Dear Ranjan,

First, I want to join the others in thanking you for making the Ulm reprints available on your Academia page.

https://independent.academia.edu/RanjanMP/CD-ROM-Publications

This is a rich archive on a major moment in the history of 20th century design.

Nothing here contradicts that value of evidence in testing some design propositions and some design solutions.

Roger Martin and you are both correct in stating that “design thinking is not about providing proof but about insights that change the meaning of situations.”

David Sless is correct in arguing that testing and evidence help us to choose among better and worse design solutions before implementing them.

Design thinking is one kind of design process. Evidence-based testing is another.

David works with a wide range of issues that involve communication research. One of his most important projects has been a long-term series of projects about labels and how-to-use-this medicine instructions for people. His group has produced useful, tested instructions and guidelines on these issues, along with reports to government that guide best practice in regulation.

http://communication.org.au/product-category/publications/

Markets do not handle this kind of work very well. While medicine consumers are required to take medicine, they don’t choose the medicine they take. Because physicians prescribe medicine based on medical properties rather than patient understanding, there is a market mismatch between physicians and patients. Physicians are the customers who choose pharmaceutical products, and pharmaceutical companies work toward that market. Patients are the end-users who consume pharmaceutical products. The frequent failure of patients to understand medicines and how to use them leads to major adverse consequences. I won’t describe them all, but these include problems that occur in the form of epidemics, drug-resistant diseases, and massive environmental damage. The simple expedient of better patient understanding through careful testing and evidence can demonstrably improve a major public health problem for which markets offer no appropriate response.

David is not the only one doing this kind of work. Karel van der Waarde has done distinguished work in this field. Researchers at University of Reading School of Arts and Communication Design have conducted excellent work in related areas. This is also the case at University of Cincinnati, now home of the journal Visible Language.

Mike Zender is now editor of VL, and the statement on his home page sums up the value of bringing these different issues together:

“As a designer, marketer and professor, I integrate visual problem solving, consumer understanding, quantitative and qualitative measurement, and pedagogical evaluation to solve complex communication problems.”

Ranjan, you yourself use multiple, integrative approaches, and you find ways to ask questions about problems where markets do not offer answers.

HfG Ulm did great things. It was another era. It was a time of confidence, perhaps over-confidence, yet HfG Ulm was a great experiment. To label the project as arrogant is wrong. But David remains right on the value of evidence – times change, and we change and learn with the times.

There are other examples in which testing and evidence can improve design. Surely, this is one area where design research and doctoral education can contribute to better design practice.

Yours,

Ken

Ken Friedman, PhD, DSc (hc), FDRS | University Distinguished Professor | Swinburne University of Technology | Melbourne, Australia | [log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]> | Mobile +61 404 830 462 | Home Page http://www.swinburne.edu.au/design/people/Professor-Ken-Friedman-ID22.html<http://www.swinburne.edu.au/design>    Academia Page http://swinburne.academia.edu/KenFriedman About Me Page http://about.me/ken_friedman

Guest Professor | College of Design and Innovation | Tongji University | Shanghai, China

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M P Ranjan wrote:

—snip—

I beg to differ with you. Design is not tested by evidence but by acceptance and the market. There is no way that you can prove a design with evidence unless it is an already accepted offering that is well beyond the innovation stage and is at a stage of maturity. Gui Bonsieppe has written about this in his book Interface. Science innovation is peer reviewed and approved by expert approval. Technological innovations can be proved by laboratory tests. However, design cannot be proved by either of these methods and can only be accepted by the market.

Roger Martin, former Dean of Rotmans and author of many influential books on design thinking says that design thinking is not about providing proof but about insights that change the meaning of situations and I agree with him whole heartedly.

HfG Ulm was ahead of its time but the discourse at the school was true and its understanding of the complexities of design was way ahead of its time. HfG Ulm is over 50 years in vintage but still has many lessons for us to understand design if only we are looking for such understanding.

—snip—




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