Somebody throw me a frickin' bone here...
I'm the boss. Need the "info".
Seriously though, something that both me and a fellow web design friend of mine are both going through lately has us both kinda frustrated. Maybe it's just because I'm not asking the right questions or taking a bold enough (see 'dictator') approach to the project.
Anyway - how come people that aren't designers (web or any other variety) think they know better what looks good for a website? Even moreso than those that have spent years in the trenches battling Photoshop, CSS, pixels, and HTML. I mean...if I were going to take my car into the shop to have a new engine put in, I certainly wouldn't be telling the mechanics there I don't like the way they mounted the engine on the chassis or that it should sit higher or lower, etc. They're the expert and I'm paying for their services. I'd respect them being the authority and would do nothing beyond ask for a suggestion or tell them what I want the end result to be.
Let's take the analogy of building and designing a house. I might know how to hammer a nail into wood. Heck, I might even know how to put up drywall and install windows. But to tell an interior decorator that decorates homes for a living that I know better than they do what looks good and what doesn't...is not only pretentious but pretty ignorant, if you ask me.
But when it's a website, suddenly everyone and their brother is an expert and knows how things should be laid out, colored, and so on. *Sigh*...
Anybody figured out how to overcome this problem without losing their client or making them feel like you hold them in contempt for thinking they know best?