Last night, while drinking margaritas at The Iron Cactus, a woman (who will remain unnamed) came up to me and blurted out, “I respect your work, but damn your panel sucked!” I told her I was sorry she didn’t like it, and she proceeded to rail on for nearly 10 minutes about just how bad it was. I was a bit taken aback, and also a bit tipsy, so I just kept apologizing and thanking her for the criticism.
I know I shouldn’t let one’s person’s feelings bother me much, but dammit, I’m human, and it does bother me. So, I thought I’d take a moment to respond to her, as well as anyone else who wasn’t too pleased with the panel.
When she found words other than “sucked”, “disappointing,” and “lame,” this person noted that our panel “sounded like four people talking about their jobs at a bar.” What she (apparently) didn’t get is that that is precisely what we were going for. We wanted the panel to be conversational, lighthearted, fun, and free-form. We had no designs on doing a presentation full of bullet points. You can get the bullet points, concrete examples, and links to resources about designer’s workflows anywhere on the web — including the mini-site we made specifically for the panel. After all, the very definition of “panel” is a small group of people brought together to discuss a particular matter. I realize some people take their “panel” slot at SXSW to give a presentation, but that’s not what we were going for. Sorry if that disappointed you.
This person also suggested that we spent “no time at all preparing.” I assure you, that’s not true. One look at the website (which took hours) should make that clear.
Just after I stepped down from the panel stage, two close friends told me about “some girl” who walked out of the panel — and made a Joel Seigel-style scene out of it. But she didn’t stop there — I was told she went into the panel next door, got on the mic for a question, and prefaced it with, “Sorry if you covered this earlier, but I was in the other panel, but I left because it sucked…” I can only assume it was the same woman that took 10 minutes of my party time to tell me how much I sucked.
For anyone who’s still here watching panels (or “presentations”), please avoid being a total bitch about the matter. If you don’t like a session, feel free to walk out. But don’t make a giant scene of it. If you see a panelist out at party, feel free to offer constructive criticism. But keeping the word “sucked” out of it is probably a good idea. Also, if you leave a panel early, you may not be qualified to comment on the entirety of it. From what I was told, this person left before we really got going.
I know it was only one person (and most of the other feedback I’ve heard has been good, or at least constructive) — but damn, one person can really ruin your night.
Sorry, the time to post comments to this entry has expired.
001 // Chris Harrison // 03.13.2007 // 10:15 AM
Opinions are like a-holes, everyone’s got one, right? Shrug it off.
002 // baron // 03.13.2007 // 10:16 AM
She must be really good at whatever it is she does for a living to be able to say that to your face. Maybe she meant to join the panel on Microsoft Enterprise Design Solutions and Your Workflow?
003 // Jon Hicks // 03.13.2007 // 10:45 AM
@Chris - shrug it off? Hmm, maybe. I say name and shame! There’s no excuse for plain rudeness and histrionics.
004 // Adam Darowski // 03.13.2007 // 11:01 AM
Jeff.. I hopped over to your site because I’m linking to you in my live notes of the Typography panel because you made such an excellent point about px vs. em.
About your panel, you hit it right on the head. You filled the description of the panel perfectly. She obviously didn’t read the book. I’m sorry that she bugged you. But plenty of us loved the panel.
I didn’t check the companion site until the next morning. I can’t even fathom the research you guys did. One bit of a suggestion—perhaps you should have explained better up front what was on this companion site. Those that didn’t appreciate the conversational style would have seen that it was built upon a greater conversation you were conducting for weeks leading up to the panel.
I’d say don’t let it bug you, but it would bug me. You guys were great.
005 // Baxter // 03.13.2007 // 11:14 AM
Bah. If the best she can come up with was “it sucked” her thoughts aren’t clearly formed enough to bother worrying about. Forget it. Enjoy Austin, and the people there who AREN’T jerks.
006 // Mani Sheriar // 03.13.2007 // 11:31 AM
Dear Jeff,
I couldn’t be more mortified when I woke up this morning (in hangover agony mind you) and read this post. That horrible woman was me, and I apologize deeply, and publicly, for making you feel badly.
Believe it or not, I actually can usually offer constructive criticism in a kind and lighthearted way. Clearly I did not accomplish that last night. What happened from my perspective is that after letting you know that I really loved your work and then drunkenly blurting out that your panel sucked (did I really say it sucked? … if so, that’s horrific of me), I could see immediately that I had upset you and tried, obviously with absolutely no success, to back-pedal. I think the continued railing that you felt you experienced was actually me trying desperately to explain and minimize what I had said. And, ironically, I actually felt that I was the one spending the rest of the conversation apologizing. I distinctly remember hanging my head in shame and telling you that I was actually normally quite a nice person!
