Being My Father's Son (why you are no longer the typical user)

I was at a design conference in Seattle talking with a colleague when it arrived with a buzz. Instead of the sweet note of longing I hoped for, I received this vaguely foreboding statement - and I deserved it.

A little background... My father had a way with cars. He had the intuition and touch, and at times it seemed he related to them better than to any of us children. I was in awe of his skill and how he seemed able to see and understand things that eluded the rest of us.

Well, one of our cars would have a carburetor flooding problem in very specific circumstances. He knew that, and knew how to correct it when necessary. Problem was, it was the car my mother drove most, and she wasn't blessed with his "car whisperer" gifts... One frigid winter night I remember him talking her through the process over the phone: remove the air cleaner, stick a hair comb into the choke plate to lean out the mix, and so on. It wasn't really a problem in his eyes because he understood the system intimately, and how to address problems it occasionally had. It sure was a catastrophe that victimized my mother on nights like that though.

Keeping that in mind, let’s pull this all forward... I had recently added a soundbar to our television and left the wiring in a “functional” state, planning to redo it when I wall-mounted the television in a week. The universal remote wasn’t playing well with the soundbar, the HDMI ports and routing were a mess, but I knew exactly what was going on and could navigate it well. That was me - my wife didn’t understand it, couldn’t visualize it, and had no patience for it (or me) when “Chopped” was about to start. Didn’t help that this was the third setup she had to deal with in as many weeks as I experimented.

My wife was a typical user, and it is often easy for product development professionals to lose touch with their point of view. You may think you are just like them – heck, you use the product at home too! But the more you know as a professional in the field (designer, engineer, marketing specialist, etc...), the further you get from being a kindred soul of the mass market consumer. The mechanisms of accomplishing a task are apparent to you, and you’ve gotten to the point of developing sophisticated jargon to describe the elements and actions you deal with to make the magic happen. Most of the time they don’t care – nor should they. A convoluted description or excuse doesn’t solve their need, regardless of how proud we may be that we figured it all out.

I already know this well, but an occasional humbling reminder is a healthy thing. I had grown to be my father's son, but my wife was clearly not my mother's daughter (as is the custom, I suppose).


Announcement:
Moving forward, entries for this blog will be posted at the website of my new company (www.distillpd.com).  After more than 20 years exploring user research and industrial design for clients while representing a legacy consultancy I was proud to play a significant role in, the time had come for a new chapter. My partner (Dean Holzberger) and I founded Distill PD to tackle complex product development problems with creative methodology – boiling down various influences, constraints, and opportunities to product solutions our partners could take to market with confidence. We look forward to exciting collaborations with like-minded partners in the years to come.

Do You Believe In Magic?

 

This past week I spoke to two classes of mechanical engineering seniors at Marquette University. I've been doing this each Fall for the past few years at the request of their professor Vikram Cariapa - introducing user centered Design Research techniques as they start in on their Engineering Capstone projects.

In introducing our company, Vikram referred to his childhood in India and his fascination with the streamline era of Industrial design - specifically with trains such as those designed by Brooks Stevens. This certainly was a romantic era for design, capturing the optimism and promise of the future (as envisioned at the time). It was about so much more than mere transport of goods and people.

Afterward I was chatting with Vikram and we got to the topic of hobbies. I find the topic captivating because it highlights the point where our appreciation for utility transforms into fascination and obsession. As a practicing designer, I want to design things to work better in a person's life - but the artist inside also wants the product to transcend that utilitarian aim somewhat... to create something they cherish. It reminds me of a quote from the preface of Oscar Wilde's A Picture of Dorian Gray:

We can forgive a man for making a useful thing as long as he does not admire it. The only excuse for making a useless thing is that one admires it intensely. 

All art is quite useless.” - Oscar Wilde

We may not be making pure art as designers serving industry, but I do feel that the drive to bring an element of design "magic" to these artifacts enhances the ownership experience in a meaningful way for the user. In designing for the casual user we search for ways to enhance that engagement, but when we tackle a product for a truly engaged user (the hobbyist or enthusiast) we confront a specialized language which we need to study and internalize.

But that topic will have to wait for another day, and another post...

