From The Couch

by Eric Niu

You may be wondering what happened to the projects begun at the last ID Charette hosted by the IDSAB Couch and ID administration. The student body is moving forward on many of the projects, and we are excited to host the second ID Charette tomorrow, Saturday, April 7, to move the other topics forward.

Based largely on input from Hugh Musick and David McGaw, below is a summary of steps taken since the last charette on February 17. If you are interested further details on any of these topics, please email us.

Course Planning: Hugh Musick, ID's Associate Director, has worked to revise course descriptions to more accurately reflect the subjects covered in each course. This collection of descriptions will be updated each semester to reflect the changing nature of ID's course offerings. In addition, the faculty are exploring how to choose common topics to be shared across classes each year so that students are not trying to become experts in six completely unrelated topics every semester.

Class Structure: On March 28th, Patrick Whitney issued an email to the ID community describing recent steps taken by the faculty to address class size. These include (1) a new, large classroom on the second floor, (2) new classes in subjects related to those of overcrowded electives, (3) stricter controls on elective class sizes, and (4) modifications to the way core classes will be taught.

Career Services: Roy Luebke arranged a meeting between Hugh and Bruce Mueller, Executive Director of IIT 's Career Center. Keeping an ID-centric focus to collaborations, they are meeting next month with Alexis Baum and Andrew Buhayar, the recruitID co-chairs, to identify administrative tasks that can be handled by the Career Center instead of by students. Alexis, Andrew, and Hugh continue to work on formalizing the process of organizing recruitID events.

Prototyping: Chris Conley, head of the Product track, met with an outside shop consultant on March 27 to discuss updates to the current shop and developing a series of classes around prototyping methods for next fall. In addition, he is identifying manufacturers of state-of-the-art equipment who might use our shop as a beta site. The shop will be renovated over the summer to better accommodate the way students prototype.

MDM Concerns: The administration is exploring the idea of developing MDM -specific classes. These classes would address subjects of particular interest to MDM students as well as reduce crowding in other elective classes.

Student & Alumni Cohorts: Brad Nemer and David McGaw are looking to prototype Cohorts that will facilitate closer interactions among diverse groups of students from all classifications (Foundation, MDes, MDMs, Alumni). Beginning with dinner meetings, topics for discussion might include preparation for internships, managing team dynamics, and maintaining creative inspiration. It's not inconceivable to imagine a little fun competition among Cohorts, either.

Bruce Nussbaum recently provoked discussion with his article, "Are Designers the Enemy of Design?" G.K. Van Patter of NextD decided to use this article as the starting point for the most recent, and special, issue of The NextD Journal. The following articles were submitted by some of our own students, Zachary Jean Paradis and Eric Niu and Alex Cheek.

Nussbaum's original article

Adaptive Path's response

The NextD Journal Special Issue

A response to "Designers Suck"

by Eric Niu & Alex Cheek

As design thinkers, we think we know everything. But what are we doing about it?

"Design" is now called on to create so much stuff that designers have been forced to specialize. Instead of design being the task of a single person, the profession has split. Design thinkers have tasked themselves to develop understanding, leaving designers to the the act of implementation. And we've already forgotten how to communicate with each other. Designers are told that they suck; design thinkers are told that they don't know how to make anything. Each of us just keeps doing what we want to do. But Design is not just what "design thinkers" think or what "designers" do. It's both.

In class on Monday, Larry Keeley talked about the "rhythm of planning." By the halfway point of a project, you need to have decided what to do. If by then, you don't stop planning and start doing, then you'll run out of time. Rushed, you will likely end up accomplishing something trivial and unsatisfying. In essence, we think his point is that the doing requires just as much time and effort as the thinking that precedes it. Design thinking is not very valuable without an equal measure of designing.

Aren't we supposed to be having a conversation? The "discussion" between design thinkers and designers has devolved, and now we don't understand each other anymore. People who choose to become design thinkers are typically less interested in how things are made. People who choose to become designers are typically less interested in thinking about why something should be made. And that's not such a bad thing. Our differences force us to challenge our preconceptions.

But each of us thinks our way is better, and our egos are preventing us from working together. So we just keep calling each other names, and the conversation we're supposed to be having goes nowhere.