I feel profoundly crappy for making you feel bad and being a dark spot on the awesome time that is SxSW. Especially since you are actually someone I have admired professionally for a long time – for your work, your writings and your accomplishments. You are basically the reason I went to the Design Workflow panel! And, no, I am not the woman who left early and went to the next room and got on the mic to say that your panel sucked (I’m really not … I have witnesses!).
I hope you will consider accepting my apology.
007 // Jeff Croft // 03.13.2007 // 11:54 AM
Hey Mani-
I was perfectly happy to keep you unnamed. :) But, I respect you for coming forward and apologizing. You certainly did apologize last night, as well, and I know the drinks probably had a bit to do with how well you were able to accomplish that.
I certainly accept your apology and hold no ill will towards you. I was telling all my friends yesterday that I wanted honest, real feedback, rather than people just saying “good job,” and you certainly provided that. :)
Sorry for assuming you were the same person that walked out — knowing that certainly makes me feel better about you personally. Like I said, I realized last night that you had been drinking and probably didn’t intend to come off as rude as you did — I’m sure it would have been different without the drinks. My assumption that you were the same person that made a big scene walking out led me to think, “it’s not just that she’s drunk — she did this sober during the panel, too!” Obviously, I was wrong about that, so I apologize for that.
That having been said, I now know that there were two people that hated my panel — so that kinda sucks. :)
No worries, Mani. You were being honest, you were drinking, and you apologized. No harm done. Find me tonight and I’ll buy you a free drink. :)
008 // Mani Sheriar // 03.13.2007 // 12:02 PM
God bless you for being gracious! Now I feel like I can come out of hiding and leave my hotel room. ;~)
009 // Mike D. // 03.13.2007 // 12:46 PM
I’m sure your particular panel was great, but I have to say that a big part of the reason I did not attend SXSW this year was the poor quality of so many panels the year before. About 20% of the panels I attended were good and 80% were a bunch of ill-prepared folks going all over the place and looking like they had never been on stage before. That could have just been bad luck in picking panels, I suppose, but it wasn’t much different the year before either. A little better, but not great.
On another note, multiple columns? Scroll down, scroll up again, and then scroll down again? Not sold… :)
010 // Maura // 03.13.2007 // 12:54 PM
Oh man, have to agree with Mike D. on the multiple columns… although I never would have said it first. :-)
011 // Jeff Croft // 03.13.2007 // 1:21 PM
@Mike: I’m certainly not saying our panel was great (really hard to tell, from my perspective). I was just wanting to apologize to anyone that found it less than, or different than, what they expected, and to say that if anyone wants to criticize a panelist, they ought to at least try and be constructive about it. I definitely wasn’t trying to claim Mani was wrong — only that maybe there’s a better way to go about saying it. I also totally wasn’t trying to call Mani out publicly, and as much as I respect her for commenting here, I feel bad to have done so, now!
Myself, I much prefer the panels that are more discussion-based and free form to those that are more structured presentations. I guess I just feel like I can read the bullet points on any given topic in a book or online somewhere. What I can’t get without being here is an insight into the personalities, minds, and thought process of the people I respect. I read all these people’s blogs — I don’t really need to hear what they wrote on their blog over again. i’d rather hear about the stuff in their head that isn’t normally talked about. But, everyone’s different, and I’m sure some people prefer the more presentational sessions. Also, I was on a panel with three other people that had ideas about how it should be. Certainly there are things we did that I would have done differently if it was only up to me. But we had to pick a style that worked for the four of us and roll with it. Can’t please everyone, I guess.
@Mike and Maura: As for the multiple columns, I’m not entirely sold myself. But, that’s what this site is for — trying new things, seeing what works. It’s an experiment, no doubt. :)
012 // Mike D. // 03.13.2007 // 1:24 PM
Cool, now get rid of it before I walk out of this place and over to Hicks’ blog where I can spout out about how terrible your columns are. :)
013 // Baxter // 03.13.2007 // 1:39 PM
Just thinking out loud here, but I wonder about capturing window.height and using it to calculate column height and number of columns so no scrolling would be required.
Seems possible, so long as the content would fit on one screen.
014 // Jeff Croft // 03.13.2007 // 2 PM
Baxter - that’s definitely possible, but it’s not what I want to do. I want manual control over where my column breaks are. But yeah, I’ve seen that done, and it works pretty well, as long as you don’t mind your column getting broken any old place.
