Creative Team Improves Collaboration with Imagery Profiles

Context

A small product design team (designers, copywriter, product lead) working on brand and UI. They relied on quick verbal briefs and “picture this” feedback.

Challenge

• Feedback often fell flat. When the lead said “picture a calmer, more spacious layout,” some designers had a clear internal image and iterated quickly; others had no picture and needed multiple examples or mockups before direction landed.
• Onboarding was uneven. New hires were told “we think in concepts and visuals here,” but no one had a shared language for why some people needed references and others could run with a sentence.
• Critique sessions sometimes felt personal. Low-vividness visualizers asked for more written or verbal direction and were told they “weren’t visual enough,” which confused strength in other senses (e.g. tactile, motor) with a lack of creativity.

Solution

• The team took the Imagination Index assessment and shared their Imagery Profiles in a short working session. They mapped who was strong in visual, auditory, and motor imagery and who wasn’t.
• They agreed on simple rules: briefs would include one visual reference or sketch plus a short verbal description, and feedback would offer both “what it looks like” and “what it should feel like or do” so no one had to rely on a single channel.
• For tactile and motor-heavy work (e.g. interaction feel, motion), they explicitly invited “how it feels when you use it” and “how the movement should flow” instead of only “how it looks.”

Results

• Fewer revision rounds on early concepts. Designers who needed more than “picture it” got it without having to ask repeatedly.
• Onboarding improved. New hires took the assessment and could say how they worked best; the team stopped assuming everyone “sees” direction the same way.
• Critique became less charged. The team could say “my visual imagery is low, so I need a reference” without it sounding like a deficit.

Key learnings

• One person’s “obvious” is another’s blank. Making imagery differences explicit made it easier to give and receive direction.
• Profiles are useful without changing the work—only how you communicate. The team still shipped the same kinds of outputs; they just reduced friction in the process.
• Visual imagination isn’t the only creative channel. Strong tactile or motor imagery showed up in interaction design and motion; naming that helped the team value different strengths.