Looking Back On Two Decades

A recent endeavor of mine was an installation at the Brooks Stevens Gallery of Industrial Design at the Milwaukee Institute of Art and Design.  This exhibit celebrates the 20-year anniversary of the gallery and features historic work as well as a section devoted to the last 20 years of output from our company.  In addition to pulling together the exhibit I also participated in a panel discussion on the opening night.  Being that I started with Brooks Stevens just about 20 years ago this carried a little emotional weight for me.

The opening statement of our portion of the exhibit touched upon an issue I find very interesting from the view of a consultant design firm:

Industrial Design is often discussed using the language of visual aesthetics. The “function” of a product viewed as something to be captured within a stylish shell formed and polished to conform to the aesthetic vision of a lone designer. With success, that designer’s vision may extend to more and more products, imbuing them with a common “look”.  And so a designer’s brand language strengthens… 

The work of Brooks Stevens Inc. over the last 20 years doesn’t exhibit a common “look” nearly as much as it does a common “touch.” It is characterized by a focus upon bringing true value to the market and to the end user – crafting a balance between the factors of consumer desire, business viability, and functional feasibility. Aesthetic language is more impactful when it cooperates with functionality instead of fighting against it, and promotes the brand of the client rather than the brand of the designer. 

From products you touch everyday to products that touch your life in critical times… From nudging young dreamers to explore design to those careers started with BSI which have gone on to influence other firms and manufacturers…   

The touch of Brooks Stevens Inc. surrounds you – and it goes deeper than just the surface.

The BSG@20 exhibit also features work by Fiskars, Master Lock, Lunar Desgin, and GE Healthcare. The show will be ending its run on the 8th of February, 2014, and I encourage those of you who are in the area to visit this unique show before it closes.

What You Want v.s. What You Need (and When)

I snapped the image above over the holidays while visiting my aunt and uncle.  I pounced on the opportunity to document something firsthand that I had seen many times before online and in fieldwork.  We've all experienced the confusion of trying to use a remote control which had literally dozens of buttons more than we would interact with in daily use.  This low-tech solution strikes back with paper and masking tape.

This issue has been repeatedly addressed via ultra-simple remote controls, but the seemingly obvious solution never seems to stick.  Examples include Mitsubishi's pen remote (1990), Go-Video's Palm Mate (1993), and Samsung's Pebble remote (2009), among others.  I have yet to see one of these examples sitting out at a home I visit.  

Will we ever learn - or is is more of a case of serving needs which change contextually?  I suggest there is more than one customer to satisfy here, and that may be defined as much by time as by who:

• The end user, confronted by a daunting array of tiny buttons  when they simply want to turn up the volume.
• The end user, trying to make a purchase decision.  They may not understand all of the techno-jargon, but they can see when one product seems to have a lot more to offer than another for the same price.
• The retail buyer, tasked with pulling together a competitive offering of products each year.  Their customers may never get to touch the product if it is boxed or online, so bulleted and tallied lists of features have strong influence.
• The Manufacturer, attempting to minimize parts, costs, and SKUs across multiple products and markets.  Extending the reach of a product by adding more buttons on the same overlay is a small incremental hit compared to offering unique products tooled and designed for niche markets.

Working backward, the last two are different people with similar aims - but the first two are the same person separated by stage of ownership.  

I'm apparently not immune to this either, as evidenced by my last car purchase.  The rally-inspired performance capabilities and countless small convenience features sure were seductive when I was contemplating the purchase, but did they really make sense during my daily commute in heavy traffic?  Well, maybe that's not the best example, as it still brings a smile to my face every time it pummels my kidneys with it's stiff ride and presses me back into the seat in second gear.  Logical... well, not really.  Emotional... oh yes.


“Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more violent. It takes a touch of genius — and a lot of courage to move in the opposite direction.” 
 - E.F. Schumacher

Trust Me, You'll Love It...

I recently attended a branding presentation by Harvey Briggs, hosted by PDMA at Johnson Health Tech.  In addition to his extensive experience with major brands (Chevrolet, Pepsi, Kimberly-Clark, Oscar Mayer, Black & Decker, etc…), Harvey has accumulated numerous accolades including a Cannes Advertising Festival “Gold Lion” and being named a “creative All-Star” by Adweek.  A core message of his presentation stressed that branding should be baked-in from the beginning of the NPD process, rather than applying it as a veneer near the end as so many do.  Products, not advertising, are the ultimate expression of a company’s brand.  Call me selfish, but I support this sentiment.