015 // Ryan C. // 03.13.2007 // 3:13 PM
I attended the Design Workflows at Work panel, and while it was not exactly what I was expecting it most certainly not a bad discussion. I still found it informative, and it was surprising to see that the years I spent freelancing I came up with a lot of the same methods that the panel discussed. What I picked up from the people leaving around me was that they were expecting an ABC approach to designing. They were complaining the same way that those on the campfire chat were, that they didn’t want to hear about the personal lives of the designers and just wanted workflow charts. What they didn’t understand is that there is not a standard for being a designer, everyone is different and has a different workflow and their personal lives affect them. I believe the panel made this point clear, and I don’t believe you should feel bad just because people had different expectations and did not have the patience to stick around and try to understand what the panel was trying to say. One of the reasons I go to SxSW is to hear peers discuss things that im interested in, not to hear some stodgy gasbag talk TO me about something im interested in but is so boring I fall asleep. So keep your chin up and don’t worry to much about it.
016 // Baxter // 03.13.2007 // 3:26 PM
That would be a problem. That’s what I get for thinking out loud.
017 // Jeff Croft // 03.13.2007 // 3:28 PM
Thanks for that, Ryan. I think you’re exactly right in that it seems some people wanted more precise instructions or concrete examples of what we do and how we do it. In hindsight, perhaps we should have provided that in the session. Who knows. Our thinking was that the site served that purpose for us — it has 25+ interviews with great web designers, tons of resources, and so forth. Since we’d done that, we decided to have a more free-form discussion in the session.
Oh well, one can always learn from past mistakes. The bottom line, I think, is that you can never please everyone. Hopefully we pleased a lot of people, at least.
018 // chris // 03.13.2007 // 3:30 PM
Regarding the panel, I’ve nothing to say as I’m not at SXSW with all the hipsters. Props to Mani for outing herself though.
Now, the columns, I think I’m biased at the moment because on my display each column is perfectly sized so that I don’t have to scroll at all, just move my eyeballs. I imagine if I was on a smaller display, a laptop, it would be disconcerting. The same, if the content was of any greater quantity.
Presentationally, it looks a tad crisper compared to those posts that don’t use the multi-column format.
019 // Jeff Croft // 03.13.2007 // 3:31 PM
To further demonstrate how hard it is to determine upfront what people are expecting, check this out. I just found a site which seems to think our panel was going to “focus specifically on accessibility”:
http://www.knowbility.org/air-interactive/?content=SxSW
020 // Chris // 03.13.2007 // 3:47 PM
Not as knowledgable as they thought they were. :)
I feel like the kid with his hand raised for commenting twice in 20 minutes. While I might not have seen the panel I did just take a quick run through the companion website. You certainly didn’t slouch on the content there. So, I wanted to say thanks for providing it.
One of the things that ‘sucks’ about all these great panels is that I usually only get to hear about them. It’s nice to be able to get something out of the experiences the rest of you are offering. So, thanks for that.
Now, sitting on my hand.
021 // Ryan C. // 03.13.2007 // 3:55 PM
If it were up to Knowability all of the interactive panels would have been about accessibility! Not that there is anything wrong with that. :)
022 // Mike D. // 03.13.2007 // 8:12 PM
I want manual control over where my column breaks are.
Ok, now you’re talkin’ crazy talk. Are you sure you aren’t some crusty old print designer guest posting on Croftie’s blog?
023 // Kyle // 03.13.2007 // 9:51 PM
A group of us in Austin were just discussing this issue tonight at dinner. I think there are different expectations of different SXSW attendees.
We found that some of us are ok with a more discussion-based panel, and some want a presentation. I think that people know that a formal presentation will give them specific information that they can take home. Some discussion panels do provide this type of information, but some don’t. That is the risk of having a freeform discussion.
In this case I think ultimately the problem was that panel itself was different that what people expected after reading the title. Jeff, I enjoyed this panel, and thought it was fun. I enjoyed hearing about how each of you get motivated and lighten the mood in the workplace. (I’m buying a ping pong ball gun!) But I think the phrase “design workflows” created the expectation that we would hear about the design process, while the discussion leaned more toward workplace culture.
I do think it would help if SXSW would describe discussion-based panels like “A conversation about” or state that it is a discussion. Some of the keynote panels are labeled this way, and it lets the attendees know what to expect.
024 // Jeff Croft // 03.13.2007 // 10:34 PM
I totally understand what you’re saying (and don’t disagree, either), but to me, workplace culture is part of the design workflow.
