All

I want to gather peoples opnions on how long certain design tasks should take you.

The reason why I have a burning deire to ask this question is because, I have recently been told I am no longer needed at one particular design company because i was taking to long to put togther designs for some interactive touch screens that I was designing in photoshop. The thing was there were several screens that I had to design all at once that made up the project, about 2 or 3 screen deigns to be done within just 2 days!!!
Which I think is a ridiculously short period of time to come up with a finished polished designs by. I mean before you even jump into photoshop and Illustrator, I need at least a day or two to sketch out on paper my thoughts, brainstorm, and do some online visual research into other companys/ websites that have a similar ''look and feel'' to the client that I am designing for, once I have this research/ inspration to hand, its only then that I will begin my design mock ups in photoshop/Illustrator.

So, I ask you all to comment please about how what is a good employable pace that I should be working to? I appreciate some design tasks will take longer than others depending on the size of the project, but I would particularly be intersted in how long should a logo or how long it should take to design some website page layouts in photoshop??

I ask this question because after being told what i was told, I am now very worried that I will never be quick enough despite my design talent to get things done in the time people expect them to be done by. :-(
 
Every job/company/person is different. From what you have said here it sounds like they wanted some rough concepts rather than finished designs.

I'd have said 2 days for 2-3 screen designs would have been enough for me personally but it does depend on the complexity of the designs etc.

Personally I very rarely spend more than half a day on concept sketches and brainstorming as often as not my work evolves or I get new ideas while I'm drawing up some concepts etc, but again everyone is different.

I'd have thought that the company would have given a brief in regards to the feel and look of any corporate identity (if its not new) so this would govern a lot of the work.
 
I'd say that 2 days would be enough for that task. But it does depend on how complex these screens were and how much information you'd been given to carry out the task.

When I worked for agencies they usually allowed 1 day for a website concept (including a sub page), which I always felt was a little rushed. Sometimes I'd have to really power through the sub page design and neglect it a bit to finish the job on time. Now that I work for myself I allow 1.5 days for such a task and find that it works nicely.
 
Hi Will,

Thanks or your input and feedback, much appreciated. Having visited your website {which is very nice by the way} you talk about the the phases you go through to put together a design like the planning and research before you consider any design work, which makes total sense, however when you say the agencies you worked for normally only allowed you a day for website concept and a sub page did did that also mean you had to plan and think of an appropriate layout all within the same day? That just seems like a hell of a lot to ask for in one days work, but if you can work that quickly fair play to you. Maybe I need to learn to think on my feet a little quicker without sacrificing to much quality in the work, would you agree?
 
Speed, Price, Quality, pick any 2 but never all 3.

I'm surprised that you've been pushed over the pace issue of your work, is that a permanent employment or a freelance arrangement? Seems strange, don't think I could just let people go with that excuse unless I wanted an employment tribunal. Is there something deeper?

In term of work v pace, your output seems about par for the course, without full knowledge. It would not seem to me be as slow enough to warrant dismisal. Confused.
 
It's hard to say without knowing the exact scope of your project, and I don't really know anything about touch screen designing. Letting you go because of that seems a bit harsh though. The company I work for also allow one day for a website concept incl. a subpage (and planning, sketching etc) which seems to be pretty standard judging from Will's post. I also feel that it's very rushed sometimes. I'd love to have an extra day, or just half a day, for polishing and to give more attention to detail.
 
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