My never-ending song of design
“Follow what you like, not the money.” said Oskar Juhlin, an Industrial designer at Gustavsbergs Porslinsfabrik, previously Veryday. As we wrap up this year’s studies in the Industrial Design Intensive (IDI) course, Anja and Brendon organized an excursion where we met designers from different fields and discuss the role of being an industrial designer. One common idea every industrial designer mentioned is to follow your passion. After a year of IDI and the excursion, I came up with the following conclusion: in order to design products and services that people enjoy and benefit society, designers need to enjoy what they are doing. A good product or service is the byproduct of a happy designer with passion. Will passion really help designers design products and services users enjoy? My motivation is to link my journey in IDI with this excursion. To reflect on how designers in different fields find their passion, whether they find their passion, how do they find their passion and what I will be doing next, my role and my responsibility as an individual, a designer.
Finding passion is an iterative process. Senior Interaction Designer, Piotr Kuklo, at IDEO said: “It is a lot about trying different things, failing at some but always having a confidence in the process and believing that in the end all of those puzzles will come together at some point.” During my IDI year, we learnt different design methodologies, the design process can be messy, but eventually you will get the result you are hoping for. “It took me a long time to find it. It’s from trying so many different things.” Anja Neidhardt, current PhD at UID said. During this iterative process, Curator Viviane Stappmanns at Vitra Design Museum said: “Small initiative, small steps, there is not just one solution.” There is not just one passion, there are so many things that brings you joy, the point is to take the time to think about it.
A passion is important because it’s the foundation of being a designer who designs products and services that make a difference in people’s lives (end users actually enjoy it and find it useful in their lives). “…nothing can be a work of art which is not useful; that is to say, which does not minister to the body when well under command of the mind, or which does not amuse, soothe, or elevate the mind in a healthy state…” said William Morris, a British textile designer, poet, novelist, translator, and socialist activist associated with the British Arts and Crafts Movement.1 If the work does not elevate the designer’s mind, it will not elevate user’s mind. Making cheap products and greed will not add value to society, it will not make a positive societal impact. He said “simplicity of life” is important, that “we shall have leisure to think about our work, that faithful daily companion, which no man any longer will venture to call the curse of labor: for surely then we shall be happy in it, each in his place, no man grudging at another…men will then assuredly be happy in their work, and that happiness will assuredly bring forth decorative, noble, popular art.”1 Passion is what brings a designer joy, thus joy for end users as well. If a worker is happy at work, the result is something that will elevate the mind and body. This not only apply to products, but also services, after all, products consists of services. Imagine you cannot wait to get up in the morning and do your work, it won’t be ‘work’ at all, and it will be part of your lifestyle. This extends to designer’s responsibility as well. First, be honest about the reasons you want to become a designer, how you want to design and what you want to do as a designer. Circular economy not only applies to products and services, but also to values. We could eliminate ‘waste’, in this case, time and energy spent working on something that does not bring you joy. If we start right from the beginning, passion, the why, feeds back to the problems designers want to solve. Designers will be happy at their craft, and that energy feeds back into the work they do – creating a positive regenerative model. This positive cycle will feed back into the system.
Passion is finding out the why. Everyone is a designer. Everything we do is design and “all men are designers. All that we do, almost all the time, is design, for design is basic to all human activity.” said Victor Papanek, an Austrian-American designer and educator who became a strong advocate of the socially and ecologically responsible design of products, tools, and community infrastructures. My background in economics helped me to understand people’s choices. According to Papanek, an economist is a designer, the way an economist think combines with designer’s methodology, and it could be a powerful combination. What I love about economics is its ability to use the qualitative and quantitative sides to tell a story and draw conclusions and insights. The magic ingredients of design concept and methodologies add the empathy side of the story to make a more complete picture. “Design must be an innovative, highly creative, cross-disciplinary tool responsive to the true needs of men. It must be more research-oriented, and we must stop defiling the earth itself with poorly-designed objects and structures.” said Victor Papanek.1 Design and economics overlap in so many areas. Economics is about improving people’s well-being, making people’s lives better. There is a concept called choice architecture in behavior economics, it explores why people make certain decisions. Things people say and things people do are often different, and the way to deal with this is prototyping in design. People are not rational when it comes to making decisions. Designers could benefit from incorporating choice architecture from behavioral economics.
It’s also important not to forget the human values while pursuing one’s passion in design. “Design has become the most powerful tool with which man shapes his tools and environments (and, by extension, society and himself). This demands high social and moral responsibility from the designer. It also demands greater understanding of the people by those who practice design and more insight into the design proves by the public.” said Victor Papanek.1 To be a designer who design with social responsibility is to find out the why. Does it add value to society? And it doesn’t have to be a huge impact immediately. A small step is able to add up over time and this is a huge impact.
What are the whys for me?
A section of a poster created by Rachel Zhang, this is part of a course project from Industrial Design Intensive course at Umeå Institute of Design.
