Title: Silicon Valley Killed the Design Agency
Context: Buying a design agency and bringing it in house does not a UX-led company make. But it’s better than the alternative.
Synopsis: Several years ago, prior to the burst of the dot com bubble, the world was littered with web design agencies. These were skills that did not exist inside established businesses so it made absolute sense for those with these talents to play the market and rent their expertise to the highest bidder. Eventually businesses (or more likely their finance people) realized that for the amount of money they were sending out the door to these web design mercenaries it would be cheaper and easier to simply bring this capability in house. These days, you’re not a serious business unless you have ownership of an end-to-end internet infrastructure capability—including design—as part of your core, day-to-day business model. As these same businesses wake up to the fact that UX is no longer a tangental competence best managed on a consultative basis, expect to see ever greater absorption of independent design talent into the corporate fabric. These things are too important to leave up to the caprice of agency partners. The life—and possible death—of your business depends on it.
Best Bit: “Great companies WILL create environments that creative people want to work in. If design is a strategic part of their business, they’re going to work really hard to figure it out.”
via zurb.com
Leave a Reply