DESIGN MANAGEMENTHISTORIES
8 FEBRUARY 2012
Design Management
• definitions
• histories of design management
• (if time) themes e.g. design thinking
Definitions
• Your current definition of design management
• Referring to handout, decide which definition is most effective and why
Definitions
• Who• Why • What• Where• When• How
Definitions
• Looking at definitions becomes an enquiry in itself
Definitions
• history:– Old French: “relation of incidents” (like
newspaper reporting)
– Greek: “learning or knowing by experience” (like “enquiry”) [Online dictionary of etymology]
Definitions
• Design/designer
– 1640s: “one who schemes”
– 1660s: “one who makes an artistic design or a construction plan” [Online dictionary of etymology]
Definitions
• Manager/management– Achieving goals efficiently and effectively (usually
involving leadership) Drucker
Definitions
• Are we any closer?• Confusion arises because Design Management
is NOT a completely water-tight category all of its own and is influenced by:
• Design culture and history• Approaches to management• … concepts of history• Reliability of individual witnesses
Definitions
• Whatever we do must be critical in its focus
Histories
• Management– 19C: resource allocation– 20C: approaches reflecting new knowledge• Science• Psychology• Sociology• Statistics• IT• Strategy
– 21C: agility
Histories
• Business and marketing
– Up to 50s: Production– 50s-60s: Product quality– 60s: Selling– 70s: Marketing
Histories
• Design– Emergence of the profession of designer– Demands of engineering and business– Tension between business needs and creativity– Emergence of particular design disciplines
Histories
• Design management
– Pre 60s: managing product aesthetics– 60s and 70s: systematic mgt of design– 80s and 90s: strategic value of design– 00s and 10s: design & innovation
Histories
Michael Farr (1965)– Definition of the problem– Finding and enabling a designer– Coming in on budget and on time– Professionalising design management– Identifying DM as a “total commercial function”
• Project Management
Histories
Peter Gorb (1990)– Corporate setting– Organisational role of design–Manager-centred?
• Strategic focus
Histories
Kathryn Best (2006)– Project management – Adds and creates value– Leadership role
• Managing design strategy• Managing design process• Managing design implementation
• Multifacteted role [but not “managing as designing”]
Histories
• 60s: – Identifying design practice– Corporate recognition of DM
• Oakley (1990): – two cultures– Design process– Design as a strategic tool– Project management– Links between marketing and design
Histories
• Cooper and Press (1995)
– Strategic value of design– Corporate identity– Design audits
Histories
• Best (2006)
• Managing design strategy• Managing design process• Managing design implementation
Histories
• Other “heroes”– Bill Hollins (service design)– Wally Olins (corporate identity)– Alan Topalian– Angela Dumas– Mark Oakley– James Pilditch– Thomas Schutte
Histories
• DMI definition• Almost silent on “design thinking”• Included in definition:– “It includes the use of design thinking – or using
design processes to solve general business problems”
– Lockwood (2010)
Design thinking
• Methodology for transforming “existing conditions into preferred ones” (Simon, 1969)
• “full spectrum … human-centred design ethos” (Brown, 2008)
• Design methods• Design attitude• Design reasoning• “Imagining, visualising and dreaming up” and thinking
through (Cooper in Lockwood, 2010)• “Intellectual approach to problem framing” (Buchanan
1992)
Design thinking
• Gore-Tex (Lockwood, 2010) used for skiwear as Thinsulate (1979) at CAMP7:– CFO keen skier – involved with testing– Evaluated designs– Considered business models– Prototyping– [user-centred]– [Lockwood’s first job!]
Design thinking
• Attractive to business• Open ended approach to problem solving• Various names:– Creative Problem Solving– Problem solving– Design thinking– Lateral thinking
Final point
• Research worlds
– Objective world– Socially constructed world– Individually constructed world