Designing with little time

I found of of the worst roads in this country today, Going from Hanmer Springs through to Nelson. This road is very windy though does have some beautiful scenery.
Though this does not bring into what I have been thinking today. While working as a print designer for a day I have found some interesting thoughts.
In 5 hours we had managed to get the program and some of the other bits and pieces done to put on the cars and in the cars. It did not help that we had to wait for the the files to arrive by email, which in the end never arrived and we had to access the emails through webmail interface which had never been setup before. Not having the compete files and waiting, then getting people coming in to the shop and wanting us to change the design and content. One of the explanations is that people come in with an idea or an opinion on what they want, once it has been put together though they want to make further changes, or add content. Even though this programme has been done for a number of years, yet they dont make any of these suggestions before, it is left to the designer to update the material and make it look professional each year.
Another issue is why do people expect to be able to hand in the information at the last minute, and get a professional design and print one day out from the event.
People are not to sure what they want when they enter, they can only make judgments on what they get.
I was thinking about this and how this could affect our students, especially in the technology area, clients come in with a general idea, though they have no idea on what they want as a final design. It is up to the student to design an interface and software interaction.