Design Critique
A session structure that produces useful feedback instead of opinions, with the framing written in advance.
Definition
A critique template prepares the presenter's framing and structures the session so feedback is tied to stated objectives.
Craft convention. True because the industry converged on it. Breaking it costs familiarity, not correctness.
Fill it in
Loading your draft…
Saved in this browser only. Nothing is sent anywhere.
Framing (prepared by the presenter)
One or two sentences. What this work is trying to solve.
What is fixed. Feedback that ignores these wastes the session.
Saves the room from proposing what you already discarded, and says why.
Be specific. Unfocused requests produce unfocused feedback.
Session
Silent review first, then clarifying questions, then feedback, then a summary.
Record each point against the objective it relates to. Note preferences separately.
Outcome
The presenter decides. They are not obliged to accept every point, but they should say what they are doing.
Record what was not resolved and how it will be settled: research, a decision, or a test.
Running the session
A critique fails in the first two minutes, when nobody has said what the work is trying to do or what kind of feedback is wanted.
- 1
State the objective and the constraints
What this is meant to achieve, and what is already fixed. Feedback that ignores a hard constraint costs the session time and the presenter goodwill.
- 2
Name the ask
Explore, critique or approve. These are three different sessions, and most disagreements come from people being in different ones.
- 3
Give people silent time with the work
A few minutes of quiet review produces independent observations rather than variations on whatever the first person said.
- 4
Take questions of clarification first
Separating understanding from judgement prevents feedback aimed at something the work is not trying to do.
- 5
Feed back against the objective
Each point tied to the stated objective and, where possible, to a principle or evidence rather than to preference.
- 6
Close with what the presenter will do
The presenter restates the actions and what they are setting aside. Undecided feedback returns unchanged next week.
Giving and receiving it
Do
- Describe what you observe before proposing a change: I could not tell which action was primary, rather than make it blue.
- Say which principle or evidence a point rests on, so it can be weighed rather than counted.
- Ask the presenter what they already know is unresolved, and spend the time elsewhere.
- Record decisions and open questions where the work lives, not only in the meeting.
Do not
- Do not give feedback on fidelity the work does not claim to have.
- Do not redesign the work in the room, which replaces the presenter's thinking with the loudest person's.
- Do not let seniority settle a disagreement that evidence could settle.
- Do not run a critique without an objective. Without one, every opinion is equally relevant and nothing is decided.
Local chart
TPL·012 · Region VIII · Grid G4
This entry and the entries it is stated to connect with. Each line is labelled with what the connection means.
Continue from here
Each link says what the connection is, so you can tell a principle from an alternative from a thing people mix this up with.
Often used with
These usually appear in the same screen or the same decision.
- Confirmation BiasBIAS·009 · Cognitive bias
- Curse of KnowledgeBIAS·008 · Cognitive bias
- Contribution ModelsSYS·007 · Design system
- Occam's RazorPRIN·001 · Principle
- Heuristic EvaluationTPL·008 · Template
- Design CritiqueFLOW·001 · Workflow
Short definition
The one-paragraph version, for when that is all you need.
- Design CritiqueTERM·111 · Term