INDUSTRIAL DESIGNERS: when the work sucks

Early career, you tie worth to output. Good work means you're good, rejected work means you're not. When someone kills your concept, it feels like they're tearing you apart. But the work isn't you.

Killed concepts aren't reflections of your value. They're attempts at solving problems. Some work, some don't. When worth depends on work succeeding, you stop learning. Learning requires asking "why didn't that solve the problem?" not "what does this mean about me?"

Your worth as a person has nothing to do with whether this concept worked. Those are different things. When your concept gets destroyed, stop spiralling. That was one attempt among thousands you will make during your career. Pick yourself up, dust it off, and learn the lesson.

Separate identity from output to improve faster. Not because you care less, because you care enough to analyze what happened instead of defending something that’s not a proxy for you.

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