Why designers who fear specialisation have got it wrong
When I wrote Can you specialise in Australia? my inbox was flooded with designers not wanting to give up variety, reduce their skillset, or become boring production machines.
They’ve got it completely backwards and I’ve finally got a case study that proves it 🙂
The specialisation myth
The fear is understandable. Many designers think specialisation means doing the same thing repeatedly — endless logos for law firms or countless websites for restaurants.
But that’s not specialisation. That’s production work.
True specialisation means understanding one sector so deeply that you become the go-to person for solving their most complex, multi-faceted problems. And complex problems require expanded skillsets, not reduced ones.
Proof from Amsterdam
I’m writing this from Berlin, the third stop on our work holiday. In Amsterdam, we visited The Grachten Museum a museum telling about how and why the city was built around canals. The exhibition was a masterclass in what real specialisation looks like.
To tell this story, the interpretive designer used:
- animation – illustrative, photographic and claymation
- sound design – as roleplay, voiceover and for atmosphere
- haptic design – sensory experiences like walking on sand
- projection mapping across walls and interactive tables
- immersive installations including a half-finished building visitors could explore
- video footage on everything from huge walls to vintage TV screens
- graphic novel storytelling
- sophisticated wayfinding.
This wasn’t a designer who’d limited their skills. This was someone who’d mastered multiple disciplines because their sector — cultural institutions — demanded sophisticated multi-sensory storytelling.
The real opportunity
The same principle applies across every sector. Healthcare designers don’t just make things look medical: they learn regulatory requirements, user psychology, and data visualisation. Education specialists master child development, accessibility standards, and interactive learning theory.
Each sector’s complex challenges force you to expand your capabilities, not reduce them.
So what?
Specialisation isn’t about doing less. It’s about understanding your clients’ world so deeply that you become indispensable for their biggest challenges.
The designers who fear losing variety are missing the point. True specialisation offers more variety, not less — just within a context you understand intimately.
That’s where the real creative satisfaction lies.
Carol Mackay
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Want more?
These articles talk more about working in the creative industry:
Can you specialise in Australia?
Case study: helping a design studio find their niche
About Carol Mackay
After 30+ years running a design studio, I accumulated a pretty special network of fellow designers. One thing most have in common: a need for more information about the ‘business’ side of design. Most are impatient with any task competing for time spent doing what they love – designing so they wanted more info about how to work more efficiently and effectively.
Not me. I love that intersection between design and business. I built a career working with Ombudsman schemes, the Emergency Services sector and the Courts. My special power has always been an ability to use design to translate the difficult to understand or the unpalatable message.
I now use exactly the same skills with creative business owners. I translate the indigestible into bite-sized chunks of information. I share insights, introduce tools and embed processes to help others build confidence business decision-making skills. More confidence makes it easier to grasp opportunities. More confidence makes it easier to recognise a good client from the bad.
Outside DBC I have mentored with Womentor, AGDA The Aunties, and most recently Regional Arts NSW.
And I’m a proud volunteer and board member of Never Not Creative.
Always happy to chat, I can be contacted here.
