- Last year I had the honor of giving a keynote
at AIGA, the Institute of Graphic Arts
2020 Design Conference.
The conference theme was building bridges,
and I'd like to share my message here.
Now I'm a designer,
but the way that I like to think about it is
I actually make glasses for a living.
I make glasses that help people see things more clearly.
Now a lot of people would call these glasses frameworks.
So whether they be about road mapping,
workshop facilitation design, thinking, service design,
I conduct research and then I distill
that research into a common framework.
My hope is that practitioners like you
use these frameworks to inform your own work.
Maybe help visualize your role and expertise to others,
or even just simply push the boundaries
of how you think about something.
Today I want to build a pair of glasses with you.
I want you to put them on and tell me what you see.
But before we do,
let's start with why we're building these glasses.
We all think that we're these mission driven problem solvers
out to change the world.
But if you look through all of our LinkedIn bios,
each says something to the effect of,
"I'm this kind of designer, doing this kind of work,
I went to this kind of program."
This framework is at the center of this.
I want to help us broaden our understanding of what we do,
agnostic of the specific discipline or medium.
We can communicate ourselves, our work, and our value
based off of our purpose, not our discipline.
So let's build a framework of how we can
view ourselves as designers and our place in the world.
The first component of our framework is the "What".
This is the materials, the medium,
and techniques that we use.
Essentially our craft.
Think the artifact or evidence each discipline produces.
Architect, house. Graphic designer, posters.
Type designer, fonts.
It's what you create. It's what you do.
This is the most straightforward piece of our framework.
Now if that's what you do, this next piece is how you do it.
The "How", the process, foundational approach, and behavior,
The actions you take to create the, "What".
I'm not saying discreet actions,
but the broader approaches we take.
Things like observing the world
and distilling complex, ambiguous spaces.
Understanding the problem to be solved, gathering research,
and talking to users, collecting meaningful feedback.
This is the process side of
what makes us inherently designers.
And then you have our last component, the "Why".
This is the hardest and most abstract.
This is the purpose behind the activities
of your craft and the artifacts it creates.
Now, this is pretty high level.
I'm not talking about the goal of a specific project,
like increasing return on investment,
but why you chose to design.
What motivates you to continue honing your craft?
For example, if you're an architect,
it's why you care about helping people build houses.
To quote our founder, Don Norman,
"To make people more sensitive
to the problems of life and to the needs of people."
So most people start and lead their careers with the "What".
Which, you know, makes sense.
It's the most tangible and frankly, topical.
Thus it's the easiest to communicate
to ourselves and others.
And then we have the "How."
It's what we create and our understanding of that creation.
Now, as we mature it's natural to shift towards
the intentionality when it comes to process.
Fine tuning our approach.
I think of this like learning a language.
First, we learn the "What"s, the vocabulary.
And then we begin to string that
vocabulary together in different ways.
We speak it out loud.
We learn the nuances of how to put everything together.
And then finally most designers
start to question their "Why".
But there's a problem with thinking in this order.
If you lead with the "What" and the "How",
you inherently limit both how you see yourself
and how others see you.
Thus even when the boundaries of design continue to expand,
designers' minds remain shackled
to their major, their medium, or title.
And then we limit ourselves to the confines
of these predetermined expectations.
And then our impact becomes just as narrow as our approach.
So let's take this traditional "What, how, why"
and flip it.
Let's change our lens
and start with "Why" as our foundation.
And then from that build into the "How",
and then last, the "What".
What becomes so powerful about this simple switch
is realizing how much of who you are as a designer
has little to do with the specific medium we work with,
but rather the unique way we see the world.
I routinely get asked how I transitioned
from graphic design to user experience.
I never viewed this as a transition,
as I retained over two thirds of who I am
and just reapplied my skillset.
Like distilling meaning from the world,
synthesizing complex concepts,
or creating shared visualizations.
Throughout life, we in the world
will shift the mediums we work with.
Tools, objects, technology will change with time.
What stays consistent is your foundation
of why you chose to be a designer.
This also opens us up to new tables and spheres
that design has never had a voice.
If you don't decide what your purpose is, someone else will.
This can be a bridge to everything starting with the world.
Even someone who you have the least in common with
also has a "Why" whether they've articulated it or not.
What we need more of in the world right now
is understanding other's perspective and their "Why"s
whether we agree with them or not.
This can also be a bridge to others.
Regardless of if you are sharing your "Why",
taking this framework and bridging it to other designers
gives you the opportunity to find similarities,
leading you to learn from others,
identify new opportunities, and seek like-minded partners.
And lastly, it can be a bridge to yourself.
What's your "Why"?
If it doesn't jump to the front of your mind,
reflect on your projects and most meaningful work
and derive a hypothesis that you
can continue to test as you hone your craft.
If you want to expand on your craft,
realize you already have the foundation to do so.
Designers hold a unique power and skillset
to build on top of the world's "Why"s.
We have the skillset to listen,
the process to build, the super power to create.
Which is what we have to maximize
as design moves into new spheres.
This uniquely positions us to be bridges in the world.