Design | The New Business

As someone with a business background and a desire to pursue entrepreneurship, this week's video and readings were particularly hopeful. Because of Startups, This is How Design Works, I've decided to post Dieter Ram's 10 Principles of Good Design near my computer as a sort of checklist for each project I begin! Dieter Ram says good design is...

innovative
makes a product useful
aesthetic
makes a product understandable
unobtrusive
honest
long-lasting
thorough
environmentally friendly
as little design as possible.

Although I found Design | The New Business to be a bit slow in parts, I collected a few pages full of interesting quotes from the designers and business professional that were interviewed. One of the first interviewees stated that "managing complexity is one of the huge opportunities of our time." I agree fully and hope that I am trying to do that in all areas of my life, particularly "design." I also liked one definition of a good designer.

A good designer has the ability to translate a need or desire of the customer into a business proposition OR translate a business capability into a product for the user.

I like this duality.

I've also long wondered why our design department isn't in continuous collaboration with the School of Business. One interviewee quoted that "design without business is a pointless exercise." Perhaps because I have an art background it's tough for me to accept that word "pointless," but I think it should at least urge designers to think outside the art and typography bubble and look at their work from a businessperson's perspective.

While I enjoyed reading Fast Company's "The United States of Design," I'm not really sure if I agree with the author, or if I completely disagree with the author. She admits to making generalizations - and she does, in a big way - about national aesthetics and commitment to design, but she never truly comes full circle. While she does proffer that perhaps American design is so diverse and innovative because many greats have migrated to the US from other countries, the entire article still seems very biased and narrow. Perhaps we tend to think of American design in this way simply because we hear more about it in the media? Tischler writes

"The U.S. design community has a distinctive mind-set and perspective. Its design is pragmatic, with an emphasis on marketplace appeal; streamlined, in a way that focuses on ease of use; and democratic, which fuels the integration of new ideas, new processes, and new business models."

I have a very hard time believing that American design - like one-click ordering from Amazon - is any more pragmatic or streamlined than (what may appear to us) to be a rudimentary tool or system used by farmers in a remote village somewhere in the world who's family's entire livelihood depends on his/her productivity and ingenuity. She also tries to contrast American products like hard-working John Deere machinery and post-it notes to decorative "elegant china or precious chairs" from other countries. Hardly a fair or useful comparison if you ask me.

I also don't completely understand the desire of some folks within the design industry to be recognized or have an official branch within the government. In some respects, a government organization seems at odds with innovative design! The small forest worth of paperwork that my bank and lawyer have to complete in order for me to buy a house hardly seems congruent with innovation, pragmatism, or streamlined-ness (not a real word, just trying to make a point). Innovation seems to happen more frequently in garages or scrappy start-ups, so I have to wonder what a behemoth bureaucracy like the US government could contribute to foster more innovation?

GLUTEN-FREE GOODNESS PROJECT UPDATE
Good news this week, Terra Cafe has agreed to test some of my ideas and prototypes! It's going to be another week before that testing happens, but plans are in order to use my "front-of-house" components like table tents and customer-written order cards to find out whether gluten-free customers feel more welcome and at ease, and if kitchen staff feel they achieve greater protection against cross-contamination by using these simple, color-coded prototypes. I better whip out my exacto knife and double sided tape because I have 20 tables to accomodate for next Friday's lunchtime crowd!