They sent a Figma link and told me the build starts when the file is done. Forty frames. The designer had already been in it for six weeks. Do you need a designer before you hire a developer? I asked who books the job in week one. They said small businesses, once the brand feels right. There was no person. I was supposed to sit on the invoice until a category grew a face.
Hire the designer when a stranger is buying the look and you don't have one yet. Hire me when a person has to log in and finish a job. If you already have a logo, or you'll let me make plain screens, I can start. I write a brief before I quote. Say whether it's a website or a web product before you pick the hire. One full-stack developer does not staff a brand studio. Those are different weeks, and both sit on the services page.
What people mean by a designer before a developer
The email almost never asks the question in the title. It's a link, plus a line that I should wait. Sometimes waiting is right. A public site, nothing on it that looks like them, and a stranger who decides in ten seconds whether to call. Sometimes the link is those forty frames. A login, a dashboard, settings, an admin with no records, and the marketing pages shoved in the same file. Nobody in that file has a Tuesday.
The other one is a mood board. Three sites they like, and a note that says "make it feel premium." I can't build a note. Or it's a logo sitting in Drive, and a worry that plain screens will look cheap in front of an investor. The logo is enough to start a product. It's a bad reason to stop a job someone could finish next week.
I build the screens once someone has decided them. I don't invent the brand in the same weeks. If the designer is still picking type while I'm supposed to be shipping, both invoices move. I watched a homepage get redrawn four times. The login under it never met a user.
How to tell if you need a designer or a developer first
Don't count the frames. Forty of them can still be a guess. One page with the type locked is something I can build. I look at who it's for. A stranger deciding whether you look real, or a person who has to come back and finish a job.
Designer first
The look is the job
- A stranger decides if you look real before they read a sentence
- No logo yet, and the type is whatever the file opened with
Developer first
Someone has to finish a job
- A named person logs in and finishes one job
- You have a logo, or you told me plain screens are fine
The cut
The consulting site in selected workcame with the pages already written. I took that Figma into production. I didn't spend six weeks learning who it was for. A login nobody has opened is a different job. What belongs in a first version is the person and the job. Leave the type plain until they finish it.
What a Figma file buys before you hire a developer
A finished file tightens the quote. I can see the screen on a phone, what it looks like with no records, and what happens when a save fails. I quote weeks from that. I still don't know who the user is. A clickable dashboard is a guess when the only person who has clicked it is the founder.
If you already have a file, I need the screen where the job finishes, at phone size, including the empty one and the failure. Type and color already picked. Not six palettes and a comment that says "TBD." I can build that. I can't build a tour of every settings panel you might want in year two.
I send the rest back. Eighty components and no user. A marketing site and a dashboard in one file. "We'll refine the brand during the build." A design system before anyone uses the product is a second product, and I won't hide it in the first version price. How much a custom website costs assumes someone can decide the look. How much a first version costs assumes the job has a name. A file that tries to be both is how you pay for neither. Week six then shows up as a change request that is really a new company.
If the live site already gets the call and the complaint is the type, you don't need a file that throws the URLs out. That cut is redesign a website or start over. Keep the paths that already send people. Change the templates. A designer can still own the type. They shouldn't be the reason the quote opens on a blank repo.
When a designer before a developer is the wrong hire
A good file helps. I won't let one stand in for a missing person. On these briefs I either wait, or I start the build and the designer comes after someone has actually used it.
Nobody is named
Back to the forty frames. "Small businesses" is a category. If you can't say who finishes the job in week one, another month in Figma won't produce them. Write the person down, or wait. Don't pay for frames while you think. How long a first version takes starts when that person exists, not when someone says the file looks done.
The site already gets the call
The words work. The URLs send people. Someone still wants a new identity before any code, and a twelve-week plan that replaces the site. Hire the designer for the type if the type is actually tired. Don't hire them as cover for starting over. I've opened that quote. The form on the live site was fine. The new file was a second company.
The brand is supposed to appear during the build
I turn that down. Inventing the identity and the product in the same sprint is how the homepage eats the weeks and the login ships half-done. Finish the look, or tell me plain screens are fine. I won't do both and call it one quote. If the real question is HubSpot versus something only you run, that's build custom software or buy a SaaS tool. A brand book doesn't answer it.
If nobody is named, I won't start from the file. Send the person, or send the designer.
Send the Figma, or tell me you don't have one. Tell me what you're building. I wrote the longer version of this under a designer before a developer. If the file is only there so we can wait, I'll say that before anyone starts.
