This insight describes an argument where designers don’t have the right education and training, skillset, mindset. While these elements are all different in nature – education what you get in school, training what you can get throughout your career, skillset embodies hard + soft skills and result from natural and apprehended means, and mindset which […]
Business
5. Access – Designers are not selected for the job, not invited, not mentored and groomed for it.
This insight describes a context in which designers are not selected for the job, not invited, not mentored and groomed for it. While many designers cite this as a true insight impacting the reality described by the question we pose, this is seen by non-designers as a typical complaint of a group of people that […]
What is the future of large corporations?
While some governments have acted in ways that may look inadequate, many large corporations have stepped up in ways that have become as impactful if not more than governments. And in many ways because these large corporations are global, they have impacted places and people that otherwise would have not via their local government. While […]
Elliot Noyes
When talking about the history of design at IBM, many tend to focus on Elliot Noyes who was hired in 1956 as a design consultant by the then IBM CEO and Chairman of the Board T. J. Watson Jr. who popularized the statement “Good design is Good Business”. Noyes was a well-respected architect with a […]
Henry Dreyfuss
Henry Dreyfuss FIDSA is a past President of the IDSA (1965) and the organization recognizes him as one of their Chairmen Emeriti, they have a concise but thorough biography of Henry Dreyfuss in their site (IDSA, 1975), and it covers his work from the nineteen twenties to his death in 1972, touching companies and brands […]
Sara Little Turnbull
Sara Little Turnbull was born in 1917 and grew up in Brooklyn as the youngest of a Russian immigrant family of very sparse means. This early experience shaped the rest of her life and career. She attended Parsons School of design on a full scholarship. Using her insatiable curiosity allied with a multi-dimensional approach, Sara […]
Has the value of design in business improved in the last 30 years?
In 1988 Peter Lawrence, co-founder of the DMI Design Management Institute and the Corporate Design Foundation, stated that design was a corporate asset requiring management like any other asset, commenting on the fact that many executives still treated design as superficial and expendable and suggesting designers need to participate in the customer research process. Though […]
What about where design and business are not aligned?
Revenue models propose a great way to understand the alignment and misalignment between design and business project cycles. Typical models map cumulative cash flow over time, through stages of Idea Generation, Commercialization and Realization. With differences in terminology, this model holds true to many organizations, and though it allows designers to perform and add value […]