#009: Self-Awareness & Skill-Mapping

As a Designer, and someone who aspires to grow every day, I am in a consistent state of evolving and emotion. I want to be the best version of myself, but I see all my flaws. I want to present the best experiences in the world, but I see all the mistakes. Call me Hamilton because I’ve never been satisfied.

I will admit I am a perfectionist. Genuinely, I am never happy with anything I make, and I always think about how I can make it even better. This is a personal problem that may never be resolved, however, I have come to terms with this feature, and now, I am learning how to turn my weaknesses into strengths. The process is simple, first, it is the awareness that something is wrong, then it is a desire to change, then it is learning how to change, then it is trying to change. Once my weakness is a normal aspect of myself, I can learn how to improve it and turn that into a strength. Not succumbing to insecurities and fears along the way is the true challenge, however, I have found that only you can be your worst enemy. And once you get past the daunting first step, you will start to sprint in no time.

My first step was the hardest. I want to admit something rather personal, but I feel that sharing will help others not make the same mistakes as me, or, at least, get professional help sooner rather than later. I have recently come to terms with the fact that I have serious mental health issues and I was self-medicating heavily with alcohol. I have always been slightly aware of these things, unfortunately, I just never cared enough to change and I dissociated so hard that I was numb to my depression. Deep down I wanted to be better, and I cared about others around me, unfortunately, I found it hard to take myself seriously sometimes. In the end, the best decision I made was to seek professional help and guidance on how to handle my mental health issues.

Thankfully, I am speaking retrospectively and have dealt with these issues rigorously over the last 10 years, but it is a battle that will extend for eternity. As Marcus Parks from Last Podcast on the Left says, "Your mental illness is not your fault, but it is your responsibility." Even though I have been aware of my internal issues, only now am I truly taking it seriously, and after five months of extreme personal challenges, I finally feel like I am heading in the right direction. I feel a sense of clarity I have never felt before. It took tremendous pressure and stress to push me out of the molasses river I was wading through, but now I don’t feel so stuck. I feel light and insightful. I am already gaining priceless insights that are seemingly endless, and I am excited to share some big ones today.?

I could probably write a whole series on my journey with mental health and substance abuse, but for now, I want to focus on how I have applied self-awareness to my professional life as a Designer. Ironically, to focus, you must first unfocus, zoom out, and examine the entire picture to achieve the most realistic perspective. To improve as a Designer, you must understand how you fit into the current design landscape and how your skills will impact a modern team. Competition is fierce and the industry evolves constantly, therefore it is a good exercise to map your skills and understand where you are at and where you want to be. You may find that you weren’t as talented as you initially thought, I know I did. I will be the first to admit that I was arrogant and overconfident in my abilities as an individual contributor, and I thought I could take on the world. I fell into the trap of spiraling tunnel vision becoming a turbulent cycle of random ideas and projects not seen through or thought out. I was ignoring good advice and hyper-focusing on irrelevant details while ignoring glaring, larger, issues.

Ultimately, it came down to listening to others and allowing myself to be vulnerable enough to let people in and try to help. That is why the first step is the hardest, you can’t do it alone and it will not be pretty. You must be vulnerable, be humble, kill your ego, and learn to let others in. You may not like what you hear, the truth hurts, but once you come to terms with reality, you can start living in it.

NNG Skill-Mapping

Now that I am living in reality, I am coming to terms with my current state as a Designer, and learning what I want to improve on for my future state. By mapping my skills according to Rachel Krause with the Nielsen Norman Group, I have gained a holistic understanding of who I am as a Designer and how I can impact a team.

Here are my results in a nice infographic that I put together.

I admit, I was surprised by the results. I realized I was putting way too much value on one aspect of who I am as a designer. I became very lopsided. I was good at visual design and continued improving on that skill until I eventually maxed it out. Now, the time I spend trying to get better at the visual side of the house is much less impactful than the time I would spend trying to improve the experience side of the house. Therefore, I should improve my qualitative and quantitative research skills to help me validate further that my beautiful wireframes are solving the User's problems.

Next, a great skill to have as a designer is presenting your work and telling an audience story. This used to be my biggest weakness, but over the years I have focused on growing that skill by trying it, failing, learning, and repeating. Every time I gave a presentation, I felt like I was at death's door, but after my blood pressure settled, I felt an incredible gain of strength and wisdom. Just trying something and not worrying about the results is a great skill to master, and I will let you know when I even master the art of failure.

Becoming self-aware is a challenge. The process comes down to wanting to change and believing that you can make a difference. The answer to those questions is always yes, you can change. You must want to change, challenge yourself, and believe in yourself. As long as you are passionate and remain resilient, you will be surprised by what you can achieve. Just remember that nothing good in life comes easy.

Thank you for reading, and have a great day!

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Links & References:

NNG Skill Mapping — https://www.nngroup.com/articles/skill-mapping/

My Last Article — #008: Cool Takes on AI

My Website — https://www.cmykris.com/