Pretty is not a plan
Screens without a brief are a mood. They look like progress and hide the argument you still need to have: what must be true, what can wait, and how you will know it worked.
We sit with the people who will use the system. We write constraints out loud. Then we draw. That order does not change.
A brief you can argue with
A good brief names the job, the users, the must/later cut, and the ugly paths. If nobody can disagree with it, it is not specific enough.
Design then has a map. Engineering has a path. The client has something to react to that is not a colour palette.
