All professions must continually expand and refresh their skillsets.  And if you are hanging the tag of “professional” on to your web design business, then you have to continually upgrade your skills. It is not going to come to you auto-magically, and if you are not reading up on things, how the hell can you call yourself a professional? You’ll be the first to be crying on mailing lists and in groups about the “slow economy”. Wah wah wah.

There is no excuse anymore to NOT be up on the latest.  I am giving you a ready made blogroll. Subscribe using a simple feed reader. I use Bloglines.

Here is a list, some of these are in the site blogroll over to the right. Read on!

http://www.webdesignerwall.com/

http://freelanceswitch.com/

http://abduzeedo.com/

http://psdtuts.com/

http://sixrevisions.com/

http://www.thinkvitamin.com/

http://www.noupe.com/

http://www.boxesandarrows.com/

http://www.456bereastreet.com/

http://alistapart.com/

http://css-tricks.com/

http://web-graphics.com/

http://www.simplebits.com/

http://www.bittbox.com/

http://www.smashingmagazine.com/

http://webjackalope.com/

http://www.webreference.com/

http://veerle.duoh.com/

If you have more to add to these, please let me know in comments. I need more food. They need to have a good sized readership.

A very good read for new designers who are just starting out, or for oldskool ones who have finally decided to upgrade their skills and code to standards. Gone is the day of the FP n00b wannabee hacker. Well, not really, but they don’t have the brains to google to find a blog like this.

A project of Chris Coyier (whose name you might remember from my enthusiastic mention of his CSS-Tricks.com site) and David Walsh — if I’m remembering correctly, this is the same pair that put together the Band Website Template as well: Chris with the visuals and David with the programming.

Back to Script & Style — you might expect it to be a bit sparse, being a newer site, but it looks like the fellas have raided their stash because I’m back 25 pages into the archives and still going strong.

Each of their articles is not simply a headline link but describes what they found useful about the article to which they link. And you run the gamut here: MooTools, free icon sets, and someone’s best tutorials on converting PSD to XHTML is what’s in my browser’s page view right now, if that gives you an idea.

Based in WordPress, the site itself, with it’s pleasing half-and-half design, is a good way to kick start your design and development engine. So put it on your frequent visit list or RSS feed today.

another very timely and insightful blog post. In particular:

8. How to Deal With Scope Creep. Scope creep — when uncontrolled changes affect the scope of a project – can be the bane of a freelancer’s existence. If you don’t address it with a client, you easily could squander all your profit on a job.

Scope creep sets in when a project is not well-defined, well-planned or well-managed, or when there is a change in direction. If this happens early in a project, it may be a sign that you didn’t ask enough questions at the outset, or that you underestimated the project.

When this happens, above all, don’t procrastinate. The most important aspect of managing scope creep is communication. As soon as you see that a project is veering off course and that you will be spending more time or more money, you must advise your client immediately and decide together how to handle it.

If, for example, in a status meeting or phone call, it becomes obvious that what you are being asked to do is outside the scope of the project, say so right away: “That is outside the scope of the project as we outlined it in the proposal, so we’ll need to review that and possibly revise the pricing. Are you aware of that?” Then, initiate a “change order” to document the changes.

It’s also a good idea to include a reference to scope creep in your contract so there are no surprises. A simple paragraph that outlines the process if scope creep starts to happen will plant the necessary seed so that you can bring it up much more easily later.

Yep. That’s a pretty good list!

Note also that nowhere in this list do the words “Photoshop,” “Illustrator,” “Dreamweaver,” or “Fireworks” appear. As I and others have observed plenty of times before, tools do not make a designer. Anyone can learn to use Fireworks or Dreamweaver in an hour or less, but nobody can be a competent Web designer unless they possess a foundation in the things listed above. Choose your own tools and learn to use them, but don’t let the tools define your abilities; tools won’t create a place for you in the profession.

If there is one thing that I can stress to new designers, it is the point above. Tools do not make you a web designer. Owning a copy of Dreamweaver and having all of P7’s extensions do not make you a designer. And I will add in that designations do not make you a designer. I’ve seen some piss-poor designers boast that they are “this designation” or “that designation”. Their portfolios literally looked as if they had never read a single book or even article on what good design is all about, nor had any instruction at all on basic design principles. Yeah there are good “(insert your ego designation of choice)” designers, I just have seen far more really horrible wankers.

One thing that new designers also need to understand, and it is brought out in Andy’s post, especially if they go solo, is all the business aspects of being a designer. it will bite you unless you understand that you are not just going to be designing web sites. You are going to be going out and talking to people, selling yourself, and then delivering the product as well. And following up after the sale. Things that successful businesses do every day. It will be most of your time suck. And then you also have to be the bill collector. That is a part of the job that really sucks. You have to be everyone in the big company, all rolled into one. Try being remarkable at all of that.

What other advice can you add that is not covered by Andy’s post?

I was installing MAMP on my old eMac, and in the sidebar of the “stat” page was this little gem.

We’ve been having a long discussion on how we track our time, and subsequent diversions. I think it actually started as a “how do i estimate this project when I usually do flat rate, but do not know the technology behind what needs to be done, thus need to estimate hours” question to the list. It’s been a very interesting discussion into how we work. One list member has had a brain injury, and has very bad short term memory, thus she really needs help in remembering to time herself on things. Others have kids running all over the house (ahhhh the life of a mom after the kids have left!) and they have trouble timing and keeping up with things. Many solutions have been posted, and I’ll get a post together with a bunch of them. But, this little timer should be of help.

Last week on the list, a member was getting ready to send out her “newsletter” and was sending it to her subscribed recipients (which is doing what I encourage all members to do, a newsletter on a regular basis instead of whining about lack of business), and was wondering if she should send it out to the chamber of commerce list of contacts she had as well as anyone who had in the past contacted her via her email form. I thnk that Seth has a very good way of putting it. My answer on the list was quite similar. Amazing huh? Or is it that I am a closet marketing guru?

“Purple Cow: Transform Your Business by Being Remarkable” (Seth Godin)

Especially pertinent to the discussion we had on the list:

• Did every person on the list really and truly opt in? Not like sort of, but really ask for it?
• So that means that if I didn’t send it to them, they’d complain about not getting it?
• See #5. If they wouldn’t complain, take them off!

And the winner which says it all:

• If I had to pay 42 cents to send this email, would I?

Gotta love this blog entry, it is mailing list pertinent as well as general email blast pertinent/ Gee I seem like I am using that word alot lately. hmm gotta go buy a thesaurus.

A pretty good little list.

A List Apart: Articles: Why Did You Hire Me?

# Don’t treat your invoices with an apologetic tone. You and the client agreed to a rate and a schedule of terms. Submit the invoice and thank them for their prompt payment.

# Fulfill your obligation. Even if you have to bring in a resource under cover of darkness and eat the cost of the extra help, do the job you agreed to do. This will not only get you prompt payment, but will also boost your reputation.

The Cure for Content-Delay Syndrome

Like many other clients, my it’s-been-three-years-and-I-still-don’t-have-the-content client had a patchwork of words produced by subject matter experts with no training as writers and no guidance. While they may know their area (a profession, a department, a product) quite well, and are sometimes able to write lucidly, subject matter experts are seldom sensitive to the nuances of the English language. They also tend to pay little attention to the wording for miscellaneous pages, forms, submission messages, pop-up boxes, and so on. As a consequence, website content often fails to reflect the thought and planning that goes into the rest of the site. The language on sites built this way is almost always inconsistent: spelling, grammar rules, tone, and voice are like flotsam and jetsam on the shores of a sea of information.