Mismatch between form and function
After having discussion about why some products are food shaped, my Japanese friend introduced me a website where a Japanese designer keeps posting his/her own design prototypes (Prototype 1000).
In fact, there are many products whose actual function is not matched with the function inferred from its form. Examples include donut shaped tape (from 3M), burger shaped/fries shaped/coke shaped USB drive (from Burger King), and chocolate shaped mirror (from Meiji).
Why do companies create and sell these products? Do consumers like a product when there is a gap between the actual function and the inferred function? If not, do consumers want to be shown different from others by having those products? If not… why? I want to identify the benefit of form-function mismatch, which has not been discussed in the past.
Hypothesis-driven thinking
Jeanne Liedtka @ U of Toronto
Jeanne Liedtka, a professor at the University of Virginia’s Darden Graduate School of Business, visited University of Toronto and presented her work on growth. She argues that “catalysts” succeed against odds because they (1) have a broad repertoire (e.g., cross-functionally trained), (2) have a learning mindset, and have an empathy.
What was interesting in her talk was to compare between growth mindset business people (based on hypothesis-driven thinking) and fixed mindset business people.
- When people have a growth mindset, they consider life as a journey of learning, embrace uncertainty, seek new experience, broaden repertoire, manage risks through action, place small bets quickly (i.e., rapid prototyping), and thus succeed more often in new situations.
- When people have a fixed mindset, they consider life as a test to avoid mistake, fear uncertainty, avoid new experience, narrow repertore, fail to manage risks without action, place large bets slowly, and thus fail more often in new situations.
She emphasized that “learning” is important when people make failures. “Learning people” learn from their failures because failures are opportunity for them to test their hypotheses, whereas “non-learning people” do not have the same chance.
I am very much with her in that life-long learning with hypothesis-driven thinking is essential to succeed in ANY domain, let alone design and new product development.
So far, I have met only two academically sound literature on the topic of design thinking or how designers think. One is abductive thinking suggested by Nigel Cross and the other is this: hypothesis-driven thinking. If there is any other thought about how designers think, hope to talk more.
designer’s blog
My designer friend who is studying design in California “virtually” introduced me one of her friends, Paolo Jono. He is doing research at Jump Associates as a designer.
In his blog, he has posted many interesting issues about design & business with his extensive AND deep understanding about design processes and designers. For instance, he addressed not only practical issues (e.g., a list of design firms in North America) but also interesting academic issues (e.g., the story behind the product).
Definitely worth a visit!
Designers need empathy
Dev Patnaik, Founder and Principal, Jump Associates talked about How Your Business Can Prosper When You Create Widespread Empathy at March 5, 2009 @ Rotman DesignWorks, Toronto.
Empathy is giving up a self-centered world and walking in others’ shoes. It is related to the concept of mirror neurons or reciprocal altruism: Neurons fire not only when we actually do (e.g., playing basketball) but also when we simply see (e.g., watching basketball game) or hear (e.g., hearing basketball sound) and further, people treat others as they want to be treated.
He proposes that empathy is important for designers. See Nike and Harley Davidson. If we apply empathy to business, we can even find which firms are highly empathic or not.
His talk was very interesting. In fact, I became curious about when empathy works and when not, how we know when it is does not benefit, and how to overcome the problem. For instance, B&O’s designers do not listen to their customers but focus on their own inner voices and successfully innovate their products. Dev suggested that to overcome the dark side of empathy, we should empathize not with a single person but with multiple groups of people. This is interesting. None of prior research on empathy or perspective taking has not considered multiple targets. Further, it opened up more important questions: when designers empathize with very different groups of people, which groups should be and actually be considered more importantly?
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