It is quite an honor to be invited as a guest blogger on this site. I have followed Ralf’s blog for a while now and we have discovered that some of the issues I am looking at in my work very much relate to the concerns and interests of the participants of Vol. 2: design-management.de.
Before I will begin “rambling off,” I think it is only fair for you to learn a little bit more about me. I am writing from the city of Atlanta, where I have just recently returned after six years in Pittsburgh. I am quite happy about this since Atlanta is home to my beloved Falcons and Braves. And while I grew fond of the Steelers in Pittsburgh (sorry, Pirates, not a possibility), I did miss watching my favorite team’s matches.
Currently, I am finishing up my dissertation on organizational change through human-centered product development. I anticipate being one of the first PhDs in Design that the School of Design at Carnegie Mellon graduates this May. Depending on the day, I consider myself either a gutsy pioneer or a masochistic guinea pig. This is after all a rather young field and even among designers, the value of design research is still in dispute. There are encouraging signs though, and I do count this blog among them. So thank you for the opportunity to engage in a conversation.
What will I be talking about? What is my contribution?
There are several directions in which we can take this blog. Much on it depends on your interests, questions, comments, suggestions and perspectives. To begin the conversation, I will share with you what I am currently working on– a dissertation for a doctoral degree in design. This in itself might be a topic: What is a PhD in Design? How does one go about it? Why would designers want to engage in doctoral research? But of course, many of you would sooner or later ask: And what does this have to do with design management?
Well, a lot in my case. In fact, in my first chapter, I spend a significant amount of thought and words trying to come to terms with where design management comes from, what it accomplishes and where it falls short. Why am I doing this? Because like many of the readers on this blog, I am interested in learning about how design thinking and design methods apply to the organization itself. As we have seen over the past posts to Ralf’s blog, there is a big question as to what design thinking and design methods are.
In my methods chapter, I am pointing to the lack of existing case studies about design projects and how they contribute to a lack of understanding the activities that constitute designing. When I say case studies, I do not have in mind the glossy magazine and book pages that claim to “uncover” “real-life projects” or “design secrets.” I pitty the poor business student, manager or anyone else outside of design hoping to find answers about methods and thought in them. All they get to see are finished products and PR pieces that have more of a marketing function for both the designer and the product than an educational role. The fuzzy front end, the activities, the struggles, none of these are explained or communicated through these highly sterile aesthetic works. What we are left with is design equals magic. As a result, most people perceive of design only that which is linked to star designers, form and objects.
If there is such a thing as design thinking and design methods, we need to talk about it. Among the difficulties to talk– or even document– design thinking and design methods, is the concern that inadvertently by doing so, designing will be reduced to a formulaic activity. That is the fear that by describing design activities one takes the creativity out of design since much of what is happening in designing happens “between the lines.”
Actually, from what I see, just the opposite may be the case. For organizations, creativity is great but only as long as it can be applied efficiently and effectively. Thus, many organizations prefer to talk about the activities of designing as a “process” rather than as an “inquiry.” A process implies a particular outcome whereas an inquiry puts the outcome in question. When it comes to innovation, the “process” approach is problematic because organizations themselves have to change, too, in order to provide better products and experiences for their customers. A “process” effectively contains the creative potential within the activities that are defined to be part of the process. An inquiry, on the other hand, does not have such boundaries and can truly be effective within the organization.
My criticism with design management is, that it has so far, mostly looked at designing as a process, rather than an inquiry. And when we start talking about designing, we might just find the principles at work that are at the heart of every design project. In my upcoming blog, I will talk about a recent project I participated in. Unusual in its nature and context, I hope to encourage others to open up their own treasure box of experiences.
References:
IDSA. 2002 Design Secrets: Products: 50 Real-Life Projects Uncovered (Design Secrets
Series) by Industrial Designers Society of America, Rockport Publishers.
Industrial Design Society of America (IDSA). 2002. Design Secrets: Products: 50
Real-Life Projects Uncovered (Design Secrets Series), Rockport Publishers.
