I work for a company who associate “development” as part of the design department. There is no “development team”, just a Design team.

My company recently merged and I had to take a mini interview to keep my job.
I’m a web designer, My primary skill is design, I also code in HTML and CSS to W3C standards.

I took the test, and the interviewer who knew nothing about code, asked if I had intermediate knowledge of Javascript. I told him no, but I know how to implement Jquery…
Although I kept my job, apparently I didn’t at first, because of my reply being “no” to Javascript Knowledge.

My Company hire designers for under 30k to come up with fresh concept designs and code the final product in HTML/CSS Flash & Jquery. It’s extremely taxing, and slows down the workflow, but my team are used to it, and to be honest they allow themselves to be walked over.

Before I merged, my old company had a web developer who would do the coding. I can code to the same level as him, but for better workflow, it makes sense that i solely work on creating a design that will bring in revenue, pass it on.., then work on the next design.

to conclude my rant..

I agree that Web designers in a company should know how to code in HTML/CSS. But only to know the techniques and limitations of HTML/CSS.

btw Mark, I agree Fireworks is the better solution for UI. I absolutely hate photoshop. Unfortunately, my new design team don’t use fireworks. So I “must” use photoshop. say’s my new Head of design.

and it was intended to look like that :p

My mistakes earlier in freelancing were presenting too many concepts. Never fear, the client WILL select the one you least support and/or create a Frankenstein from multiple concepts.

I think this bad habit stemmed from early days in design studios. My ‘client’ were my fellow designers and the creative director in the internal review session, so yeah–many concepts on the table–but reviewed by pros.

Lots O’Concepts doesn’t work when dealing directly with client!

I’m totally on board w/Lee Muroe’s approach for web design. Focus on one and iterate as required (w/stated limits). I’ve adopted that approach for logo work, as well.