NextD Journal I ReReThinking Design Special Issue, April 2007
Eric Niu & Alex Cheek |
Beautiful Diversion
Graduate Students, IIT, United States
As design thinkers, we think we know everything. But what are we doing about it? “Design” is now called on to create so much stuff that designers have been forced to specialize. Instead of design being the task of a single person, the profession has split. Design thinkers have tasked themselves to develop understanding, leaving designers to the the act of implementation. And we’ve already forgotten how to communicate with each other. Designers are told that they suck; design thinkers are told that they don’t know how to make anything. Each of us just keeps doing what we want to do. But Design is not just what “design thinkers” think or what “designers” do. It’s both. In class on Monday, Larry Keeley talked about the “rhythm of planning.” By the halfway point of a project, you need to have decided what to do. If by then, you don’t stop planning and start doing, then you’ll run out of time. Rushed, you will likely end up accomplishing something trivial and unsatisfying. In essence, we think his point is that the doing requires just as much time and effort as the thinking that precedes it. Design thinking is not very valuable without an equal measure of designing. Aren’t we supposed to be having a conversation? The “discussion” between design thinkers and designers has devolved, and now we don't understand each other anymore. People who choose to become design thinkers are typically less interested in how things are made. People who choose to become designers are typically less interested in thinking about why something should be made. And that's not such a bad thing. Our differences force us to challenge our preconceptions. But each of us thinks our way is better, and our egos are preventing us from working together. So we just keep calling each other names, and the conversation we're supposed to be having goes nowhere. It’s silly for either side to think that they own Design. As design thinkers, we need to engage designers and learn to communicate our value in a more meaningful way.
Gill Wildman |
Plot, United Kingdom
I appreciate a lot of what Bruce is saying. However, I find myself shaking my head at how. It would be great to read a mainstream media business column that talked about important emergent patterns in innovation and design that didn’t involve the author’s ego or position of power. I don’t see many designers, (democratized or celebrity) or even design managers, who really get much of choice between making landfill or cradle-tocradle products. It’s a board level decision. Most designers aren’t invited. But I am being deliberately naïve here — the point of mainstream media articles is to create a stir and to get to know the author a bit more. Expecting the column to inform us more about, say, amazing feats of sustainable development; or services that encourage participation in change; or prototypes that shape transport policies; is perhaps a tall order, but it’s the sort of thing I like to read. Bring on more tales of modest, enabling, and highconsequence design thinking. Lose the dumb attempts to be controversial.
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