Steve Portigal Says:
September 16th, 2005 at 3:11Visit Steve Portigal
Awesome stuff, Sabine. Do you have examples of how companies are making use of design in this way?t Are their certain categories/markets, or certain attributes of corporate structure? Large, small, new, old? Or stories about companies that have been sucessful in evolving along these routes?
Or maybe some anecdotal thoughts about this; since I’m sure this is not exactly the type of analysis you have been doing :)
Michael Says:
September 16th, 2005 at 5:57Visit Michael
Sabine, thank you for adding to the conversation!
I am envious that you have the Braves, a winning team. Here in Des Moines we have the Iowa Cubs, AAA farm team of the Chicago Cubs - so you can see we remain commited to hopeless causes!
Have you read Peter Block’s book, “The Answer to How Is Yes”? It is a reflection, in part, on why a pragmatic insistence on the question “how” can act as a way of resisting real change. Not dead on with your subject but some themes in his work remind me of what you presenting.
Looking forward to your next post.
jens Says:
September 16th, 2005 at 17:51Visit jens
hi sabine. that is interesting stuff. i do not quite see that process and inquiry have to be opposing poles. i think you can combine it. and i think you can combine it ONLY IN A PROCESS.
_ i actually opened my treasure box just recently and you will find some stuff that will be of interest for you. just follow the link below…
and thanks, ralf, for bringing sabine:)
jens Says:
September 16th, 2005 at 18:18Visit jens
ps
it is actually these three posts which might be of interest to you
http://sachlichkeit.blogspot.com/2005/07/joseph-beuys-on-management_18.html
http://sachlichkeit.blogspot.com/2005/08/design-by-west-point.html
http://sachlichkeit.blogspot.com/2005/09/speaking-of-process.html
sabine Says:
September 17th, 2005 at 6:13Visit sabine
Thanks to all for the friendly and warm welcome– and also for the different pointers in regards to the issues I began to talk about. Here are my thoughts on the points made so far… I hope it is ok with everyone that I am responding in one rather than in three different posts.
Concerning your questions, Steve:
At this point, the organizations that I know employ human-centered product development in a conscious effort to effect internal organizational change are government agencies. The three agencies I study are the Internal Revenue Service, the United States Postal Service and the Australian Tax Office. These are huge, complex systems (and thus bring in all the beauties of systems design problems) with a clientele that spans all ages, classes, ethnicities, etc. They tend to be at least decades old, if not hundreds of years. I argue that if human-centered product development can effect change in one of these least likely to change organizations, human-centered product development can do even more in the much more flexible and adaptive corporate environment. There are some books who try to tell the story but so far have fallen short of acknowledging or demonstrating the internal role of product development. I am particularly thinking of “The Perpetual Enterprise Machine” by Bowen et al (1995). Lauralee Alben’s work at Procter and Gamble might be heading this direction but it is too early to say since ittle has been written about it yet. (From Products to the Profound: Inspiring Innovation through Organizational Change within Procter & Gamble; DMI.org).
In response to Michael:
No, I have not read Peter Block’s book yet but I just looked it up and it sounds very interesting. I will try to get a hold of a copy. I do want to say this, though: At the heart of product development is the ability to envision an alternative future AND to realize, i.e. make it happen. This puts another question before the “how” question: “Why” are we doing what we are doing? People seem to be less resistant to change when they know what, how and why things are changing. Designers can have a role in all three questions: invent alternative scenarios and visions; employ a wide range of methods and generate arguments for why a particular change makes sense.
In response to Jens:
I don’t want to get lost in semantics but I have become more careful in using particular terms to describe things, situations or concepts. In organizations, the term process is quite familiar to managers. They think of decision-making processes, input-output processes, chemical processes, mental processes, etc. Process in this context often refers to a form of mechanism that simply does describe or characterize the nature of the activities that go into designing. A process tends to be repeatable in the same form and allow for probability and prediction, such as is the case in game theory. I did enjoy the links you provided– thank you. I particularly enjoyed the Beuys on management post. Reading your post on process, I think you might be interested in Philip Kotler’s Humanistic Marketing; an old piece but right on and still valid. Perhaps for me the “process” you talk about is human-centered product development. There is after all– and I imagine you would agree with me– a difference between product tests, focus groups and user research.
