How to Communicate Design Decisions to Non-Designers

Introduction

Ever presented a design you loved, only to hear: “Can we make it pop more?” or “I liked the first version better.”

Designers speak in user flows, accessibility, and cognitive load—but stakeholders often think in ROI, deadlines, and personal preferences. This gap leads to frustration, wasted time, and worse: bad design compromises.

This guide teaches you how to bridge that gap using empathy, strategy, and a little psychology.

1. Understand Their Perspective

Why they see things differently:

• Executives care about business impact.

• Engineers care about feasibility.

• Clients care about personal taste (even if they say they don’t).

What to do:

• Ask questions first: “What’s the biggest concern with this design?”

• Align with their goals: Tie design choices to metrics (e.g., “This CTA placement increased sign-ups by 20% in tests.”)

2. The 3-Part Framework for Persuasion

To get buy-in, structure your rationale around:

A. Data (Logic)

• User testing clips

• Analytics (e.g., “60% of users missed the button in the old layout.”)

• Competitor benchmarks

B. Storytelling (Emotion)

• User personas (e.g., “Meet Sarah, who struggles with small buttons because of arthritis.”)

• Before/after scenarios (show the problem your design solves)

C. Tradeoffs (Realism)

Acknowledge constraints: “We could make the text flashy, but it would hurt readability—here’s a compromise.”

3. Phrases to Avoid (And What to Say Instead)

❌ “This is best practice.” → “Here’s how this approach improves [specific metric].”
❌ “That’s not how users think.” → “In testing, users struggled when we tried that—here’s the video.”
❌ “Trust me, I’m the designer.” → “Let me walk you through the research behind this.”

4. Handling Common Pushback

“Make the logo bigger.”

• Response: “I tested two versions—larger logos actually drew attention away from the call-to-action, reducing conversions by 15%. What’s the primary goal here?”

“I don’t like the colors.”

• Response: “These colors align with our accessibility contrast ratios. Would you like to see a variant that keeps compliance but adjusts the tone?”

“Just copy [Competitor X].”

• Response: “Their users have different needs—here’s how our solution better serves [our specific audience].”

5. Real-World Example

Situation: A client insisted on a cluttered homepage.
Solution:

1. Showed heatmaps of users ignoring the extra elements.

2. Proposed a cleaner layout with a 30-second Loom walkthrough explaining why.

3. Result: 40% fewer support tickets about navigation.