During a discussion about a product idea, I became curious and asked my friend—a talented engineer—about the programming language and frameworks they used for a previous project. After their brief explanation, they said, “Anyway, it’s not as important.” I interpreted this to mean it’s not unimportant, but rather of secondary importance.
Similarly, I was once told how user-unfriendly RStudio is, which could be a blocker for using R to solve problems. However, after identifying the problem to solve, I didn’t need to use the IDE—instead, a familiar code editor with an R interpreter was sufficient.
In the context of design, people often become obsessed with learning new software and technology. These tools (like Figma) are certainly important, but the idea and design process remain the most critical components. A walk in the garden can take your design much further than technology alone ever could.
Sometimes we become too passionate about or intimidated by software or the so-called “exact tool” needed to solve a problem. However, these typically aren’t the most important elements. To me, they are of secondary importance.