The Web Professional Of The Future
September 14, 2004 | 
15 Comments
Summary: I was recently interviewed for a high school project and it got me thinking about the Web professional of the future.
This last weekend I was asked to be interviewed for a high school project by a future Web professional, Dalibor Dvorski. You can read my answers at his site.
It was a quick interview, but it got me to thinking about how I stumbled into Web design and how different it will probably be for future Web designers. It’s not been that long but quite a bit has changed in the last 10 years or so.
If you’re like me you aren’t a “formally trained” Web professional. I’m mostly self taught and I imagine many people who’ve been at it awhile are as well, at least to some degree. At times I think this puts me at a disadvantage, yet I can say there are some plusses as well. But then again, it’s not like I had a choice.
When I got my first job as a Web designer there were no formal programs teaching Web design, development or anything like that. There were a few fledgling certificate programs but they weren’t really an option and I’m actually glad I didn’t try to pursue that course.
Looking at the state of education in Web design today, which is much better, but still way too “tools” focused, I realized that back then I’d probably not have gotten very far relying on a “formal” Web design education. It’d have been outdated pretty quick. As well it doesn’t fit my learning style, a style which has really helped me stay on top of all it takes to be a Web professional.
I learn on the job, and while the theory would have been good to have, everything else was, and still is to a lesser degree, too fluid to learn from a few years of classes. There are many, many times, even today, when I feel like I’m making it up as I go along. Yes, trial and error are still in full effect.
We don’t have any hard rules for how to plan, design and build Web sites and applications yet. We’ve got some great guidelines and we’re learning more and more about our medium every day, but the fact remains that Web design (etc.) is a young field and those of us who are working on the Web in a professional aspect are still kind of pioneers.
In many respects the arguments we have on issues like liquid design, browser compatibility, Flash, semantic coding, Web standards and the rest are similar to a child pushing and learning the boundaries and limits of its parents. But we’re growing up. The Web gets more mature and our disciplines become more defined every year.
Some day soon we’ll be introducing more new generations of working professionals to the Web. Kids who grew up with computers and the Internet. College grads who’ve been trained on the fundamentals we’re just now fleshing out. Those of us who’ve been here for awhile will have an opportunity to be teachers and mentors and even though there will always be lots more to learn and new methods to master, we’ll have a whole lot of knowledge and experience to offer.
I spend a lot of time thinking about the future of the Web, where design will be and how we can help lay a foundation for those who come after us. I’ve written about my feelings on learning Web design and I’m always interested and excited about how those just beginning to architect, design and build the Web see our professions.
I’m even more interested in how they envision moving it forward. Here’s to the future of the Web and those who make it.
Filed under: Web General
Comments
1. Jeremy Flint said:
I am in the same boat as you are Keith. I have been designing web sites since 96/97 (maybe even as early as 1995), but I have never received any “formal” training. I taught myself HTML. Cnet’s Builder.com was my main hang-out for many years.
As far as the design side of things, I have always been artistic. Always loved drawing and such. My college education in Graphic Design sort of helped form my “style” of web design, always pushing for clean lines, well organized content, and easy to use (similar to the swiss school of design i guess - very much based on the grid).
Now, there are classes being taught in High School, mostly about how to use programs like Dreamweaver and Photoshop. Few, if any, of the courses are teaching usability, accessibility, or just basic design theory as it relates to web design: content organization, heirarchy of page elements, etc.
Posted on September 14, 2004 11:35 AM | #
2. Rob Mientjes said:
Now we actually are pioneers, but that shouldn’t stop us from trying to do it as if it is serious business - it most certainly is. The day will come, though, that most of the more experienced computer users are familiar with web site creation, and the day will come that what we do is outdated (though we still can keep up). But I still have high hopes. If I keep on learning and growing in the business, I still have my business.
But you are right - it is still a young industry, and the future of it is still a blur.
Posted on September 14, 2004 11:50 AM | #
3. Adam said:
Keith, or whomever, do you think there will ever be “hard rules” for development, design, etc? Are there really hard rules per se in other careers? (Note: I don’t know the answers here, I’m truly asking) Will web professionals ever have professional schooling – like architects, doctors and lawyers do now?
Ooh, and how about: Will there ever be a web design equivalent to Harvard Law? A web design school known around the world for turning out the best and the brightest?
And the kicker: Will people ever stop saying, “Oh, my 13 year old cousin is a web designer, too.”
Posted on September 14, 2004 12:01 PM | #
4. Keith said:
Adam – Good questions.
1 - I’m not sure we’ll ever have “rules” but we’ll have more solid guidelines for sure.