Still, there are other elements far too influential to overlook.  One way to bake in a consistent brand from inception is to have a dominant personality be the face of the brand – such as a charismatic founder (e.g. Steve Jobs or James Dyson).  It is a bit ironic that Mr. Dyson derides the concept of “branding” when he so effectively represents the brand of his namesake.  This of course presents a problem when the progenitor ceases to be – since companies typically hope to outlive their founders.

Kentucky Fried Chicken soldiered on with stylized images of their founder, even dabbling with a cartoonish iteration which likely caused some heartburn for those who knew the real man.  Betty Crocker’s relatives and friends had no such concerns.  Perhaps the most forward-looking approach is that of KISS - intentional or not.  By turning themselves into cartoons from the start and keeping their identities secret, they created a brand which could survive their departure.  In fact, they currently tour with replacements playing the roles of Ace and Peter in full makeup and costumes patterned after the 70’s originals.  That’s 50 percent, and the band has openly talked about continuing tours with 100 percent replacements – a touring cast in the mold of Cats and Phantom of the Opera.  Is this wrong?  The spectacle, the songs, and everything else will be the same for the fans who trek to these shows…

Brand is a promise of a consistent experience, and the faces, characters, and icons presented in the media all serve as proxies for the product in delivering on that promise.

Keeping It Real

This article on Cognitive Overhead from a co founder of Bump is an interesting read. It turns out that looking at simplicity too simplistically can lead us to miss the point.  The article refers to "the number of logical connections or jumps your brain has to make in order to understand or contextualize the thing you’re looking at”.  The more convoluted the jumps, the less comprehension of value your user may perceive.  This isn't mere minimizing of clicks - it is about forging a clearer path from user action to benefit.

 

There's a user-centered design principle I've kept in mind over the years which I feel is certainly related - Keeping It Real.  While we are capable of learning what various abstract signals convey, a more direct representation of the ramifications brings the message home more effectively.  This direct path can take many forms:

• A pictogram of fingers being mangled by a rotating mechanisms rather than words warning not to reach into this opening...
• The pleading voice of a mother rather than a repetitive beep...
• Leading the user's eye via form and color to the "action" end of a tool rather than a large area on the side where you could fit the logo...

Simply put: don't fall in love with your product or the parlor tricks you can pull off with embedded technology - maintain the focus on benefits brought to the user's life through its use.

Insight Steering The Ship

Last week I attended a talk by James Ludwig of Steelcase.  This event was presented as part of the MIAD Creativity Series, and it was a wonderful opportunity to hear a design leader share some insights.  Discovery World's inspiring surroundings and mission certainly didn't hurt the evening's proceedings...

While James shared several interesting principles that evening, two in particular piqued my interest.  Intentionally or not, I believe these two guiding lights are intertwined.

If There Is No Insight, There Is No Project:
Before commencing with the "what's" and "how's" of NPD, make sure you have a firm grasp on the "why's".  In supporting this point he stressed the value of synthesis in research, not mere observation.  It can be overwhelmingly tempting for designers to immediately jump to direct solutions for the numerous small issues they observe in the field.  Doing so before they have enough inputs to understand the interrelations and complexities of why the user is doing something can lead to a perpetual game of NPD "Whack-A-Mole"; a never-ending chase for incremental changes.

Invention Happens At The Programmatic Level:
I found this principle particularly interesting from a selfish standpoint.  Creativity often is pigeon-holed as the activity of designers, who wield their markers like magic wands as they solve the world's problems.  This romanticized view has certainly served me well, and has been a lot of fun when everything falls into place just right.  But as I've progressed in my career, and I'm certain that many designers in my circumstance feel this way as well, I've grown to understand that the need for creativity only increases as one takes on responsibilities extending beyond traditional "designer" skills.  The toolbox and scale may change, but the pursuit doesn't.  Your creativity at the programmatic level is key to the success of your team.

The Coming Storm...

