A design review fails for one of two reasons. The first is that nobody knows what is being decided. The second is that everyone knows, and nobody is willing to decide it.
The fix for both is procedural. We open every crit with a single sentence the designer has written in advance: the question this review needs to answer. If the question is not on the page, the review does not start.
Three rules we keep
- The decider is named at the top of the doc, and is in the room.
- No silent screens. If you have not spoken in fifteen minutes, you will be asked.
- The crit ends with a written outcome, posted to the channel before anyone leaves.
A crit that ends with everyone smiling and no decision recorded is a meeting that has paid the cost without buying the result.
These rules are dull. That is why they work. The interesting part of the design happens in the work, between reviews. The review is the gate, not the show.