:: ::
Like I said, I will talk about a recent experience with design thinking and design methods that happend to take place during the 2nd Ittingen Summer School on Science as Intervention: Shaping the Future.
jens Says:
September 17th, 2005 at 9:56Visit jens
hi sabine.
i agree with you that process is commonly used as something more or less linear, more or less predictable.
especially in the context and rhetorics of management consulting: strategy is what adds the value. process=implementation is for idiots/ taken for granted/ is trivial.
well, that might perhaps be the case in classical management consulting - in strategic design consulting it never is.
it is exactly the other way around:
in design management strategy is comparingly trivial to process. because it may be hard to come up with the right strategy - but it will be 10times harder to coordinate all the people and make them all add their part of creativity to make an idea become a seamless experience.
that in away is also the case when you look at design as a potential change agent in an organization.
hope i have made myself - halfway - understood.
regarding your thesis: systems-theory of course is where i’d dig in - but you know that.
design as organizational change agent, if you’d like me to produce some more information, please send a mail.
and let me see if i can come up with a post on that matter on my site..
jens Says:
September 17th, 2005 at 9:58Visit jens
oh, and one question: at which university did you study before?
sabine Says:
September 17th, 2005 at 15:14Visit sabine
Jens,
Two questions for you: What is “strategy” for you? I strategy dynamic or static?
jens Says:
September 17th, 2005 at 17:35Visit jens
good question. you have got me there… thanks for actually reading my stuff..:)
still, let me answer: as an intellectual act strategy is dynamic. it is about working on a future direction, on a new course, on a different route.
in organisational reality/implementation strategy is very often very static. decisions have been made behind closed doors with a bunch of external specialists. the result is being presented - and that then is very static: this is it. go and get there! (or: why are you not there yet, idiots)
this is when strategy leaves the corporation behind. happens often - most of the time, actually. it is the old concept/metaphor of an organization (the one that roger martin calls the “broken body” /http://www.businessweek.com/innovate/content/sep2005/id20050901_844211.htm)
happens all of the time. our management organisations are so dysfunctional that we do not realize it anymore - we take the frictions, the noise of a breaking axis or of 3 flat tyres running over the motorway for granted… management is like this.
as soon as management gets a face, gets visible - as in design management or brand management (iow: the coordination of creative processes) these frictions can not be ignored anymore because we can sense and judge them on a level that we have learnt…
puh.
thanks for that question sabine. was inspiring
jens Says:
September 17th, 2005 at 17:51Visit jens
…
and just to finish this thought.
here now something as soft a factor as design - or better: as aesthetics (the power to sense, or to judge with your senses)- plays a new role in today’s hyper competitive markets with their highly trained customers…
suddenly something as soft a factor as aesthetics and design points the finger an aspects of organizational dysfunctionality that have been widely discussed since the 1970s… is this just retro-fever? …or are we experiencing a fundamental change here? this question, dear sabine, goes to you.
jens Says:
September 18th, 2005 at 12:02Visit jens
thoughts revisited:
i can be even more extreme
process=dynamic=execution=underrated
strategy=static=idea=overrated
in one way though strategy can become more than just a torturing piece of paper.
(… i wonder why henry mintzberg has not said anything on design management… he could swallow the whole thing with one sentence…:)
that when you make strategy a joint effort. and that only goes by…. you have got it: process.
this process then is not your trivial linear process. it is - to stay in the design management discussion - what roger martin calls the choices cascade.
or - if we leave the design management community and drink some fresh water right from the spring, we read henry mintzberg’s the rhythm of change for example.
yes. these processes are permanent change management. but that is what it needs to keep the blood running through these veins.
i do not like the term change management though… i prefer to call it process.
sabine Says:
September 19th, 2005 at 20:36Visit sabine
Hi everyone,
I am writing on my second post, trying to keep my spelling errors down. Thanks to all, particularly Jens for his productive feedback! It sounds like we have a lot to talk about strategy and design and I will come back to these issues in my upcoming post. If you are looking for good reading in the meantime, I will add my favorite Mintzberg readings to the list. Unlike Jens, I find he actually does say quite a bit about designing and design management.