"Brainstorming" has been with us for quite a while now, to the sound of cheers and simultaneous jabs of ridicule.  Often characterized by silly exercises and "absolutely no criticism" decrees in an effort to get us out of figurative boxes, I can understand why some of the more pragmatic types amongst us look at it all as a bunch of superfluous goofiness.  It doesn't help that formal studies have supported the hypothesis that a solitary person is capable of coming up with more solutions to a complex problem than a brainstorming group in the same amount of time.

Which leads me to ask - why do we brainstorm?

There are several reasons I remain committed to the group brainstorming process, at least in the format that we execute it at Brooks Stevens Inc.  The practice keeps the focus upon group collaboration - which is healthy for the project well beyond the session itself.  That doesn't mean we are hamstrung by democratic buy-in on every decision; rather, it ensures that we buy-in to the concept that there are multiple inputs which can be relevant and need to be listened to.  That, and the cross-pollination that you get through this process will be sorely missed in other solitary approaches.

Quantity of ideas is part of the mechanics of the session, but it is not the prize outcome.  A structured session can look a lot like a compressed concept phase or as a way to get a LOT of great ideas – but it is much more valuable and valid as an intense “immersion bootcamp” to get an extended project team heading in the same general direction with the same general goals.  Coming out of a complex discovery research phase, this is often the best way to internalize the findings for the group so they can proceed into concept development most effectively.

Years ago I tried to be an island.  I valued my design input by how much I could do alone - in quantity, quality, and breadth.  But I was so much older then - I'm younger than that now...


image credit: 惟①刻¾

Can You Hear Where I'm Coming From?

Considering the namesake of this blog, I felt obligated to reblog this post from FastCoDesign.  The audio at 3:33 shows how seemingly random patterns can transform into recognizable themes through repetition and scale (speed in this case).

Does Big Data Always Equal Big Understanding?

Lots of chatter about Big Data out there these days. Huge possibilities lie ahead for those who can use it smartly, but there's a flip side for those who jump aboard without a good understanding of what it really represents. Some of the cautionary discourse centers around privacy fears, potential for misinterpretation, or even stunted creativity in favor of easy commercial successes.

Big Data may not lie, but it doesn't always tell the whole truth either. Making the leap to assume that chasing raw data on grandiose scales equals understanding is similar to assuming that more complexity in computing operations equals sentience. No matter how complete your quantitative dataset, it still needs scrutiny and interpretation to be meaningful.

An intriguing approach is to maintain the complexity and depth of the original data - but dramatically improve the accessibility.  Rather than present your pre-packaged analysis of the inputs, empower your audience to interrogate the inputs directly and construct their own conclusions.  Perhaps not the ideal approach for a short presentation by a consultant, but maybe perfect to build an engaged audience?  I'm interested to see where this can lead and how those bounds can be blurred...


"The real danger is not that computers will begin to think like men, but that men will begin to think like computers"
     - Sydney J. Harris

Where Do You Look For Your Easter Eggs?

There's a story my mother tells about my sister as a toddler, hunting for Easter eggs. Our older brother knew the game - he would quickly loop around the house looking in all of the prime spots to gather the stashed eggs and assorted goodies. My sister Helen was new to this, so she opted to follow his example. She dutifully followed him to check every spot he was successful finding an egg in. No surprise to us in hindsight, she didn't find any Easter eggs of her own that year.

In order to discover the "next big thing" or understand your user in ways your competition doesn't, you need to look in places less obvious - those not explored time and time again by others who came before you. When they zig, you zag. When they think linearly, you think laterally.

One fun tool for encouraging lateral thinking is the Oblique Strategies card set created by Brian Eno and Peter Schmidt. These cards have been used by many musical artists over the last few decades, ranging from Robert Fripp and David Bowie to REM and Coldplay(!?). Abstract directives and queries on the cards encourage the user to confront the dilemma in front of them in a new manner - hopefully to surprising result.

Or maybe it is simpler than that. Perhaps the question "where would Mom hide an easter egg" simply changes to "where on Mom's precious carpet and furniture would she worry least about a stain from dye"?

P.S.
Don't worry about my sister - she grew up to be talented and smart. The best of us kids, actually...

