Importance of thinking different

In this entertaining 20 minutes presentation at the Lift Conference 2011, CEO of Hublot, Jean-Claude Biver talks about innovation, creativity, and his philosophy that can be summarized by three commandments:

1. Be the first
2. Be unique
3. Be different

Unlike other presenters, he speaks without any visual aid which really draws all the attention towards his natural comical nature, making the presentation to be most entertaining.

He ends his presentation with a story that summarizes his 3 commandments by 'painting a footballer's hair red', which I assume at that time was uncommon, which I doubt. Anyway ultimately that had played some influence which earned the footballer* the opportunity to play his football in Italy.

Fun fact: Jean Claude Biver was the man responsible for Omega's huge success over the past 10 years, with one of his notable marketing techniques was his product placement strategies, notably on James Bond films. On a separate note, he so makes his own cheese.

*I did a search and found that footballer to be Atsushi Yanagisawa, a very successful player in Japan who played in Sampdoria...but failed to net a single goal abroad.

The Tourist Lane

To improve pedestrian efficiency, the people at Improv Everywhere is suggesting tourists to commute on their designated walkways so they could do what they do, like randomly change direction and walk into things while looking up instead of ahead.

I reckon this is healthy and relevant for any urban society, especially for a city like Seoul with 22 million people. I guess this also acts to preserve the locality and identity of a place. It actually got me thinking about how this would have already been implemented in North Korean as visiting tourists are embarked on a full guided tour.

From a local perspective, as seen from the video, this would also probably invoke a certain value of pride to be proud of your own identity.

What looks ridiculous on first impression might actually hold true weight if thought through!

3 ways good design makes you happy

An excellent 13 minutes with Donald Norman.


Video link
http://www.ted.com/talks/don_norman_on_design_and_emotion.html

Visceral
How things look, feel and sound, affecting how we are biological pre-wired

Behavioral
Subconscious sense of usability towards things. Similar to physiological pleasure

Reflective
Similar to ideological pleasure. i.e. to buy a hybrid to portray the image of caring for the environment It's the 'voice' in our heads

The number of Os depicting the number of pages of results is a good example of a simple 'feel-good' design implementation.


The brain works better when it's in a state of positive valence—being happy, positive, or motivated, or being in the absence of criticism or stress

Cognition is about understanding the world / Emotion is about interpreting the world.

Essentially, it's all about designing things to make us smile.

Being Human

It's the midpoint of my first semester at SADI and I've been thrilled to be learning about different fields of design. Having learned new jargon coined by masters of the field such as Liz Sanders (MakeTools), Bill Moggridge (IDEO), Don Norman (User-centered design expert), and Engine and Cooper (both Service Design agencies), delivered through my highly esteemed professors all have provided great insights to to establish what the future holds being a designer in the 21st century. 

The gist of it all really goes down to be distilled and I conclude that design is has gone way beyond from being functional to having to evoking a similar emotional response from every user that engages the intention of a design. We have to recognize that every user is different (understanding contexts and cultural aspects etc.) in which each individual holds different expectations to the design. The ultimate aim is to first understand what is it to be human and then gain clearer insights as to how to interact with them. Thankfully both users and designers are human, so there's a great leveling plane to begin with.

Such tools, frameworks, and methodologies are after all created by humans for humans, user to user. This is probably the best justifications for my cause to further my knowledge and education—to know myself better and to understand the user. The keyword is emotion and the two words I find the most powerful is love and passion, they are simply the greatest. For me I draw the energy from the people around me who personifies these 2 words from 2 parties:

Love: Quite literally, my love ones. They are my partner, family and friends
Passion: The heroes of their trade and what they stand for. Because what they stand for—can change the world.

Just like how this man below did.

Brand Lecture

Usage of Metaphor > Scott tissues > Cloud > Soft

Quaker = Oats
Quakers are honest, frugal people
Quakers exude tradition

Print ads used to embed a symbol of death which are now banned. i.e a distorted image may be interpreted as death. Especially for tobacco and liquor products.

Know target audience. Sell children shampoo to parents who are going to buy it for them.