It's silly for either side to think that they own Design. As design thinkers, we need to engage designers and learn to communicate our value in a more meaningful way.

Why Design Deserves Less Blame and Less Credit

by Zachary Paradis

I know Bruce Nussbaum personally. He is nice man who has become the most vocal and probably most important proponent for design, my chosen field. For this, I am deeply appreciative. Unfortunately, like many journalists writing for popular publications like BusinessWeek, he has a tendency to simplify issues to the point where meaning has been lost. So it is with his piece titled Are Designers The Enemy Of Design? Before responding directly to Bruce, let's clarify a few things.

As I've written before, the word “design” is highly problematic mainly because of its flexibility. One can design just about anything: hair, fashion, furniture, hardware, electronic hardware, software, business models, services, space shuttles, or living rooms. Even the nature of the discipline of design (if you can say there is discipline of design at all) speaks to its flexibility; one could easily argue that each and every method used by designers is borrowed from some other discipline. Visualization and an appreciation of color and form comes from art; prototyping and passion for materials from engineering; systems thinking and observational methods from social science.

Is there a single other discipline with few or no unique methods? If one is an engineer, there is little doubt regarding what one does and what methods one uses. The same is mostly true for doctors, lawyers, psychologists, computer scientists, etc. This is certainly a big reason why “design” and many of the concepts related to it is so very hard to describe. This integration also contributes to a general lack of agreement on what design is from its own practitioners. It is chameleon-like in being what people need it to be. Thought of in this way, design is perhaps the only wholly synthetic discipline. This is interesting considering the goal of the activity of design itself is the synthesis of disparate information and parts into integrated solutions.

Having this purpose of integration is also exactly why design has become all the rage these days. It transforms our messy and complicated problems into meaningful and elegant solutions. It takes inputs from people's desires, technological capabilities, and business feasibility and produces a tangible outcome. This is especially important in our current era of Continuous Innovation. We've spent a century optimizing business, product creation, and delivery. Every MBA student is taught the "Key Revolutions in Business," usually in a class titled Organizational Behavior. These revolutions, starting with Taylorism and ending with Information Technology, revolve around the optimization of factories, companies, industries and information roughly in that order. Each changed the game so drastically that firms were forced to get on board to compete. They are well instituted in pretty much every company.

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Project Snapshots

Wonder what goes on in other classes? Here we look at what various IDers are working on.

In Martin Thaler's product workshop, students are developing medical devices for the home environment. Chin-Wei Chou's concept is a combination glucose monitor/insulin injector for diabetics that non-intrusively measures blood glucose levels through skin contact, and meter out appropriate insulin doses.
To find out more, ask Chin-Wei.

In Chris Conley's product workshop last fall, sponsored by Hewlett-Packard, students designed imaging/communications products for silvers (people over 50). John Ekholm's Meridian uses photography and GPS technology to document and share travel experiences.
To find out more, download the presentation.

Suggest or submit an interesting project, whether it's recently completed or in progress.

New IDer: Joe Dizney

MDM, Fall 2007

Joe (not Joseph, please) Dizney. MDM Fall 2007 candidate, 56 years old, born Napoleonville, Louisiana, resident of New York City (Manhattan, NEVER above 14th Street) for 25+ years. Worked at: submarines; photography; illustration; magazines; newspapers; books; rock and roll (The Ordinaires--guitar, of course. Stratocaster preferred); other esoteric music; arts and lifestyles; food, food, food; writing; sculling; skulking; gardening; blah, blah, blah…
Married: …and geographically estranged from Jessie Woeltz
Politics: Registered Democrat, but as with religion (see below) politics is to be lived, not discussed. Action defines character. (Are you listening, Dubya?) Religion: Buddh-ish, actually.

How did you end up at ID? What were your motivations for coming? Where were you working before?

After a year or more of dissatisfaction in the position of Design Director at The Wall Street Journal, a job I'd had for almost ten years, in July I decided to take a sabbatical with nothing more in mind than the limits of my horizons, physically and metaphorically. I wasn't planning on lying about, mind you: I had a couple of long-neglected personal projects to tend to, did some teaching, attended some workshops and conferences, all the while considering my options. I was still in touch with my former staff and was still mentoring a couple of junior colleagues.

