I appreciate the response posted by Bryan Minihan to the IXDA discussion list a couple of months ago for being a much needed dose of good sense. Thank you Leah Buhley for bring it to our attention.

“The greatest mistake I ever made, working for my first big company (70K employees back in 1996) was thinking they were big enough to have solved all of the little problems. I couldn’t have been more wrong. It took 4 years at that company, and another 4 at my next big one (120K folks) before this sank into my thick head:

Both large and small companies not only suffer from similar problems, but they repeat them over and over again – because every company is comprised of human beings, all of whom want to leave their own mark on their respective organizations.

Over time, I have evolved a few mantras that (for me, at least) ensure my design work makes it to production intact:

• Always assume, despite all evidence to the contrary, that most people want to deliver quality work
• If you feel your company is too slow in delivering quality, most likely, everyone else does, too
• If you hear “that’s impossible”, you’re not providing enough of a solution
• If you hear “we don’t know how to do that”, you need to show them how
• If no one else will do it, figure out how to do it yourself
• If you get pushback from management, marketing, sales, support, operations, development, or the PMO office, then you’re not involving them in your design process
• If you don’t like the bureaucracy, figure out how to change it
• Never bash your own company/department/colleagues in public.
• If you disagree with a group or person in the way of progress, talk to them about it, or drop it and move on
• The folks who drive real change in large companies don’t do the leg-work. If you want to make a difference, climb out of the cube, talk to people, and claw your way to a level where you can affect real change. If you’re not up for that, stop complaining. Yes, this can take years (and has).

It’s far too easy to criticize from the outside, or from your own small silo in a very large company. Actually doing something about it is actual work.