Bimmer's Brand Ballad

BMW Introduces New ‘Sound Logo’

So, BMW has a new sound logo...

I'm intrigued by how effectively sound logos can reinforce a brand through our memory's affinity for audible stimuli.  We are inundated by them daily, and you would recognize them if you focused upon them - yet most of us seem oblivious of their presence in our lives.

The old one seems somehow more "Bavarian" to me.  The new one more... backwards psychedelic synth-saxophone?!?  What's your take?

Am I Constructivist Or Am I Memorex?

As discussed previously, in order for a Visual Brand Language (VBL) strategy to be applied successfully across a diverse line of products, we understand that there needs to be some level of mutability to it.  The "amount of stretch" required may vary depending upon the nature of your product line, but it is always there at some level.

But if a strong VBL relies on recognition and mutability simultaneously, do we have a conflict?  Well, it turns out those two factors are not as mutually exclusive as it would first appear.  In his book "This Is Your Brain On Music" Dr. Daniel Levitin explores how our brains interpret and process musical stimuli.  Throughout the book he uses musical examples to illustrate aspects of how our brains access memory and recognition, and relates these examples to the competing Constructivist and Record-Keeping theories.  While this is all well above my pay-grade, in a nutshell it can be stated that Constructivists argue that we store relational information to inform a reconstruction of events when needed, while the Record-Keepers argue that memories are recorded verbatim as in a video file.  Both schools of thought have evidence to support their views, and in the end it appears that each contain a part of the truth.

If you were able to successfully identify a popular traditional melody whistled to you out of pitch, out of time, and with inconsistencies in interpretation, your brain would be illustrating behavior consistent with the Constructivist theory.  You took an imperfect input and broke it down into sets of relationships which you could interpret and derive meaning from.  Each individual pitch may be off, but if the relationships between them is somewhat consistent with the intended melody (not even in amount, just direction up or down) you will most likely be able to identify the song.

Interestingly, if we turned the tables around and asked you to whistle a recent hit song to me (one with a singular, definitive performance), you would perform it closer to the original performance’s key and tempo than chance could account for.  This is true whether you had musical training in your background or not.  Relationships are not the lone factor of recognition, your Record-Keeping brain maintained a persistent reference for you to recall in this scenario.

The Constructivist theory demonstrates to us that in the absence of specific sensory information, even in spite of it at times, our memory is capable of dynamically reconstructing a story.  This is at the core of why a VBL framework can be manipulated so dramatically yet still remain recognizable to the consumer.  Your VBL is a melody, which is reinterpreted time and time again through the multitude of product offerings you bring to the market.  The individual product may be a cappella, mellow acoustic, death-metal dirge, or a dance remix, but The Song Remains The Same…

Don't Fear the Researcher

This past week I gave a presentation on ethnographic research at GE Healthcare Research Park.  The Diagnostic Cardiology Systems Team invited me as part of their Global Engineer’s Week - a series of events centered around delivering innovative customer value.  There was a personal message I decided to fit in as part of that presentation...

When I came on board with Brooks Stevens Inc. many years ago, we were still very much the small ID-centric firm we were during our founder’s time.  Since then, we’ve expanded to include mechanical engineering, FEA, prototyping, and ethnographic research.  I can say that each of these additions – which made ID a smaller portion of our culture and business – have contributed significantly to my growth towards being a better designer today.  These additions didn’t diminish design’s role, they enhanced design's capability to succeed.

Incorporation of design research in earnest changes things, and it makes some designers uncomfortable.  They fear that the creative aspect of their job is somehow being fenced-in; the fun being squeezed out of it.  But the reality is that design research doesn’t tie your hands or restrict your creativity – it enables you to be better at what you love to do, with insights and opportunities for you to capitalize upon.

My background is firmly within ID, and I still am a designer at heart to this day.  If I was solely an ethnographer by training and career path, you’d have reason to look at my praises of design research with a jaundiced eye.  But I’m not that guy.  I’ve done a lot of ethnography, and collaborated with some great researchers over the years.

 

Come on baby...don't fear the researcher.

