Nigel and All,

Nigel wrote: I do think that it helps to have a design undergraduate
(and/or
masters) degree when doing PhD in design research. Why is that? Just my
prejudice? Or do such students bring some kinds of appropriate knowledge,
values and skills with them? Anyone agree/disagree? (Oh, go on - I'm sure
you do!)

I would expect most PhD-students in design to have a design background, and
I am sure there are advantages of having experience from designing and
knowledge of design when you research design. It is the same in most other
fields - what you do a doctorate in is what you studied at either the
masters (most common) and/or undergraduate level.

However, since design is ecclectic, a lot of research on design and
designing is done by people who have their background in other disciplines.
Are these people neccessarily disqualified because they have not been
designing themselves? Do they have to, or should they only aim at improving
their research by collaborating with designers with a research degree? If
the latter occurs I believe it to be a distinct advantage that all
researchers on the team have formal training in doing scientific research.

Actually, I have been involved in constructing research communities with
members from various disciplines, including designers of food processing
equipment, food products and their packaging, advertising, organizational
and economic solutions, etc. The consoritum is called NAMM - in Norwegian
that is a sound you make when you thoroughly enjoy what you eat. All the
researchers have formal research training, and they do both scientific
research as well as developing applied solutions in cooperation with people
in the industry who do not necessarily have scientific research training.
It is amasing how long it takes for the participants to understand and
appreciate the unique knowledge each person has. Just think of the
challenges of first understanding the other person, and then translate your
own knowledge to something that is correctly interpreted by the other
person - repeated for each unique background present, and translating their
contributions to your own field.

There is no doubt in my mind that the more such team members have in terms
of common research thoughts and vocabulary, the faster we are able to take
advantage of the unique knowledge contribution of each individual. We also
learn to have deep respect for the abilities of others, and get quite a
training in multiple sub-cultural communication. Having a spread of
competencies in the group generates a lot of creativity and solutions that
could not have occured except in such settings.

I think that might be a thought for recruitment policies to doctoral
programs with a certain minimum size. Also it may influence the thinking of
how we construct doctoral programs. The main purpose of doctorates is to
develop good researchers, not good designers, even though the result of
research should lead to improved design practice too. If it is the case
that reseach done in teams composed of people with differing competencies
and disciplines are more generative and creative than one-discipline based
teams, maybe training in cross-disciplinary team research in the doctoral
programs should be considered as well. In the NAMM program we have
developed a system of joint faculty appointments and joint doctoral theses
funding and advisory groups between the participating reseach communities
in order to promote ecclectic and integrative research across disciplines.
NAMM is funded by the Norwegian Research council in recognition of its
importance in a country that it the biggest net exporter of fish in the
world.

It is funny how such cooperation influences the participants. For some
years the Norwegian School of Marketing (NMH - a part of the Norwegian
School of Management) ran and ad for recruiting students. It showed a fish,
and the text went: "Can you come up with a t least 10 suggestions for
building added value into this fish? If you can, consider studying at the
NMH."

I hope this gives some food for thought (pun intended)

Brynjulf

Brynjulf Tellefsen
Associate Professor
Department of Knowledge Management
Norwegian School of Management
P. O. Box 4676 Sofienberg
N-0506 Oslo, NORWAY

Phone direct:  +47-22985142
Via exchange:  +47-22985000
Faximile: +47-22985111
Private phone/fax: +47-22149697
e-mail: [log in to unmask]



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