Concepts vs Methods

The other day I mentioned what I’d put in a design document, and I talked about concepts.

It’s important to be able to distinguish between concepts and methods –

The internet dictionary says that a concept is “a plan or intention; a conception”. Think of it as the big-idea you’re intending to accomplish.

It also says that a method is “a particular form of procedure for accomplishing or approaching something, especially a systematic or established one”. It’s the implementation of the idea.

The place where this gets interesting is when we are teaching or training someone, not just writing notes about your design.

If we fail to explain the concept, the big-idea, in a way that helps someone fully understand why we’re doing something, then we’ve failed to teach them the most important part. The focus will naturally shift toward the methods used to implement it, and the person we’re teaching/training will not grasp the reasons why. The methods just become “rules” in a legalistic sense, and rules are meant to be broken, right?

Besides just creating a rule that is meant to be broken, not understanding the why behind a particular method or process (or rule) creates the situation where the person may not recognize a better alternative method/process when it presents itself. The why is the thing that gives you the ability to discern that.

Of course, this applies throughout all of life, not just when writing a design document. Think of this from a parenting perspective, for example.

You can tell your kids to get their homework done before watching TV (is that still a thing?), or you can explain that they should not put things off until it’s too late to get things done, and they’re too tired to focus and do their best work.

The first one is a method without any reason why, but the second one starts to teach them the concept – do your work when you’re best able to do it, so you get your best work.

Always strive to give people the reasons why, the concepts, the big ideas so they can better understand what they’re being asked to do.