 

When "Mirror, Mirror" Is Not A Mirror

There's an oft-quoted product development story involving "slow" elevators. In this story, passengers are complaining to building management about the lengthy waits for elevators in a tall building. Most would-be problem solvers, when presented with this situation, attack the readily apparent source of the pain: slow elevator mechanisms. The hero of the story decides that the real problem is that people think that elevators are too slow, and that perception is exacerbated by their boredom while waiting. Ultimately, mirrors are installed in the lobby and the elevators themselves, passengers occupy themselves with checking their hair, outfit, (and yes, other occupants), and management is thrilled with the inexpensive and easy to implement solution to their problems.

This story is typically pulled out to show how impactful the definition of a problem is to the creative problem solving process, and how thinking within disciplinary boxes can lead us to overlook novel solutions. It came to mind when I recently stayed at an Aloft hotel on a research trip and saw their familiar Liquid Lava™ floor tiles in the elevator. I realized that these were a new twist on the classic elevator mirror. They took this ubiquitous distractive element and elevated it slightly more toward actual engagement. In a sense, Aloft managed to put "mirrors" on the floors of their elevators without the risqué/creepy implications - while creating an experience unique to their hotels. They didn’t think outside the box, but rather rotated it on its side…

What Goes Around Comes Around...

When I was taking my foundation courses in school, it struck me that the basic principles of visual design the professors were attempting to drive into my head were often directly applicable to songwriting. Repetition, contrast, balance, and so on; I started noting how songs I liked manipulated these factors in effective ways. In hindsight, I now realize that these principles are relevant to nearly any creative endeavor - writing, dance, and yes, design.

The image above links to a fascinating video by mathemusician Vi Hart. The video illustrates this idea of crossing principles from one pursuit with another with more impact than I can in words alone here.

Your Brand Is A Melody

Defining a visual/emotional target for a new product is at the heart of what every designer does.  It is one of our "bread and butter" skills.  Things get exponentially more interesting when the challenge shifts to a line of products instead of simply one.  Does the line of offerings have similar basic forms to deal with (such as automobiles) or do they vary greatly (as in sporting goods)?  Do the different iterations imply differing levels of expense and quality, or does each target some unique functional segment of the market?

Just as there are a multitude of scenarios to contemplate, there are a multitude of approaches which can be taken.  Some approaches opt to rigidly define a language and apply it in a systematic manner to the line.  This can be very successful in regards to customer recognition, but it also can be very limiting if your brand needs to serve a wider customer base or react to changes in those markets.  Not exactly niche concerns - I know, right?

To effectively support a brand vision over time a Visual Brand Language (VBL) strategy needs to be agile and adaptable.  The mutability of a brand language is what gives it strength.  We don't want it to be so rigid that it is fragile; one element out of position makes the whole house of cards come down.  We want a VBL strategy to be more like a melody - where if I whistle it to you out of pitch, out of time, with inconsistencies in interpretation, you can still easily recognize it for what it is intended to represent.

Day One, Post One…

I've been doing this "design" thing a while now, and I've learned a few things along the way. Sometimes I copied what I saw or was told to do, sometimes I learned the hard way. The most rewarding lessons came when I extrapolated an observation or idea into a new format and experimented with it - often in collaboration with a like-minded co-worker.

In that spirit, I'll be sharing some design-related thoughts via this blog - writing them down to visually "hear it out loud" and refine them along the way. Some of what I post should be obvious in hindsight – but hopefully stated in a novel way which makes it worth repeating.

A few themes will be recurring:

• Brand as Melody: exploration of Visual Brand Language (VBL) principles and processes using musical composition as an analogue.  I am personally fascinated by how closely these pursuits parallel each other, and feel that some elements of VBL can be more easily understood by non-designers when correlated to another medium, such as music.
• Harnessing the Spark: fostering and managing creativity within groups.  This can range from tools for the day-to-day activities of a creative group to the more concentrated actions in a brainstorming session.  In either, I am particularly interested in maintaining a keen eye on pragmatic and actionable results.
• Design Voyeur: observations of interesting design elements or approaches which may inspire you to be better or simply chuckle.

I hope someone out there finds my posts intriguing, professionally helpful, or simply amusing.  But... if you're looking for amusing pictures of cats you'll need to go elsewhere (I can provide links if needed).