Figma Skills Won't Get You Promoted

WARNING: This newsletter is not for design students or newbies

Dear Designer,

Today's advice letter concerns the design community's fetishization of Figma and how our obsession with tools gives the wrong impression.

Let me explain.

Everywhere you look, designer dudes are obsessed with Figma.

There's even a custom piece of hardware on the Figma store.

You can't make this stuff up.

To an outsider, this must seem like madness. We've reached peak tool worship with Figma.

All these productivity hacks and motion design tutorials on TikTok are just good old-fashioned practicioner fun, right? Every designer agrees Figma is the tool we need to master digital design. How could that be bad?

You cheapen the profession when you act like Figma chops are all a designer needs. Design is so much more than the software you use for drawing rectangles.

Why do you click this stuff?

It's almost like you think that learning this one piece of software is the job...rather than, you know, learning how to design the software itself.

The worst part is when senior designers on social frame Figma skills as a way to move up the career ladder. To me, this is the ultimate red flag. 🚩

It's terrible advice for several reasons.

Leadership Doesn't Care About Figma

People in a position to promote you don't care about your Figma skills.

Figma skills don't set you apart in the job market. A designer who has mastered Figma? 🥱 Cool. Next resumé, please.

And you've had way too many iced coffees if you think the rest of the organization cares about your Figma layers. Nobody cares about your layers or your plugins. Only the developers and PMs care a little, and I bet it's less than you think.

Don't get me wrong. I love "design craft" and can spend hours in Figma, happy as a raccoon in a trash pile. My point is that people in a position to promote you don't appreciate our design craft in the same way as we do.

Leadership and people who promote care about the impact of your designs.

Leadership cares about how design fits into the current business strategy. They care about how design will make them money.

They don't care if you're the team's dedicated layer mayor. So if you feel like you need to get better at Figma, and you're already employed...don't.

There are better uses of your time.

What you can do instead of mastering Figma

As a strategist, I'm all about helping people make trade-offs. You can't learn it all.

Every second you spend getting better at UI design in Figma could be spent learning something else. You only have so much upskilling energy, so why not spend it on something that sets you apart?

These skills will do more for your career than learning how to make animations in Figma:

TL:DR: Mastering Figma is a waste of time. Learn the basics and move on to something more strategic.

-Jeff Humble

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This article was originally published on Jeff's blog. Read the full version