{"id":1231,"date":"2007-03-29T14:30:55","date_gmt":"2007-03-29T18:30:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.rebang.com\/?p=1231"},"modified":"2010-01-25T22:46:27","modified_gmt":"2010-01-26T02:46:27","slug":"why-design-thinking-makes-no-sense-to-this-designer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.rebang.com\/?p=1231","title":{"rendered":"Why “Design Thinking” Makes No Sense To This Designer"},"content":{"rendered":"

{NOTE: Cheskin visitors can read my response in the comments section below the blog entry. Unfortunately, the Cheskin Added Value blog is not allowing comments to post.<\/strong>}<\/p>\n

Consider this a continuation of my previous post (those coming here from O’Reilly might find it especially worthwhile – reLink<\/a>) inspired by something written on the Core77 forum. Here’s the entire post by RAVE12 (Link)<\/a>:<\/p>\n

Having been in school not that long ago I see it like this. 4-5 years of school is NOT that long to go from “Hey I think I would like to be a Industrial Designer” to ” Holy SH!#, I’m a professional”. You have roughly 8 semesters and at best you have 6 dedeicated classes to mock product design. the rest of the classes are fragmented parts of the whole (drawing, rendering, 3-D modeling, GD, etc.) typical you have one class a semster that does the full process summing up all the parts into one project. If you are a teacher with that limited amount of time to mold young minds into the innovative minds of the future which things are you going to spend your time on?
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\nYes the ability to communicate an idea effectively is how you can define a GOOD designer. I think the learning curve for effective idea communication has a finite limit. You can only get so good at the ability to communicate an idea, at which point all ideas will become equally valid on the bases of the presentation (sketches are tight, push pins are all the same color, rendering communiacte the idea, etc.)<\/p>\n

But what begins to seperate the GOOD from the GREAT is what is the IDEA. If I am an educator that understands these principles and the limited amount of time that I really have, I might be tempted to let the student struggle and figure out how to communicate an idea on there own so that I can emphasis and teach how to define a good idea and how to properly align that idea with a user group or vise versa.<\/p>\n

The solution to the problem of student project not having enough consideration for real world problems like mass production and price points is not better communication abilities; it is to teach them to dig deeper in there design process and method of thinking and evaluating concepts. If the project aren’t considering these things that means they need more “design thinking” classes not less.<\/p>\n

The design world is a pretty one of cool sketches and hot rendering and designed presentation; once you pull down the fascade you have to have some real meat in order to actually have relevance. TEACH MORE MEAT<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

This was fully endorsed by another designer, someone with whom I disagree and who has for some time supported what I consider overblown hype regarding the Industrial Design profession’s supposedly newfound and wide-ranging respect in the business world.<\/p>\n

So let’s take this apart and see if it deserves that Design Manager’s unequivocal endorsement.<\/p>\n

1) “Yes the ability to communicate an idea effectively is how you can define a GOOD designer<\/em>“<\/strong><\/p>\n

I disagree. The ability to communicate an idea effectively is how one defines a GOOD communicator, not<\/em> a good designer.<\/p>\n

Design as an activity should not be confused with communication. These are two separate activities. People can<\/em> design without communicating. Did the first caveman to fashion a wheel first give a powerpoint or waste time chiseling his thoughts on cave walls. I doubt it.<\/p>\n

2) “You can only get so good at the ability to communicate an idea, at which point all ideas will become equally valid on the bases of the presentation (sketches are tight, push pins are all the same color, rendering communiacte the idea, etc.)<\/em>“<\/strong><\/p>\n

Ideas never<\/em> gain justifiable validity on the basis of presentation. A bad idea communicated brilliantly is just a brilliantly presented bad idea. A brilliant idea presented horribly remains a brilliant idea even if it never goes beyond the originator.<\/p>\n

Whether or not the people to whom an idea is presented act upon that idea based<\/em> on the quality or circumstances of the presentation itself is irrelevant to the worth of the idea. Plenty of companies chase bad ideas because they were dazzled by great presentations. Most often they regret the mistake. One need look no further than all the people currently going into foreclosure because someone presented a bad financing idea to them and they liked the presentation so much they signed off on it… to their lasting regret.<\/p>\n

3) “But what begins to seperate the GOOD from the GREAT is what is the IDEA.<\/em>“<\/strong><\/p>\n

Which, again, is irrespective of the communication<\/em> of the idea.<\/p>\n

Certainly, a great presentation can generate investment funds which can help a mediocre idea evolve through an iterative design process into a great idea. But that just means the design process was far from being adequately complete. In fact, this reinforces the position that great ideas don’t usually come first but are, in fact, born of the iterative process.<\/p>\n

4) “If I am an educator that understands these principles and the limited amount of time that I really have, I might be tempted to let the student struggle and figure out how to communicate an idea on there own so that I can emphasis and teach how to define a good idea and how to properly align that idea with a user group or vise versa.<\/em>“<\/strong><\/p>\n

This is where educational institutions often screw up, imo. Design classes should not be concerned with teaching technical skills; that’s what years of prior basic instruction are intended to teach and where each person has to use their own initiative to improve themselves. Anyone can learn these things in a rote manner; no critical thinking necessary.<\/p>\n