I’d agree with that. For the record, I’m not sure who comes up with the titles and descriptions o the panels. I know I didn’t have anything to do with mine. I was just asked to be on it, and I agreed. :)
025 // Michael // 03.14.2007 // 12:18 AM
First of all, The Iron Cactus is an awesome place!
Second, I think that most people were so disappointed with your panel because they had high and very different expectations, than all of your goals. Everyone (and I’ll admit to this myself) assumed that since you are all, for the most part, the elite rockstars of the web world, that this panel was going to really solve all their problems, answer all their questions, and have them leaving telling themselves “Wow, that was the best thing ever, I am so inspired and so enlightened on web design.”
However, as you stated, this was just supposed to be a nice laid back discussion of how each of you work, and thats exactly what it was. You all did a great job just chatting about how all of you worked.
With that said, I was mostly just totally shocked by being able to meet you. My friend and I were joking around before the panel… teenage girls freak out and call all their friends when they see Justin Timberlake, I freak out and IM all my buddies when I see Jeff Croft, Bryan Veloso, and Veerle Pieters.
I really wasn’t a huge fan of the panel’s in general. What I was most looking forward to was just sitting down with all the “rockstar” designers and picking their brains, getting to know them, etc… I have to say that my favorite part about my weekend in Austin was the pleasure of meeting all of you, Shaun Inman, Steve Smith, Johnathan Snook.
I don’t think your panel sucked though man, don’t take what that crazy lady said too personally. I hope that you enjoyed your margaritas at The Iron Cactus.
026 // Henrik // 03.14.2007 // 7:48 AM
To be so agressive the motivation would have to be deeper than listening to something you are unhappy with for 10 minutes. She must either have a mental condition or be really frustrated about something else.
027 // Brian Ford // 03.14.2007 // 8:48 AM
Oh, Christ. Don’t say that. His feet are barely touching the ground as it is.
;)
028 // Kelsey Ruger // 03.14.2007 // 1:14 PM
Just getting caught on feeds when I saw your post Jeff. It is all very good feedback. I have personally gotten both good and bad feedback and appreciate both (usually prefer bad more because sometimes the people giving good feedback aren’t being honest). I spent a lot of time talking about the panel with a couple of people who were there and have a lot of speaking experience. We talked about structure, style of presentation, how much instruction we could have done in 50 minutes and I have concluded one thing - it is nearly impossible to gauge 100% of the audiences needs,wants and desires AND some people won’t like what you have to say. The panel was more conversational and that didn’t work for some people. Does it detract from the information we presented? Not really. A mentor of mine once told me that If you are afraid of being hated, you don’t deserve to be loved. I take that mantra with me into every speaking or teaching situation because most great speakers have both dedicated fans and vehement opponents. However that being said I think maybe we should have presented the web address up front, and said that it was going to be discussion rather than presentation based. That likely would have cleared up the confusion.
029 // byron // 03.14.2007 // 6:11 PM
Hi Jeff, Kudos for having the courage to give a presentation at SXSW, it’s quite an audience, and as it is growing, I hope it doesn’t turn into some kind of real life digg effect.
For what it’s worth, the woman that asked a question in the next room said something along the lines of “They were talking about [some issue] at the panel next door too, what do you think about….” Then Coudal said “You left a panel to come to ours? cool. have a book”. So I don’t remember her actually saying that the panel was bad, just that she had left.
-Byron
030 // Jeff Croft // 03.14.2007 // 6:12 PM
@Kelsey: Well said.
@Byron: Thanks. Sounds like what I heard was not quite true! Very good to know!
031 // Trey Philips // 03.15.2007 // 3:26 AM
Yeah, actually I was one of those eyewitnesses. I left the panel because it didn’t seem like it was about workflow so much, but more about inspiration and the workplace, as Kyle said earlier. I was surprised to walk over and immediately hear the lady who approached the mic and complained. I think she mumbled something about you guys talking about twitter, then kind of shut up for a second, and asked her question. I remember thinking “wow, now that’s a bold way to be remembered on the podcast.”
I wish I would have known about the mini-site. If I would have known the discussion would be about people’s lifestyles, it could have been more interesting as I could have thought more about it. It was unexpected, though. Also, the Campfire chat room was very distracting, or perhaps I should say it was “distracting my workflow.” Anyway, I still respect your presentation. Maybe in the future SXSWi will give an idea to the speakers, and then let them submit the title and description for the panel.
032 // Brady J. Frey // 03.15.2007 // 12:15 PM
Sorry you had to go through that - atleast her criticism should have been constructive and open with professionalism. I’ve spoken before when I was a political editor in Chicago, and know how much stress it can induce.
