Self-education is a sound investment

Success in any industry requires a robust curiosity

If I happen to find myself on your operating table, or at the mercy of your defense in a courtroom, I’m going to expect that you went to college specifically to do those things. And the better the school, the better I’m probably going to feel about it.

But if I’m interviewing you for a design position, I’m less concerned with where that diploma came from—where that learning took place—or if it represents a BA, BS, BFA, or WTF. We aren’t making life or death decisions in this profession.

Don’t get me wrong: A good education is a must in the design world.

Design is all I’ve ever done, and all I really wanted to do since I took my first design course. But I was only formally trained as a print designer. Since then, my career has been varied, following a path that’s taken me in several different directions. I’ve worked in everything from human-centered, agile product design to customer experience design to service design.

And I didn’t study any of these particular capabilities in a classroom.

But I’ve continued to train my eye and my brain throughout my career, to the point where I can lean into those things and extend myself to pick up new skills.

I often tell my students that when someone asks me, today, to design a logo, or consumer packaging, or even a website, I don’t get excited about it like I used to. I’ve been there, done that. But the day I get an email that says, “can you design a chair for me?” will be the day I emphatically state: “Hell yes, I can!”

Why? Because it’s something new. It’s a challenge. And I’m confident in my ability to apply the skills I have, and pick up the ones I need, to give it a good go.

Learning in the age of information

No matter when you are reading this, you are living at the height of the Information Age. Think about that. You can find anything you want to know with a quick Google search, and an immeasurable amount of information is available to you at all times. Information such as: How to write solid SEO for a website, how to create screen transition animations for an app, and probably even how to design a sleek-ass chair.

I hate to burst your bubble—especially if you just wrote a fat check to a university—but there’s so much design knowledge that can just as easily be found online as it can in a classroom. A quick search for a tutorial topic on YouTube will return hundreds of results, showcasing varied opinions and approaches. Educational platforms like Skillshare and LinkedIn Learning offer thousands of deep-dive courses into specialized topics, and at a much more affordable price than the typical college tuition.

It’s probably safe to say there’s an e-learning course for everything. And, in my opinion, design educators should be leaning on those resources (even outside of the classroom) to supplement coursework. That way, they can spend more time with students developing analytical problem-solving skills, and spend less time focused on technology. Because if you haven’t figured it out by now: Photoshop skills do not equal design skills.

But it’s not logical to rely on the Internet as your only source of design knowledge. Hanging out on Dribbble all day isn’t going to give you the skills you need to make it or the tools to help grow your career in a valuable way.

There’s a fragile line between the things you have to be taught, and the things you can just as quickly learn on your own.

Design school is only a starting point

Now I know we just spent time discussing all the flaws of design school, but if you know—for a fact—that you want to pursue a career in design, then you should 100% go to design school. Period. As long as you can afford it. That way, you’ll receive fundamental hands-on training and start to build a portfolio—the necessities if you want a foot in the door.

Design school will push you out of your comfort zone to try new things and help you build an understanding of what you like and don’t like; what works and doesn’t work. More importantly, you’ll learn how to work with other people and start to build a network. And, hopefully, you’ll learn how to manage deadlines.

Your design school of choice should provide you with an excellent overview of design history. Knowing what people have done, what they’re doing now, and what they’re referencing is a considerable step toward building an understanding of design. If you plan to break the rules one day, you at least need to know what they are and why they exist.

In my opinion, instructor-led education is precious. It should help you hone your mind and teach you how to approach problems. However, any school is only capable of equipping you with the basics, skill-wise, before sending you out into the real world. It’s on you to continue building those skills once you get there.

Good teachers may inspire you, but they should also encourage you to learn independently. And it also helps to have excellent coaches and sponsors who are willing to give you access to what they’ve learned over their careers.

Ultimately, suppose you regard learning solely as a passive process that relies on transferring knowledge from teacher to student. In that case, it’s unlikely that you’ll continue important learning habits after you leave school. Newton said, “An object at rest tends to stay at rest.” So the path to new knowledge often starts with you getting your ass off the couch and seeking it out.

Adopt a learner mindset

As the Wu-Tang Clan’s RZA famously said, “Whether I went to school or not, I would always study.” If this sounds like you, you’re probably already on the path to evolving your skills and knowledge about design (and other things) on your own time, without the need for encouragement or direction.

So, as much as I am ‘pro design school,’ I’m even more ‘pro-education.’ I believe that everyone needs to constantly feed their brains and strive to learn new things, regardless of profession or personal interests. And luckily, today, the majority of self-directed learning can be done when you want it, how you want it.

We hear—more and more—that those diplomas aren’t as valuable today as they used to be. But that doesn’t negate the truth that being successful at design requires a ton of education.

Like any, learning in this field should never stop, and you should never be satisfied that any amount of knowledge is enough.

There’s always more to discover: New tools, new digital habits, new consumer expectations. Without an ongoing devotion to learning, the speed of change in the design industry will leave you behind. Just ask anyone who studied paste-up and phototypesetting techniques in design school, right before computers radically changed the industry and turned those fundamentals into relics.

Design school isn’t the only path to becoming a designer or staying relevant in the design profession. Regardless of what you study in school (or even whether you went to school or not, like RZA), the most valuable skill you can acquire is the desire to engage with new subjects and apply that knowledge to a wide variety of problems. To approach those problems with a mindset that pulls from many disciplines. The earlier you can do it, the better.

Understanding the concept of “learning to learn” may be the most significant outcome of your design education. It’s a tool more valuable than technical proficiency or a strong portfolio. One of my colleagues often says, “you never learn something you don’t want to learn.”

So becoming a self-learner is all up to you. Prioritize this skill, and you’ll have a long (and hopefully successful) career.