I was already aware of the ID curriculum and the good stuff being promoted here, having seen the Business Week article and done a little research of my own, with nothing particular in mind. I heard that Chris Conley was giving an ID presentation at Conde Nast and thought that my friend might be interested in the program so I offered to attend with him.

Suffice it to say, he wasn't interested but I was hooked. (Rachel and Vince were also in attendance and I began a correspondence that night which Rachel will probably NEVER forgive me for as this was Oct. 30 and already WAY past the deadline for Spring registration--she and everyone else were far more concerned with legitimate candidates AND the potential move than a pest like me.) I persevered, made a quick reconnaissance trip to Chicago in November, sat in on a couple of classes (Judith and Jeremy's), got further hooked, and the administration acquiesced and here we are.

But seriously, I had a relatively successful career with some pretty high-profile projects--start-ups and development were the ones I had the most success and fun with--and when all is said and done I can honestly say that, from 80% of that experience, what I learned was how NOT to accomplish this process we call design. I developed what I consider a healthy skepticism of consultants of all stripes and focus groups in general.

I am here at ID for two reasons: 1) to find out how the process might be approached collaboratively with intelligence, method and determination without negating or sacrificing intuition and creativity (or courage and elegance--thank you, Jeremy), and 2) selfishly, to see if I am still teachable.

What are your first impressions about ID?

From 40,000 feet to my desk: I LOVE Chicago. It may be the last great truly American city—all the other really large ones have become theme parks for consumer excess. ID: The faculty AND student body are scary smart and the level (and quantity) of discourse is intimidating. I am honored and humbled to walk these halls. The space could stand some work, don't you agree?

What do you think you can bring to the people here at ID?

Hopefully nothing too pestilential or contagious. Honesty? Humility? Curiosity? A certain cantankerousness…

Which designers or thinkers have impressed you the most lately or you are following now?

Hmmmm. I really hesitate to name names and think it best to avoid hagiography in general, but rather appreciate the good stuff in its own time and space.

What are the websites you could not live without?

I keep it basic: www.marumushi.com/apps/newsmap/newsmap.cfm is my homepage (although it's been having server issues a lot lately.) When I worked at The Wall Street Journal I would consistently find out about breaking business stories here before the national news desk got them.

Bookmarked: Bartleby.com, Wikipedia, National Weather Service, NYTimes, BBC News, WSJ.com, Homestarrunner/Strong Bad email for a laugh and old time's sake. I slide around a lot otherwise. 43 Folders is a guilty pleasure (i.e. I really like it AND it ALWAYS makes me feel guilty).

What kind of activities are you planning to do in your free time (in case you have any) while at ID?

Food: I used to belong to a group of “variety meat” aficionados in NYC called The Organization (a.k.a. The Offal Truth) and would love to locate some other like-minded folks if/when there's time. (The Reader just did a piece on a bahn mi joint in Lincoln Sq., which sounds promising. I plan on checking out the Lincoln Park Rowing Club for some sculling. And of course there's music: I've already attended some great gigs here and am looking forward to more. Also, The Siskel Film Center beckons; the architectural boat tour awaits.

Past IDer: Angelo Frigo

MDes, Product Design, Spring 2003

My name is Angelo Frigo, a Planning graduate from Fall 2003. I was born in Chicago's south side, and now live in Rogers Park, though at the moment home is an apartment hotel in Seoul. Married? Soon. Children? Sooner. Politics? Is totally going Web 2.0. Religion? No, thank you.

What do you do now?

I work for Doblin as a consultant. Right now, I'm on a project in Seoul helping a big company establish a human-centered innovation practice. Clients commonly want to learn the methods and processes behind innovation projects. Recently, some have asked for assistance in building their own internal innovation competence. They want to run innovation projects in-house but don't have the resources or know-how. "Run an innovation project with us so we can repeat it later" is a request heard more and more often. My advice to current students is to know that at some point in your career you may be asked to not only do, and not only explain, but also teach how you do what you do in a simple and compelling way. So take notes when one of your brilliant professors walks you through a great lesson!

What was your background before coming to ID?

