This is a fruitful discussion. So let me rejoin it.
(I am cleverly circumventing my rule that any response to a post must be no
longer than 1/2 the item being responded to. The circumvention? Start a new
thread (by changing the Subject line). I consider this a legal
circumvention which has the side product of encouraging updating Subject
lines when the conversation strays.)
Erik said:
On Wed, Jul 1, 2015 at 6:25 AM, Erik Stolterman <[log in to unmask]>
wrote:
> If we understand designing or a designerly approach similarly as a broad
> approach to inquiry and change then we can see why todays simplistic
> understanding of 'design thinking' will lead to the kind of results that
> you (Don) comment on in your post. And it will lead to a backlash when
> people will argue that they tried it' but it does not work. No one would
> argue that 'I tried the scientific method but it doesn't work' or 'I tried
> an artistic approach but it did not work' so there must be something wrong
> with the approach. I think there will be a serious negative development
> around 'design thinking' in the next few years, hopefully this will make it
> possible for us to develop a more stable and deeply rooted understanding
> and philosophy of a 'true' designerly approach.
>
>
My earlier complaint was not about "Design Thinking": it had to do with
the common understanding of the word Design. I was complaining that Apple
and others have re-emphasized the aesthetic side of design at the expense
of understandability,usability, and functionality. So people once again are
thinking that design means making things look beautiful (and more difficult
to use). This is a bad thing for many reasons. Bad for Apple because it
used to be the leader in making understandable products. They no longer
are. Bad for people's understanding of design because there should be
no conflict between understandability, usability, functionality, and
aesthetics.
Note that even within the Design discipline (capital D), we have a wide
variety of specialized disciplines. Moreover, to produce a modern product
requires a variety of design skills, unlikely to be held by any single
design discipline. Design is not a homogeneous field. The skills of the
graphic designer are very different from those of the interaction designer,
the UX designer, the industrial designer, and so on. Design research is yet
a separate discipline, Each of those specialized skills is essential, but
it is always a bad thing when one of these areas dominates: we need a
balance.
(I consider myself an interaction designer and design researcher, and in my
work I could not function without the assistance of graphic and industrial
designers, areas in which I am rather incompetent.)
Apple and Google seem to have eliminated interaction designers and design
researchers from their core decision making. I know they still employ them,
but they do not seem to have much to say about the product.
This conversation moved to "Design Thinking" through Erik's comment.
Although i feel he misunderstood (or perhaps overgeneralized my words), his
comment is still valid and appropriate for discussion.
The problem is that no matter how we name ourselves, we will be
misunderstood. I found that many of the terms I have been associated with
have, over time been dramatically transformed in meaning over the years.
Cognitive Engineering, User Experience, Affordances, Activity-centered
Design, User-Centered and Human-Centered design (which to me are identical,
simply replacing the offensive word "user" with "human" (or "people").
The word Design is a major source of problems. I had dinner a year ago
with a German designer, Dieter Rams, who complained "even hair dressers
now call themselves designers." The word has lost all meaning. He thought
we should invent a new term, but I suspect that if we could, that new term
would soon inherit all the same difficulties. (This was the topic of a
previous discussion on this mailing list.)
Note that both David Kelly, founder of IDEO, and Patrick Whitney, Dean of
the Institute of Design (IIT/Chicago) have said they dislike the word
"design" and would replace it if they could only thin of a substitute. They
have failed to do so.
Design Thinking has also been a problem. But i stil think it a useful and
valuable term that does help emphasize that what we do in design goes
far beyond aesthetics: we are problem finders as well as problem solvers.
We focus on people and their interaction with technology. We ensure that
the fundamental issues are being solved and we do it by making, by doing,
by harassing the knowledge of multiple disciplines.
No other discipline has such an all-ranging focus as does Design. We bring
together a multitude of disciplines, from business through medicine, art
through engineering, political sign and architecture, social
and cognitive science through .... We build and create. We think by
drawing, building, creating, then reflecting upon our early sketches and
constructions, refining and improving. This is
very different from almost ever other discipline (although it is related to
what scientists actually do in their laboratories, although you would never
guess this from their publications where they make it sound
straightforward).
The fact that we have trouble explaining who we are and what we do and the
fact that many people -- designers, even -- will do design
badly should not deter us.
All disciplines -- art, humanities, science, engineering --
are misunderstood by the public. All disciplines have people who do things
well along with others who are an embarrassment and occasional disgrace to
the discipline.
That is life. Let us not retreat to the engineering solution to this
problem: "If only we didn't have people, our stuff would work perfectly."
We are not engineers: we are designers who must design for people the way
they are, not the way we wish thyem to be.
That is our unique strength. That is our power.
Don
Don
Don Norman
Prof. and Director, DesignLab, UC San Diego
[log in to unmask] designlab.ucsd.edu/ www.jnd.org <http://www.jnd.org/>
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