Design instruction should be focused on Design. That isn’t “design thinking”. It’s just Design<\/em>.<\/p>\n

5) “The solution to the problem of student project not having enough consideration for real world problems like mass production and price points is not better communication abilities; it is to teach them to dig deeper in there design process and method of thinking and evaluating concepts.<\/em>“<\/strong><\/p>\n

I disagree. The solution to resolving a poor design is no more about digging deeper into the design process<\/em> than having a better injection molding process<\/em> will get someone more thoroughly “injection molded” results (i.e. the definition is in<\/em> the process itself). The solution is to acquire the necessary inputs – to acquire the relevant knowledge<\/em> – so that the design process yields an acceptable result; there are, of course, degrees of success in Design as there are degrees of quality in injection molded parts.<\/p>\n

Through the design process, the individual determines the worth of the resulting design solution and then repeats as necessary until success is achieved. This is most often an iterative process<\/em>. Lack of knowledge is not<\/em> a Design issue; it’s an Experience and Intelligence issue. If someone doesn’t know about mass production, no improved understanding of Design will remedy that failing.<\/p>\n

Design should be focused on one thing: integrating thought with action. I contend that it’s this narrow definition that allows Design to be applied so broadly.<\/p>\n

If someone is an Industrial Designer and needs to increase their knowledge about aerodynamics to improve the result of their transportation design<\/em> effort, then they need to learn about that particular subject. If someone works in Advertising they may need to learn some things about programming websites in order to improve the design effort that goes into an ad campaign. If a CEO finds his company’s products are not selling well in a particular region of the world, then that person needs to learn some regional history and local culture in order to improve the design effort addressed at coordinating an increase in sales.<\/p>\n

6) “If the project aren’t considering these things that means they need more “design thinking” classes not less.<\/em>“<\/strong><\/p>\n

I again disagree. Thinking cannot<\/em> be separated from the act itself, thus to say that a project needs more “design thinking” is inherently flawed.<\/p>\n

Design is the fusion<\/em> of thought and action. Remove either and you no longer have Design.<\/p>\n

Drawing an object isn’t designing, it’s recording a visual image. Take critical thinking out of design ideation\/concept sketching and you have nothing left but drawing.<\/p>\n

Thinking about an object isn’t Design. Take the activity out of Design and all you have left is “thinking”. Not “design thinking”. Just… thinking. Sticking “design” in front of the word implies that it’s something special. It’s not.<\/p>\n

If the issue is left-brain versus right-brain “thinking”, then that’s what it should be called; not something as confusing, inappropriate, and misleading as “design thinking”.<\/p>\n

If, however, the issue is that Industrial Designers and other applied artists are coming out of college unable to design specifically<\/em> because they lack what people are calling “design thinking”, then what that says to me is that in addition to the technical underpinnings of their craft, they need more education in the basics; more math, more science, more history, more literature, more everything<\/em>.<\/p>\n

If the business world wants to better understand how applied artists\/designers approach problems and design “out-of-the-box” solutions, then they would be well served to first understand how they themselves are already designing… or attempting to design. If they find themselves creating action lists and equations at every turn or spending time only<\/em> thinking about the problem, they might want to consider trying some right-brain training methods to help them perceive the problem they wish to solve with more than half their brain. Unfortunately, most business institutions are themselves the product of successfully applying left-brain solutions to problems, so breaking out of that mode of linear problem-solving will be more difficult for those with traditional educations and experiences than it will be for those with different backgrounds; the environment reinforces left-brain habits among the traditional business crowd and facilitates balanced thinking among the non-traditional types.<\/p>\n

7) “The design world is a pretty one of cool sketches and hot rendering and designed presentation; once you pull down the fascade you have to have some real meat in order to actually have relevance. TEACH MORE MEAT<\/em>“<\/strong><\/p>\n

The meat, however, is not mythical “design thinking”. The meat is the knowledge necessary to deal appropriately with a particular Design challenge.<\/p>\n

I’ll continue the analogy. If meat is knowledge, then bones are technical skills\/craft. And of course the mind represents Thinking.<\/p>\n

Thus , if a skeleton is analogous to the underlying technical ability of a designer, and the mind represents the thoughts which put the body in motion, then too little “meat” means there is not enough muscle to animate the bones when the mind tells it to move. It’s tough to reach a destination – a design – when you can’t move.<\/p>\n

–<\/p>\n

Designers shouldn’t rely on having the “killer idea” first and then communicating it, but that’s what I suspect many people – including the above individual – believe. That’s all wrong in my opinion.<\/p>\n

“Genius is 1 percent inspiration and 99 percent perspiration.<\/em>” – Thomas Edison<\/p>\n

An Innovation is just the offspring of an Idea which matured through a combined application of thought and action, both of which are components of Design.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

{NOTE: Cheskin visitors can read my response in the comments section below the blog entry. Unfortunately, the Cheskin Added Value blog is not allowing comments to post.} Consider this a continuation of my previous post (those coming here from O’Reilly … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1231","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-administrative"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.rebang.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1231","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.rebang.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.rebang.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.rebang.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.rebang.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1231"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/blog.rebang.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1231\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1929,"href":"https:\/\/blog.rebang.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1231\/revisions\/1929"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.rebang.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1231"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.rebang.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1231"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.rebang.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1231"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}