Bioengineering. I studied electricity in physiology and used MRI to develop new technologies for monitoring blood sugar. I was on my way to graduate school to study the effects of TASER guns on piglets, but I couldn't quite see the forest for the trees so I went to work for Underwriters Laboratories (UL) in product safety instead. I had ideas on how UL could create an eco-sensitive product safety scheme, but I didn't have the credentials or abilities to be an intrepreneur so I looked into furthering my education and found ID.

In which ways and dimensions do you think ID has changed your career?

This is a difficult question because ID essentially replaced my career. Before ID, I would never have had the opportunity to make a career out of researching, creating, and selling ideas at a strategic level. My new career is possible because evangelicals like Patrick and so many others have helped establish the role of innovation planning in business.

Can you imagine what would you be doing if you had not attended ID?

Some combination of neurological and evolutionary biology…but then I'd crack, take on the appearance of Tom Hanks in Castaway, and captain a dive boat in Micronesia.

What are the skills learned at ID that you use the most in your current job/life?

From a young age, I liked to fix things and solve problems. Since attending ID, I now know how to break up a problem and see problem-solutions in a series of stages of development. We rarely step into a project at the singularity of its inception, and equally rarely do we see a project through to launch. ID has taught me how to identify the present stage and needs, make progress efficiently, and deliver a nice hand-off. Many people make mistakes with this: some consistently want to go back to the drawing board and rethink fundamental tenants and some want to rush to solutions too quickly.

What was the most valuable class that you took while at ID?

The most valuable were all the classes related to presenting information and ideas. I learned a different version of how to make user-centered arguments in four different classes: Grimes taught the user-centered case in Interactive Media, Russ Rosenzweig taught the four basic questions in Business Frameworks, Patrick taught Moore's Claim statement in Demo, and Conley taught his own variant in Intelligent Products. The names of the classes may change but, essentially, those classes taught me how to talk about ideas and how to treat presentations like a mini design project.

Which member of the faculty influenced you the most and why?

That is a tough one. Grimes, Keeley, Conley, Heskett, Kumar, Prabakher (of Stuart). Keeley influenced me to attend in the first place and taught me to think big.

What hard times did you have at ID, and what got you through them?

Digital Media with Grimes. It was my first semester, I was clueless and thrown into using Macromedia Director – it was awful. Lots of hugs with my Foundation family got me through it.

Developing the IDSAB into the teams known today was also tough. Many students preferred a less structured approach. It was hard to balance intuition and vision with wanting everyone to be happy.

If you could have changed one thing about ID while a student, what would it have been?

I did change a lot of things about ID while I was a student. That is one of the best parts about attending ID. ID is open source and in perpetual beta.

What's the best anecdote you have from the time you were at school (professor or student related)?

The one I use to explain what I do to my family is from Chuck. He said something to the effect of "designers solve problems, design planners figure out the right problems to solve."

How many nights did you sleep at school?

Maybe 4. Mostly during Foundation when I was all keyed up.

What is the last book that has impressed you the most?

I enjoyed Collapse by Jared Diamond. On Intelligence by Jeff Hawkins is also great. Hawkins' theory on how the brain works is so simple and easy to use as a framework for understanding the way people think. I hope to further design's understanding of behavioral psychology and irrational decision making. Write me if you're into this, too!

What other advice do you have for current and/or future ID students?

ID can set you on an absorbing and rewarding career path. However, no school is able to provide you with everything you need, so don't expect ID to. Remember that ID is just people working together with a common goal, so don't forget to help each other along.

Book Review: Peter Drucker, The Essential Drucker

by Roy Luebke

As a result of taking Chris Conley's Economics of Product Development course this semester, I bought The Essential Drucker: The Best of Sixty Years of Peter Drucker's Writings on Management, which is a compendium of Drucker's lifetime writings. Chapter 20 of this book defines Drucker's Principles of Innovation, which I found particularly interesting and profound. The following is a brief summary of this writing. This book can be purchased at Amazon for about $8.

Drucker wrote that purposeful innovation results from analysis, systemic review and hard work and can be taught, replicated and learned.