2 - There are rules in other similar careers. Software development, arcitecture and even visual design have some semblance of rules to be learned and followed. Especially when it comes to process, something I find an ongoing challenge when it comes to Web design.
3 - I hope so. It would probably be to narrow to cover simply “Web design” but maybe a school like that for HCI or something that covers a wide range of interactive disciplines. I imagine there are schools out there now that are heading this direction.
4 - I think so. I still find it extremely funny to hear people who think that professional Web design and development can be done by just anyone. It’s a joke…not even going to go there.
Posted on September 14, 2004 12:19 PM | #
5. Dalibor said:
Definitely have to agree with you, Jeremy.
I have yet to come across a true Web Design and Development course in high school. The ones that I’ve come by are still focused on the old school HTML, and don’t even touch upon XHTML and CSS, as well as Web Standards and Accessibility guidelines. Because of this, I’ve found it easier to learn everything by myself.
It would be nice to see a fully loaded Web Design class for a younger audience as well.
But again, you can learn a lot by just trial and error and analyzing the work of other designers and developers such as Keith.
Posted on September 14, 2004 01:01 PM | #
6. Kyle said:
I agree with you very much Keith as I’ve always felt that web production never really required any formal training as standards and methods are changing too quickly for schools to keep up.
Let’s take me for example, about a year and a half ago I decided to start taking web design seriously. I learned how HTML works from the inside out (not just generally, but specificallY). I learned how CSS works, how it should be used, and how it needs to be used. I’ve spent that year and half making websites nearly non-stop. Most of them never left my computer, but that doesn’t matter - I was just making them. So where did it get me? Well a few weeks ago I was asked to join a design studio. Now I’ve had the pleasure of working on projects for clients like Apple, Disney, Philips, etc. What a mindblower.
Now let’s take a look at this from a person just getting into web design. I say if you put enough effort into it, you can do just what I did. Become a full blown professional in a year. Not many other professions are like that. Would formal schooling have helped me? As far as web production, no. I would have wasted money on classes that didn’t teach me what I needed to teach myself. Instead of just knowing how to do something, I know why I’m doing something. That knowledge is invaluable.
Design on the other hand, I believe still has a lot to do as far as formal training goes. I’ve learned a ton in these past few weeks, little nuances, almost all design though. If I had formal training in color theory, how people read things, etc I would have known these. Sure, I’ve touched upon all these subjects on my own - but never gotten down to the nitty-gritty.
So my opinion for those wanting to do web design as a living? Take formal schooling in business and design. Forget HTML/CSS classes, you should learn that on your own. I’m not sure any degree would really help either, simply the experience of taking the classes.
Just my .02 (well, damn.. .looks like more of a 20 dollar bill - I should learn how to cut things short)
Posted on September 14, 2004 01:06 PM | #
7. Cody Lindley said:
Keith
Pioneering a new industry which relies heavily on a computer geek like understanding of many different professional fields is absolutely a difficult road to pave. Even more so because in most cases our pioneering traces the footsteps of many long standing professions which have already been pioneered. Pioneers we are, but man does it ever wear a person thin. I’ll just say it, it sucks!
Some days I would rather grab a shovel and dig a hole then explain the different between a reader and a user.
cody
Posted on September 14, 2004 02:06 PM | #
8. Mike said:
I began designing web sites in late 1997 with only Windows NotePad, The Complete Idiot’s Guide To Creating HTML 4 Web Sites, and the desire to create something the world would possibly see.
I tried using tools like FrontPage and Dreamweaver, but always found myself going back to the HTML View part of the editor and hand-coding the pages.
I even tried going to school in 2001 to get a degree and found that I could learn and keep up with the ever-evolving web standards better than the instructors could. I even had to correct a few teachers on the HTML/XHTML differences and deprecations. I ultimately felt that I could do better outside of school and dropped out after a year.
I have done better. Not career-wise, but design-wise. I feel that I can design standards-compliant web sites with the best of them. This may sound conceited, but I see it as confidence. As my Grandfather always said, “Confidence is believing that you can do something right. Conceit is believing you can’t do anything wrong.”
Posted on September 14, 2004 02:15 PM | #
9. Jeff said:
As Mike states, schools are rough for learning this stuff.
Things like business and architecture have a lot of hard and fast rules to them - facts to be tested on a ScanTron test sheet. Web design has very, very few of these rules. A good deal of them even change over time. (Example: content under the fold used to be almost completely ignored, but web users are more comfortable with scrolling now, so it’s becoming less of an issue)
I am in school for a “Multimedia & Web Design” B.A. right now, but the web part of the program is a let down. Meaning, I’ve learned much more on my own. The things I get from the school are the design and business side of things. Plus, it’s a nice three years of time to get up to speed with things and begin building a portfolio.