I wasn’t at the event this year, so I can’t put a good direction on your specific panel, but it does sound similar to a barcamp style which wordcamp felt sour for in my opinion. I know that sometimes speakers look at events that they should be personable and casual in conversation, but that can also lose the strong goal and direction in teaching. So, different strokes and opinions I guess; I find that casual panels lack focus or don’t seem to take the subject serious enough. In martial arts, there’s a common anger if two experienced fighters meet and one takes the training or test ‘cavalier’, it’s considered a disrespect to their peers - looking down on both the person and the importance of the situation for our growth, development and sincerity. Obviously not as serious, but I look at barcamps with the same disdain.
033 // Geof Harries // 03.15.2007 // 4:25 PM
We used a js multiple-column design for the Yukon News website - free subscription required - which calculates the height and width of the article page to resize the viewing area. If your view is narrower, you get two columns; wider views get three columns. When the page is printed, it’s one column. Could be a good solution for you as well.
034 // Jeff Croft // 03.15.2007 // 7:36 PM
Cool, Geof. I’m not going to register for an account, but I’ll take your word for it. :)
I’ve seen that sort of solution before, and it’s definitely neat — I just feel like for columns to work really well, the designer needs control over where the breaks are. But maybe it’s just me.
035 // The Guilty Carnivore // 03.16.2007 // 10:30 AM
Jeff, I’m actually receptive to multiple columns. I’ve enjoyed the way the International Herald Tribune has done it for years…do you have any UI conventions/examples of how you treat pagination (i.e. multiple pages) with the column approach?
Do you do server-side parsing in your CMS to determine word count/line length and parse CSS on the fly?
036 // Jeff Croft // 03.16.2007 // 11:56 AM
@Guilty Carnivore: The IHT implementation is the best I’ve seen of automatic multi-column on the web. Still, it’s not for me. As I’ve said a few times in this thread, I want manual control over where my columns break. So no, I don’t do any server-side parsing to determine word counts and such. I simply say, “break the column here.” That’s the way I want it, because I’m a Nazi bastard who wants full control. I don’t want columns breaking in weird places. IHT’s implementation is neat and clever, but it breaks columns in strange places, and I don’t want that.
037 // Mani Sheriar // 03.16.2007 // 1:12 PM
Hi Jeff - it’s Mani again.
This experience really got me thinking deeply – first about the difference between blogging about something and just talking about something with your friends, then to the responsibilities of being kind in the way that you write about your experiences that involve others, then on to questioning the very nature of being critical as opposed to kind in our interactions with others, and finally to my own shortcomings as a human being.
I know I’m not your favorite person right now, but I thought you might be curious to see the kinds of thoughts that this experience between us has sparked. It’s all here: http://manisheriar.com/blog/kindness.
038 // Jeff Croft // 03.16.2007 // 2:13 PM
That’s a great post, Mani. I responded at great length over on your site. And, for the record, you might actually be my favorite person right now. Let’s move on and be friends. :)
039 // Mani Sheriar // 03.16.2007 // 6:01 PM
Thank you, Jeff … I would really like that. =)
You said in your quite lovely response on my site (which really meant a lot to me, actually) that I could email or IM you any time. Since I don’t have your IM names I thought I would give you mine:
AIM: ManiSher Yahoo: Mahnie
Here’s to becoming better people!
040 // Christy // 03.17.2007 // 12:49 AM
I just want to comment on the companion website… I didn’t have the opportunity to attend SXSW and so was very happy to get a look at the website.
I was very pleasantly surprised by what I found. I’ve read through a third of the interviews so far. Fabulous stuff.
I only wish the panel themselves had been included as a part of the interviews.
Thanks for sharing.
041 // Jeff Croft // 03.17.2007 // 12:54 AM
We debated for quite a while over wether or not we should do it ourselves, and decided that it felt strange for us to do so, especially before the session at SXSW. But, maybe now we could. I’ll talk to the others and see what they think.
042 // Dustin Diaz // 03.17.2007 // 2:26 AM
Good for you for not letting it go. I still have a few things bothering me - especially the 9 out of 10 conversations from people that think I’m a cynical bitter bastard who will never forgive Yahoo for screwing me over…. how do I convince them otherwise?
Anyway… glad you posted your feelings on the blog. It’s therapeutic letting the world know :)
043 // James John Malcolm // 04.01.2007 // 6:21 AM
The collumns are great! Only nit-pick I´d have would be that the link to the top of the entry should link to a spot slightly higher, as now the first sentence doesn´t have any space above it anymore (once you click up to it).
(Dunno if that sentence was clear enough, but I´m on a very strange keyboard here..)