Also, check out Churchman, C. West’s “The Systems Approach” (Dell Publishing Co., New York, New York, 1968). Churchman beautifully compares and contrasts three different systems approaches: scientific management, management science and humanistic.
Henry Mintzberg:
“The Fall and Rise of Strategic Planning” in Harvard Business Review, Jan/Feb 1994.
“An Emerging Strategy of “Direct” Research in Administrative Science Quarterly, Vol 4, 24, Qualitative Methodology (1979).
“Of Strategies, Deliberate and Emergent” in Strategic Management Journal, Vol. 6, 1985.
Ralf Beuker Says:
September 19th, 2005 at 21:12Visit Ralf Beuker
Hi All,
thanks for this stimulating discussion you’ve started! Actually I’m on leave right now, but I can’t resist to track the discussion ;-)
While my main professional background is actually Strategic Management please allow me to enter your conversation after my return next week!
In the meantime: Keep discussing! (As Mike Wagner would say ;-)
Cheers, Ralf.
jens Says:
September 20th, 2005 at 7:02Visit jens
clearly somebody is doing her homework here. from my point of view that is a very interesting path. bravo.
but sabine, for the moment, you are at least one answer short.
(just kiddin)
talking process=inquiry
this one here is a very interesting read:
Designing Social Systems in a Changing World
Series: Contemporary Systems Thinking
Banathy, Bela H.
1997, 387 p., Hardcover
ISBN: 0-306-45251-0
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0306452510/102-9520714-4798524?v=glance
Boyd de Groot Says:
September 27th, 2005 at 17:55Visit Boyd de Groot
Hello all,
Interesting stuff here :-)
I agree with Jens in that design as process or as inquiry are not mutually exclusive and are often, from a pragmatic point of view, combined in a process.
As a designer working in the trenches of digital media, my experience is that in the early stages of a project design indeed has, or should have, the characteristics of an inquiry. We ask our clients what their objectives are, which problems they wish to solve for whom, what they want to achieve, etc.
Based on this we try to come up with a “core concept” for the product/service. When this is more or less established, the “process” part starts in where you simply have to work on delivering.
Of course, in reality the process-phase is never linear, nor is the inquiry-phase “without boundaries” in terms of scope, budget and time. It would indeed be ideal to have no boundaries in the inquiry phase in order to really analyze and understand a design or business problem inside out. Unfortunately we don’t have this luxury and in any case need to be very careful in how to communicate the necessity of the inquiry-phase as many people often think designers are in la-la-land anyway :-)
I disagree with the notion that a “process” cannot encompass creativity in it. This brings us to the area of (design) methodology and alot of people (even many of my collegue designers) are allergic to this term as it supposedly excludes creativity. I think this misconception comes from the fact that a “method” is often seen as being the same as a “recipe”. Obviously, this is not the case. With a recipe, the meal has already been designed and tested! The recipe is just the specification for production. It is the end result of a design process.
A (design) method, on the other hand, lays down a framework to help a designer with, essentially, the thought-process of solving design problems and as with scientific methods, the answer is not already in the method. On the contrary, creativity is an indispensable element within design methodology.
But at the end of the day, as Sabine would probably agree, it’s all about people and the organizational culture made up by the people. Is there a culture for inquiry in the company? Does the management realize this and support this? And even if (senior) management supports and understands it, often the majority of an organization does not and still acts according to their beliefs.
Elizabeth Says:
July 18th, 2006 at 21:24Visit Elizabeth
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Inventing Change From The Inside Out. | 7Wins.eu Says:
September 9th, 2009 at 19:34Visit Inventing Change From The Inside Out. | 7Wins.eu
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