Posted on September 14, 2004 02:35 PM | #
10. Brian Rose said:
Currently, I’m enrolled as a Graphic Design major. I know that my design technique and skill need to be upped quite a bit.
When it comes to web development, though, both on the markup and scripting side, I’ve taught myself everything. In 1996, during my sixth grade year, I joined a club at school called ‘Webmasters’. We sat around, like a bunch of geeks, going over tags and how domain propogation worked.
This was all student oriented and I found it really enjoyable. After middle school, I was the only person from the club who stuck with it. In my sophomore year of high school, I gained an interest in PHP and started learning as much as I could. I hung around the phpBB.com forums for ages and am a moderator there today.
The point of all of the above was this: even after eight years of learning about and developing web pages and applications, I’m still just a “future Web professional”. Looking at what is currently offered at the schools I took a look at during my university search (primarily the University of Colorado at Boulder and the other two Colorado state schools), education has a long way to go.
All of the programs I looked at didn’t include such things as PHP development (or even a class that could have had a discussion on it, really), nor did the curricula mention anything about CSS. The Computer Arts major classes strictly uses Dreamweaver, and the mention of scripting by hand appears to be lost on the faculty.
The educational programs out there really need to step up. I think a school for web design and development is needed, much like what DigiPen Institute did for video gaming. Just an idea.
Posted on September 14, 2004 03:55 PM | #
11. vanderwal said:
Keith, I really like your post. I learned from copying in ‘94 and had my own sites running in ‘95 and was doing this professionally in ‘96. I learned from seeing how others did things, then I went about breaking things, and fixing them. A List Apart, Web Monkey, and HTML Writer’s Guild were places I tried to absorb everything. I kept placing my hope in the tools, but the tools continually failed me and the only way to do things that worked was do it my hand (or use tools to cut down on time, but clean-up by hand).
In 2000 I found myself digging in the W3C spec trying to find answers to problems that tools from fellow developers were creating. I started going back to conferences and adding to my large book collection about this time also (conference that I had gone to before were mostly VP of Marketing talking about their tools that gave me headaches). At that point everybody good was self-taught.
In the past few years I have found little change in web training.
Colleges and the certificate schools seem to focus on tools still and don’t seem to provide a means to understand information workflow and understanding the medium. Many design schools are still in print mode or are also tied to tools. Information on the web should flow easily from a desktop, to laptop, to mobile with little problem, but they don’t because the pages are not built with best practices.
Setting best practices are very important. From the setting of how to understand the information to present and how it works in the medium is very important. From there is gets to how to best construct a site and pages. When is it appropriate to use Flash, movies, etc.? These questions don’t get asked and the answers don’t seem to be given. Another problem is moving information from print to digital formats and the changes that are needed to best work with the medium at hand.
The perception that the web is easy gets a lot of garbage created that does not work well across platforms and may not be usable. The reality is being a web professional is a lot of work. The changes are not as frequent or deep as they have been prior to 2001, but there is still a lot to learn. There is also a lot to share for those of us who learned from the bumps and bruises of trial and error as there was no other way.
We also need a language of criticism for this medium. This will help peer reviewing and improving the whole in a constructive manner. Just as film, television, literature, music have have their languages of criticism the web and digital information need this same language.
Posted on September 14, 2004 07:22 PM | #
12. Janne said:
I started implementing (not really designing) web sites late 1993 or early 1994, can’t remember now. I’m still using the same tool (emacs) for HTML coding. The versions have changed, I have learned a couple of new languages, Java and PHO, during that course, but the basic workflow is the same – maybe a little more optimised than ten years ago…
So, I agree with the rest of you that tools are not really the key for the design. They may be for the productivity, and for example, Adobe Photoshop has taken gigantic leaps towards easier web image creation.
Regarding the rules, I think that they won’t be any hard rules ever – if not created by some regulation body such as the government or EU, maybe for the thinking the best of consumers.
If you compare web site implementation/design to software implementation/design, you see several shared concepts. The programming paradigm has evolved steadily over the past 50 years, but they are still no explicit rules how to make good code/programs (or how to spot bad code/programs). Instead, there are several different ways to improve the quality, such as design patterns and extreme programming.
These improvements are not followed blindly. Instead, they are applied to resolve a specific issue. I can see several similar approaches in web design currently, see e.g. alistapart.com for several examples.
