"Does this look right to you?" Fixing the design handoff gap
A low-fidelity mockup becomes a shared canvas for alignment. By asking “Does this look right to you?” early and often, teams can catch misalignments before they become delivery risks.
One of the most critical yet often underestimated moments in product development is the handoff between designers and developers. This is when an abstract idea, nurtured by design, must become reality through engineering. Unfortunately, it often feels more like a hand grenade than a handoff.
At our company, we realized that even after running collaborative workshops, aligning early, and agreeing on goals and constraints, things still fell apart at the implementation stage. I'd finish a handover and soon after get a ping on Teams: "We can't build this" or "It won't work that way."
I'd think: "But I thought we were aligned?"
Why misalignment happens
Despite our best efforts, several familiar culprits kept surfacing:
Designers are often too close to the solution to explain it clearly.
Prototypes can be too raw to be precise or too polished to be questioned.
Teams might not feel ownership yet, especially if they haven't had a voice.
Review meetings become monologues, not conversations.
These insights are not unique to us. Cap Watkins, former VP of Design at BuzzFeed, points out that as designers push to have more influence, we sometimes distance ourselves from our product and engineering counterparts, weakening the collaboration we need most. Daniel Burka from GV similarly stresses that designers must understand their teammates' pressures and goals or risk ignoring their best ideas.
The fix low-fi, high-engagement design check-ins
We needed a better way to align, so we tried something old-school and straightforward. Printing mocks, sticking them on a whiteboard and grabbing the fattest marker we could find.
The goal?
Create a collaborative space where no one is precious about the work. Draw on the mocks. Scribble over the interface. Ask the one question that keeps surfacing value:
"Does this look right to you?"
This question does more than prompt visual feedback. Like the Five Whys, it's a diagnostic tool. It invites scrutiny, surfaces assumptions, and signals that everyone's input is needed, not just welcomed.
Why It Works
It gives engineers and PMs permission to shift from passive reviewers to active participants.
It reframes design critique as a shared checkpoint, not a designer's defence.
It shortens feedback loops and catches feasibility issues early.
Rochelle King at Spotify describes a similar philosophy: involve people early and often. Design is not a genius sport; she says it's collaborative.
The Impact
Since starting these 15-minute "Does this look right to you?" check-ins, we've seen:
Fewer surprise objections after handoff.
More confidence from non-designers to challenge or improve the solution.
There is a noticeable drop in design-related bugs.
We still conduct formal handovers with annotated specs and proper documentation, but this quick, low-fi session has become our most valuable design ritual.
Designers often feel responsible for bridging the gap between concept and code. But responsibility doesn't mean going it alone. By inviting more voices into the room and using humble tools like whiteboards and markers, we've strengthened our process and improved our products.
And we'll keep asking: Does this look right to you?