The client is not a prompt, but almost

Jonathan gave us a sales technique today that is older than software and sharper than most of it: don’t present the design as yours. Guide the conversation until the idea comes out of the client’s mouth. Once they’ve said it, it’s their baby, “es mi hijo, es mi página,” and a design someone owns emotionally doesn’t get rejected in round three ▸ 11:14.

The ugly draft, on purpose

It reminded me of the friend who made the condor logo for Rodnoc, my old 3D-printing venture. He sent a draft the same day, and it was genuinely horrible. Deliberately. Confirm the direction before investing the detail, because detail on a wrong direction is pure loss ▸ 15:50. I almost complained about the ugliness; the method was smarter than my taste.

el borrador feo es una pregunta →

The unifying bug

Here’s what ties it together. Complaining about clients, we landed on it: you can’t demand humans specify everything, because humans don’t run on specifications, they run on common sense and vision. “El humano no es un prompt.” And the kicker: if the client could visualize the whole thing upfront, they wouldn’t need you ▸ 18:32.

Which is entry 2-2 inverted. With an AI, you are the vague client and the machine executes literally. With a client, you’re the machine. Same gap, opposite chair. And the fixes rhyme across both: show images early, ship ugly drafts as questions, co-author the spec until the other side owns it. Prompting turns out to be an ancient craft; it used to be called handling the client…