In establishing our digital experience team at Marsh, we decided it was important we have a mission that we could always come back to remind us of our direction and the purpose of our work.
What follows is what I came up with. Along with being our team mantra, this would also help communicate our values to clients (both internal and external). As you may notice, I am indebted to great thinkers like Dieter Rams and Jakob Nielsen for some of these principles I espouse:
Before we get started, we’d like to introduce ourselves: we are the Marsh Digital Experience Team. We’re excited to work with you, but first we want to share something with you that should help you understand us a little better and what we believe in when it comes to design.
Our approach to design and digital properties is always centered around the user. Whether we are able to gather direct user input (recommended and preferred) or indirect user input (via user experts), the result is the same: a solution that considers the users' needs and goals every step of the way. A solution that leaves a positive, memorable impression on the user so that when he/she encounters Marsh again (in any form), that is the baseline.
How do we do that?
We can’t give away all of our design secrets, but we can share some principles we always strive to follow.
Our design and our content are clear. It isn’t necessarily brief, but it is clear. Those can often go hand in hand, but we err on the side of clarity.
Our design is focused. It is not screaming for attention in multiple places, or making you question what to look at first. Its focus allows the user to focus. It offers a direct path to follow, no matter where you are going.
Our design is deliberate and it is intentional. Everything is there for a reason. Nothing is superfluous. If there is something extra, it has a specific, measured purpose. We scrutinize everything to make sure only what is essential is present.
Our design is measured. We know the purpose of what we include in our design because we have tested it and measured it and shown that it is useful to the user. And we continue to measure each component, because as user behaviors change, our design must adapt accordingly.
Our design is minimal. As Dieter Rams would say, “good design is as little design as possible.” Good design should make you do, not think. When that is the case, less is more, and that is how we like to operate.
Finally, our design makes whatever we create useful. Ultimately, we are here to improve the user experience of our products. If it looks good but isn’t useful to the user, it isn’t worth pursuing. If it offers delight but isn’t useful to the user, it still isn’t worth pursuing. Until we know we’ve provided a useful tool to the user, we will not rest.
So that is our promise to you. Without it, we could get off easy (but we wouldn’t want that). We hold ourselves to these principles because we believe in them, and we hope by working with us, you will learn to as well.