Try swapping “why” for “what” and watch the quality of design critique improve.

I’ve recently been working with a Head of Design who was struggling to get useful feedback from their counterparts in marketing and engineering.

This reminded me of a simple trick I picked up many years ago when working with a new team that was building the muscle of giving better feedback.

It was simply to start any feedback with “what”

This small shift subtly forces the feedback-giver to focus on what they’re directly observing, rather than jumping to solutions or abstract judgments.

For the designer, it makes the feedback much easier to triage and prioritise against the solution space they know best. And it reduces the dynamic of those more accusatory “why” statements that often push people into defence mode, justifying their choices instead of listening.

It’s a small thing, but it can completely change the quality of critique, especially for teams that aren’t used to working with designers or giving high quality design feedback.

Some examples:

⛔️ Why is the text so small?
✅ What I notice is the text is hard to read.

⛔️ Why did you use that colour?
✅ What stands out is the colour draws attention away from the main action.

⛔️ Why is this page so long?
✅ What happens as I scroll is I lose track of the main point.

⛔️ Why doesn’t this feel intuitive?
✅ What I experience is I have to stop and think about what to do next.

⛔️ Why is the form designed like this?
✅ What I notice is it takes multiple steps to complete, which feels slow.

The one exception? What the hell were you thinking???