Purposeful, systemic innovation begins with the analysis of opportunities. The search for opportunities must be organized and conducted on a regular basis. There are seven sources:

1. The organization's own unexpected successes and failures, and also those of the competition
2. Incongruities, especially those in a process, such as production or distribution, or incongruities in customer behavior
3. Process needs
4. Changes in industry and market structures
5. Changes in demographics
6. Changes in meaning and perception
7. New knowledge

Innovation is both conceptual and perceptual. The imperative is to go out to look, to ask, to listen. Successful innovators use both the left and right side of their brains. They look at figures and they look at people.

To be successful, an innovation has to be simple and it has to be focused. It should only do one thing or it confuses people and won't work. All effective innovations are breathtakingly simple. It should focus on a specific need that is satisfied and on a specific end result that it produces.

Effective innovations start small. They try to do one specific thing. Starting small allows for adjustments. Starting small keeps the requirements for people and money to be fairly modest.

Do not try to be clever. Innovations must be handled by ordinary human beings, and if they are to achieve any size and importance at all, by morons or near morons.

Do not diversify. Do not try to splinter or do too many things at one time. There must be a core of unity.

Do not try to innovate for the future, innovate for the present. The innovation may have long term impact, but if you can't get it adopted now there won't be any future.

The writing continues by discussing the three conditions that must be met for an innovation to be successful:

1. Innovation is work. It requires knowledge, ingenuity, creativity, etc. Plus, innovators rarely work in more than one area, be it finance, healthcare, retail or whatever. This work requires diligence, perseverance and commitment.
2. To succeed, innovators must build on their strengths. Look at opportunities over a wide range, then ask which of the opportunities fits me, fits this company. There must be a temperamental fit with the practitioner.
3. Innovation is an effect on the economy and society, a change in the behavior of customers, of teachers, of farmers, of doctors, of people in general. Or, it is a change in a process, in how people work and produce something. Innovation must always be close to the market, focused on the market, and market driven.

In concluding, Drucker wrote that innovation by its nature is risky, as is all economic activity. But defending what was done yesterday is far more risky than making tomorrow. Innovators define risks and seek to minimize them. Innovations are successful to the extent that they systematically analyze the sources of opportunity, pinpoint the appropriate opportunity, and then exploit it, whether an opportunity has small and definable risk, or larger but still definable risk. Successful innovators are conservative; they are not risk-focused, but rather opportunity-focused.

Burgers Part II: Danish Style

by Lynam

I couldn't let my Bin Cafe review be the last word on burgers. To inspire the adventurous eaters among you, or just to brag, I share with you one of my favorites in Danish design and family tradition.

In keeping with ID culture I'll let the pictures do most of the talking on this one, save for a few particulars.

The Style: Open-faced. Form counts. Eat with knife and fork. Whenever possible, pair with a danish beer like Carlsberg and Akvavit.

The meat: whatever you like. I usally use a lean sirloin. Pan fry or grill it.

The bread: buttered whole grain rye bread (pictured). Sometimes you'll see this called “fitness bread” with some variety of grains.

The toppings (choose any or all):

Raw egg yolk (disclaimer: salmonella poisoning is a risk. That I happily take.)
Shredded horseradish (fresh is best)
Onions – raw or crispy (both approaches pictured)
Pickles – see recipe or buy “Asier” from an IKEA food section or an online Scandinavian food vendor
Capers or caper berries (both are pictured)
Tomatoes
Remoulade (if you can find it at IKEA or another scandinavian food vendor)
Fresh herbs such as dill or parsley are a nice touch.

Pickles Recipe (Agurkesalate)

1 or 2 european cucumbers
3/4 cup vinegar
1 tablespoon salt
2 tablespoons sugar
pinch of pepper
chopped dill (optional)

1. Slice the cucumber paper thin – a mandarin slicer is the best way to do this. (You do not need to peel or seed a european cucumber.)
2. Put sliced cucumbers into a bowl and sprinkle with salt and put under a weight for 1 to 2 hours to press out the juice and to take away the bitter taste. A good “weight” approach is to put a smaller bowl on top of them and put a can or jar of something in there to weigh it down.
3. Drain the cucumbers and add the dressing of vinegar, sugar and pepper. Chopped dill may be added.
4. These pickles are great with any meat – turkey, goose, burgers, pork. Liver pate is also a popular pairing.