On the other hand, web environment is still moving ahead fast and the ordinary life cycles of web design projects are multitudes smaller than software projects. This has lead to inferior quality and other issues that we see every day. Web is also “too simple”, so everybody can learn the basics – the surface, not the deeper structure and semantics.
Can I boldly say that if web coding would be harder, we would see better sites?
Posted on September 15, 2004 01:58 AM | #
13. Dave Marks said:
I’m pretty much gonna echo what others have said, but i think its important to know that this is the way most people ended up in the web world.
Like Mike, I went to Uni. Although I studied Computer Science, we had a web module - you can imagine i was overjoyed when the tutor said we would be useing a text editor and learning the raw html, as oppossed to learning to use dreamweaver or frontpage.
Then he started saying things like that
wasn’t part of a pair like most tags, and that you put it at the end of the paragragh! Gah! I nearly keeled over!!
Anyway a year of that (I had to give them a chance hey!) and I bailed out.
Since then, I’ve spend the last year and a bit working for myself. I had the luxury of a few months living rent free with my folks and £1K inheritance in the bank to get me started.
I spent about 50% of my time teaching myself, 20% working and 30% on the beach (I live in newquay, cornwall, uk). While at Uni i had picked up a 3 regular clients, and when it came to jumping ship i managed to get them onto a monthly retainer which guaranteed my rent got paid at least.
A year later, I’ve done NO advertising and I can’t keep up with the work. Word of mouth really is the best advertising!
I can now code complete valid xhtml 1.1 / css 2.0 sites. And have produced a lot of asp driven stuff aswell, including ecom shops, custom cms etc etc
I had a big problem with believing i can do things with the “professionals” but having stolen a few clients from the biggest design firm down here aswell as a few up country i comparing my portfolio with their frontpage type ridden code, i feel i’m ontop of the world :) (Please don’t look at my personal site - it hasn’t been updated since pre-uni! you know what they say about the builders house never being finished…)
Posted on September 15, 2004 03:14 AM | #
14. JohnLab said:
Hey thanks for posting this. I just loved reading everyone⦡mp;#x20AC;™s experience. It does seem like everyone came from informal training. I did, someone asked me if I was interested, I said sure. The guy went on vacation and told me to recreate the CNN.com site at the time using table-based layout. I had zilch experience. From there it grew. I am have moved on from web design and moved more into the realm of UI design for web-based applications. Most of the skills are the same. Not as much focus on things like SEO.
I think there are subjects that every designer should be well versed in. I have seen too many scenarios were things are functional but ugly and hard to use, or very pretty, but with nothing behind it⦡mp;#x20AC;? For me, I would learn whatever the job required me to learn at first, then in down time take classes or buy a book. I hear people tell me it⦡mp;#x20AC;™s a waste of time to get certified, but one of the best things that I did was get certified by Macromedia, recruiters and HR love certifications and degrees. Here⦡mp;#x20AC;™s what I am thinking what should be required in no particular order:
- User Interface design and usability theories
- Typography
- Color Theory
- Animation theory
- Intermediate knowledge of the major design tools (i.e. Photoshop, Fireworks, Illustrator, Flash, Dreamweaver), because if you don⦡mp;#x20AC;™t know already⦡mp;#x20AC;? recruiters and HR look for that too
- Intermediate knowledge of Web-based programming languages (CSS, XHTML, and JavaScript)
- Have an understanding of what is and is not capable in the backend (say with PHP, ASP, JSP, and Java)
- Accessibility best practice procedures
- Current Web Standards
- Branding
- Search Engine Optimization
- Good presentation skills
- Project management basics
- Software architecture basics
- Misc (FTP, HTML e-mail⦡mp;#x20AC;™s, PDF conversions)
- Constant alertness to the latest trends and fads of the Web Design world, you can not succeed in this business if are not.
Posted on September 15, 2004 07:16 AM | #
15. Taco John said:
I think web design hasn’t been fleshed out because the companies who have the websites haven’t really cared until recently. (Those who have dealt with clients, please correct me if I’m wrong) The attitude was (again, pure SWAG here) “If we have a website, and people know the address, it will be good enough.” The more studies that come out saying that a highly accessible website generates higher sales (I don’t know if it does), the more clients who will demand a higher level of excellence in their web design investments.
Let me also make an analogy to another industry. I’m currently in my senior year, getting a sports marketing and management degree. Until very recently, the attitude was “If you build it, they will come”. And if teams couldn’t fill a stadium, either fans just didn’t like the sport, or the team wasn’t good enough, so go get better players. It wasn’t until very recently that market research crept into the sports industry. So there are finally guidelines about how to market sporting events, what’s effective and what’s not.
Posted on September 15, 2004 08:22 AM | #
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