As both a coach and a designer, I’ve come to realize that these two roles complement each other in unexpected and powerful ways. Coaching is all about understanding human behavior, uncovering patterns, and facilitating personal growth. Design, at its core, is about solving problems for people, understanding their needs, and creating solutions that make their lives easier. When combined, the insights gained from coaching amplify my ability to design products and services that not only work well but also resonate on a deeper psychological level. Here’s how coaching has sharpened my design skills and allowed me to bring a more human-centered approach to my work.
As a coach, I delve into the mechanisms that drive human behavior—what triggers certain responses, how people navigate challenges, and how their thoughts shape their actions. These insights are invaluable in design. Understanding the subconscious triggers and mental shortcuts people rely on allows me to create designs that afford better usability. Affordance in design refers to the qualities of an object or system that indicate how it can be used, and this concept can extend to the psychological level. By leveraging knowledge of how humans think and react, I design not just for ease of use but for mental clarity, guiding users to instinctively know what to do next.
After working closely with people as a coach, I’ve realized something fundamental: despite our differences, we’re all wired with the same basic psychological makeup. Once you’ve met enough people, it becomes clear that, just like our bodies function similarly, our minds follow the same core principles. We all have shared human needs, emotional triggers, and ways of processing information, even though they might manifest in visible different ways. This universal understanding makes designing more efficient because it allows me to anticipate common user needs and behaviors without relying solely on surface-level insights from user interviews.
This also means I’m not constrained by users’ expressed needs. Instead of being limited by their vision, I can take the understanding of their fundamental psychology and create experiences that not only meet their needs but subtly lead them toward things they didn’t even know they wanted. In this way, design becomes transformative, expanding the user’s potential experiences.
One of the key lessons from coaching is understanding the pitfalls of ego. As a counselor, you’re trained to recognize how ego can cloud judgment, limit self-awareness, and block true progress. The same applies in design. Often, designers (and even users) let their egos get in the way. By stripping away the ego’s influence, I can focus more on the problem at hand and less on what I, as the designer, might think is the best solution. This leads to better collaboration with teams and clients, and ultimately, better design solutions that prioritize user needs over personal preferences or biases.