"Oh, did you need that?" The absolute innocence. The frustratingly obvious problem. Am I talking about Bailey (the rescue horse pictured) stepping on the hose while I try to fill watering troughs? Or am I talking about the resources, meetings, and access required to do my job well, that other people don't realize they're blocking? When I work in design, I'm always working deeply in context. I absolutely need the context of what business problem this feature or product needs to do, and I also need the context for the user and for the customer. When I work on a farm in early Spring, I'm always working deeply in mud... like the mud I had just dragged this hose through, that Bailey is stepping on.
I usually think of that as systems thinking versus task or linear thinking. As content designers, I feel like we're frequently in the minority as systems thinkers in task-oriented environments. When we do get to work with other systems thinkers, they work in *other* systems. I'm not sure why the dynamic skews this way, but I know this is why I get so excited to be in a room full of content designers and information architects. Now I want to go design a "THIRSTY FOR CONTEXT" shirt.Torrey Podmajersky Please give Bailey's nose a good scratch for me, and I'll happily check that site!
I’ve been thinking a lot lately about how breakdowns like this aren’t really about skill. They’re about missing context and constraints that aren’t visible to the people doing the work. When those get blocked, everything downstream suffers. I’ve been working on a scalable framework around this and your metaphor captures it perfectly!
If you're frustrated with a hose-blocker right now, consider turning that energy into a good work: contribute a few bucks to feed Bailey and the other rescue horses at Toni's Ponies. https://www.tonisponies.org/bailey