Do I have to be a good sketcher to get into design? 

The easy answer is no. In a design process, sketching Is important but the goal is not pretty pictures, it's about communication and implied realism. So practice is absolutely necessary but it doesn’t matter how ugly your picture looks, as long as you get the idea across.  

What’s the difference between engineers and designers? 

Broadly, it comes down to the approach of problem solving. Engineers excel at problems with constraints because it's based on mathematics. The more “knowns” you have, the better. Designers perform well when the problem is very abstract or obscured, where the development might not be linear. I find that when designers have too many knowns, it can negatively affect alternative solutions. Another big difference I’ve noticed is that engineering takes a very objective approach to users while designers heavily depend on user feedback to influence solutions. One is not better than the other, it just depends on what the problem needs, while most times, both are required. Left leg, right leg.  

I’m not creative, can I still be a designer? 

While some people seem as if they were born more creative than the rest of us, creativity can be learned and developed. How you may ask? Creativity really is just connecting the dots, stringing together existing ideas that seem separate, but the connection is what people perceive as “novel” or “innovative”. Like my grandma said: “there’s nothing new under the sun”. Great designers know themselves, know their design process, and understand that they need to experience life to have dots to connect. So anyone can be creative, it just takes work and exploration. 

Is design an art or science? 

Yes… It’s as much an art, as anything you design should invoke a reaction from people, as much as it is a science, in that things need to be quantified, especially in industry. Also, while design thinking might appear as a set of steps, your personal design process requires experimentation. So, while design has areas that are meant to be an artistic expression, professionally speaking, design is without a doubt, a science that can be hypothesized on, experimented on, proven and repeated. 

Do I have to go to design school?

Mmm, Nah. Design is a continually shifting professional field, so it doesn’t have a state licensing requirement like architecture and engineering have. Also, design is very much about your portfolio, networking, and maybe your ability to wear those cool eyeglasses. BUT design education is amazing because it's basically a greenhouse to grow those areas. However, if you are adept enough and know how to grow those things on your own, it’s not necessary. 

Are there design jobs out there? 

Yes but again, it is what you make it. Because design has experienced explosive growth at the professional level, things are shifting and constantly changing. Companies are looking for designers to solve complex problems but they, I’ve noticed, don’t necessarily understand how to define that position and therefore, have trouble finding qualified designers to fill that position. So, you have to be very clear at what kind of problems you can solve and your process and put that work out there.  

How do I start designing? 

Find a problem in areas of interest that you have, and solve them. If you try and use design techniques all at once, it can be overwhelming. I would suggest focusing on a specific aspect of design while solving the problem. For example, if you want to design a new cup to hold art pencils, try solving that by only using sketching techniques. Or you can use the same problem but this time, try focusing on prototyping and user research. Eventually, you solve enough problems that you can then build a killer portfolio.