Tomato brand > Fresh World Farms > Literal and effective

Brand Elements > Rationale, Cultural, Experiential, Visual, Functional, Emotional

Jockey briefs has many sub categories to sell 1 product to speak to a broader audience. Classic (regular), Tech (performance), Reps (rhythmic), Zone (colours)

Nº5 CHANEL PARIS / Iconic structural packaging

Toilet duck packaging is unique and provides great functionality, but not feasible for production from the engineers perspective. The duck name is associated with the rubber duckie toy and evokes positive childhood memories, making household chores less painful.

Public Service

Digging into further insights for my project, I thought to approach the subject (subway transportation) from the perspective of a public service, leading me to this video on Design Council UK.

Video link: Design for growth: public services
(the downside of blogger is not having an option to embed videos outside YouTube...)

Design helps create new citizen-focused products and systems, helps in redesigning more efficient, lower-cost services and improves people’s well-being.

Use design to
> Reduce cost
> Improve quality
> Give value for money
> Better experiences
Why design?
> Improve well-being of citizens
> Drive sustainable growth

Research helps identify key opportunities for improvement.

Design is beyond changing visual appearances but to change outcomes. i.e. improve quality of service, increase reliability (through consistency). Design also increases staff morale.

Redesigning services changes the platform on which services are delivered.

UX Design Development Process

2 of 3 Lecture series with Prof Kyoung Soon Oh 

Design is a process of creation, evaluation, selection, and arrangement
— James L. Harrison

Design is not a noun but a planning, doing research, thinking and making a decision of a direction. Design is defining problems and a problem solving process
— Steven Tolleson in Design Methodology

Consider activities. Think about the verb rather than the noun. i.e. when designing a chair, think about reading, eating, resting, instead of legs, arm-rest etc.

UX Framework
Physical > Size, shape, colours, materials
Cognitive > Language, symbols, controls
Social > Information interactions, trusting members
Cultural > Values shared, beliefs shared, supportive organization, accepted habits
Emotional >  Interested, happy, calm, friendly

User Experience Design is a interdisciplinary collaboration (including the user)

<Process Positioning Map, Institute of Design, IIT>

UXD Process (manufacturing) is a con-current engineering process involving product design, software development, mechanical and electronic engineering. BECAUSE our product life cycle is getting shorter and shorter.

<Design Innovation Process, Institute of Design, IIT> 

10 Principles of Good Design

Dieter Rams is probably the 20th century god of design having providing us with the '10 commandments' to us designers. He is truly one of my most admired living designers of our time along with Milton Glaser and Wally Olins.

10 Principles of Good Design 
 1. Good design is innovative
 2. Good design makes a product useful
 3. Good design is aesthetic
 4. Good design makes a product understandable 
 5. Good design is unobtrusive
 6. Good design is honest
 7. Good design is long-lasting
 8. Good design is thorough down to the last detail
 9. Good design is environmental friendly

In the video interview below, Dieter Rams talks about his opinions on the use of colour which I cannot agree more. He also said:

"Design should not dominate people, it should help people. That's what's important."

Research methods

Design research

Professional practice is a linear process

Our current generation are Digital natives
Our parents are Analog natives > they are digital immigrants

Tap into their native environment

***Process map

Adapt > Conduct > Communicate

—

Liz Sanders (maketools.com)

Product >>> Experience

Conceptualization and Visualization space

Visioning Workshop (bulls-eye chart)


Co-creation and new landscape design (IIT Institute of Design)

Approach
Expert Driven  80s
User Centrered 90s
Co-creation 00s

Empathetic design

Critical Design > You create something and then observe what happens.

Codesigning teams are expanding to include all stakeholders, particularly in the front end of during the design process.

Design is taking increasingly collective forms.  The new domains of collective creativity will require new tools an methods for designing and researching

Hypothesis of design

Deep Knowledge Outcomes (through research)
Latent > Present but not visible
Tacit > Understood without being openly expressed; implied



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Consider service design for disability market (deaf, mute, blind) or elderly market

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Assignment 5
Develop 3~5 personas for your project with the following steps:
1. Identify mutually exclusive and collectively exhaustive user segments for your project
2. Group them with their distinguishable characteristics (their ultimate goals, values, behavioral patterns, desire, or lifestyle)
3. Name them with distinguishable names.
4. Describe persona with their goals, attitude, behavior, context, desire, photo, goal, and problems


Reading reference for next assignment
Indi Young, Mental Models: Aligning Design Strategy