1. design to inspire
2. design for healthier minds and bodies
3. design for equitable society, social innovation
4. design by facilitating change
5. design with social responsibility
6. design for circular economy
7. design to challenge the status quo
“Am I doing this for money, does the work make me happy? Many are going into a profession for money, but what causes this social problem in the first place? It is not pursuing joy, it is pursuing money. And this creates a vicious cycle that feeds back to society causing problems such as mental health problems, housing problems, unequal society.” I ask myself, WHAT IS THE PROBLEM?
Passion will bring designers joy, and of course they want to pursue that, but what’s stopping some designers from doing what bring them joy? A lot of factors are involved. Bilgi Karan, a UID alumnus from the Master's Program in Advanced Product Design and a designer/strategist working as the UX Leader of IKEA Home Smart, said during the UID20 event: “Don’t follow your dreams, make billions of dreams come true.” His grandparents are immigrants, when they arrived in a new country, they didn’t have the luxury to pursue passion. They do what they need to do to get by. However, if we have a solid social infrastructure that helps immigrants, this would definitely take a lot of stress off their shoulder. Alternatively we could address the root causes of displacement, and minimize the number of refugees in the first place.
The way Bilgi Karan found his passion was through iterations. He used to design exclusive things with little impact, after he realized this, he decided to move towards doing projects with bigger impact, and that project don’t have to be big, for example, the blinking cursor invented by Charles A. Kiesling. It is a simple yet a powerful tool for everyone who uses a computer, and that is not a small impact. “Common problem with simple solutions, that’s where amazing design is always needed.” Bilgi Karan said. A designer should not only keep learning but also design with social responsibility. “Creating value is to combine what we should do and what we can do.” Bilgi said.
There is also the other side of the story. Some might say passion is overrated, there is not just one passion, what you like changes over time, but there is a common theme, and that is the red thread. You need to be able to adapt to change, not only when the employer asks you to, but because the problem you want to solve requires you to have those skills. It will help you to solve the problem quicker. According to Bilgi, Oskar, Anja, they experienced many joys prior to finding their current positions, and it’s through iterations, trying different things, so in that way it ties back to the argument I mentioned in the beginning - finding passion is an iterative process. That means you don’t have to sit in front of a computer and think what your passion is. Do something about what you want to try right now and see what happens. If you want to work for a company, why do you need to wait to apply on their website? Why not start doing that already, you don’t have to wait around for them to hire you in order to solve the problem you want to. Some mentioned that the role of a designer is to solve complex problems. Yes and no. If someone’s passion is to make a beautiful piece of artwork, that’s totally fine, that bring joy to the designer, and the user can sense the effort he puts into it. It does not have to be solving complex problems.
“I want to make an impact on people.” A lot of students say that these days. What is impact? How do you measure that impact? Can impact be measured? Is impact earning Red Dot awards for you? Or is impact creating that blinking cursor billions of people benefit from. “Needs over wants. User centric is dead.” Bilgi said. And impact again doesn’t have to be big, Euan Fraser, Innovation Principal, Senior Brand Strategist at REI Coop sports made a small impact on working tangibly in his workplace, his colleagues start using whiteboard more than power point. Small steps eventually lead to a tipping point and make a bigger impact. “…making small steps, small signals of change, be realistic about change.” Euan said. Marie Louise Juul Sondergaard, PostDoc in Digital Women’s Health at KTH Media Technology & Interaction Design Dept. Her goal is that her project can be implemented into the education system. She designs to educate. To her, that is making real societal impact.
In conclusion, as a designer or as a person, finding your passion is an iterative process. If you keep prototyping and trying different things, you will find what you really are passionate about. This is the only way to contributing society with positive impact. Happiness is generated from happy designers. But, you don’t have to wait around for the passion to fall on your head, it’s not going to happen. You have to keep iterating, trying. What about money? Do I just chase passion without thinking about how much I make? That is the problem we all have a responsibility to work on. How might we design a solid social infrastructure to allow people to have the time to create? To do something they actually want to do? What if we have a minimum living support for citizens? Some countries already do that for entrepreneurs. I want to end my essay with what Bilgi asked everyone in the UID20 - “How might we help many more people who go through the same journey and live a much better life than their parents, in an equal society and healthy planet?”
Reflections on writing this essay
I started with brainstorming and it was hard to narrow down to one central idea and a strong argument. The challenge for me is to keep the essay concise and to the point. Even with editing, I still find myself dancing in circles when it comes to prove my point in the essay. The structure of the essay needs further work as well even I try to craft each paragraph to one idea only, but still I don’t want to miss out on anything, so it might said too much in a paragraph. Building a strong argument is hard as well. Writing is a very important skill to have, no matter what field you are in, even design.
After writing the essay, I felt I went back to the journey that lead me to IDI and how everything is coming together. Design is about making people’s lives better, now it all makes sense, there was a reason I chose economics, I just happen to be blind about it before and forgot about my why overtime. I also come to realize after writing my essay, finding that passion is an iterative process. Now I am thinking what would happen if you find it? Is it good or bad when you find it? Is it a gift or a curse?
I feel this essay is a good wrap of my design studies at UID, giving me some time to sit back and think what kind of designers I want to be or what kind of person I want to be.