Your Design Workflow
The workflow is an absolute key that can help you save your valuable time without compromising on the quality. With an efficient workflow you can proficiently accomplish your tasks well in time and ensure a hefty return for all your time spent on completing the tasks.
One can scrutinize the entire design and development process by closely observing his workflow and determining the aspects of your day that are non-productive and consume most of your time. Once the factors that are restricting your productivity are uncovered, you can figure out an efficient solution with flair.
Here I have enlisted a few of the resourceful tips that can expedite design workflow productivity while ensuring high end quality, let’s have a glance at them.
1. Outline a daily routine with the time boxing technique
According to the time boxing approach, you have to fix a particular time period to work on a task. It will help you break down your design projects into the work sessions that can be managed with ease. The time slot in the increment of which you can work on a task is completely up to you; you can either set it as 30 minutes or as 3 hours. Embracing this technique in your daily routine will offer you a foundation for getting closer to the completion of a task every day.
Moreover, it is also advisable to identify the time period when you have maximum energy. Since, when you feel energetic, you can work with better concentration and accomplish the task with greater precision and speed. Thereby, scheduling the most challenging tasks when your energy is at a peak and low energy tasks for times when you have relatively lower energy can definitely help you rev up your productivity and improve the quality of your work.
2. Go for more shortcuts
Using shortcuts while designing can help you efficiently streamline the process and work more smoothly without any hassles. For instance, Ctrl+C, Ctrl+V and Ctrl+S are a few of the simple yet highly useful shortcuts that enable one to copy, paste and save respectively with a breeze. Luckily, most design software features integrated shortcuts that can improve your workflow productivity. However, you may need some time to get used to these shortcuts, but once you learn them, you can observe a dramatic change in your performance.
There are several default shortcuts, but you can also choose to create your own shortcuts for the things that you do frequently. Also, you can reap the benefits of highly useful software shortcuts; for instance, the powerful batch editing tool offered by Photoshop is a great alternative to edit a group of images included in a folder.
3. Break down your project and apply an effective task management
It is always advisable to sit and analyze the entire project beforehand so that the large task can be broken down into small actionable tasks. By doing so, you can simplify a complex task into smaller tasks. You can schedule the task and requisite components appropriately. Further, you can implement an effective one-touch principle for easily managing the task.
The one-touch principle suggests that tasks must be processed and assigned as they appear. For example, you can proficiently manage your email inbox either by immediately responding to an email or adding the task in the task management system; while making an entry in the system, you must assign a certain time at which you will look into that task. This practice will help you accomplish simple design tasks simultaneously while efficiently scheduling other tasks. Thus, you can avoid a stack of pending work with this approach and better manage your designing tasks.
4. Choose an appropriate tool for prolific collaboration
There may be a case that, despite of working as a team, you have divided the project among several individuals. In such situations, when there is no common office place, sharing designs and fetching feedback from other designers can become quite annoying. However, this can be easily managed by establishing effective collaboration among the team members. Fortunately, there are several amazing tools available on the Internet that ensures a quick and seamless collaboration. This lets members professionally work in harmony irrespective of their place of work.
5. Keep time-consuming failures and mistakes at bay – Maintain checklists
You can standardize your workflows by using checklists. These procedural documents can ensure that prime objectives are accomplished. By maintaining and referring a checklist of design tasks, you can avoid project crashes and other threatening situations.
6. Don’t forget to track your progress
Measuring the degree of persistence plays a vital in improving your overall productivity. Thus, it is advisable to track your progress, which includes analyzing the goals that you have successfully achieved and the steps that can be further improved. This will allow you to determine your weaknesses that need to be amended with a better approach.
There is no rocket science behind the techniques of improving the design workflow efficiency. It is a steady process that demands persistent efforts and contribution. You may use the aforementioned tips and boost your productivity and deliver astonishing design results while adhering to the deadlines.
About the Author –
Amanda Cline is a Programmer who has helped companies gain momentum with their small and large scale projects. If you need to convert psd to mobile app template then simply get in touch with Amanda via Twitter. she has also written interesting and informative articles on Custom Software Development, Web and mobile Application Development etc. She is currently working for Designs2HTML, a leading Web Development Company.
