It’s so interesting to see the relationship between great design and great products/companies. So many people just don’t get it. Or should I say, so many managers/CEOs don’t get it. Design separates mediocre products from great products.
Every day I visit new websites, check out new gadgets and learn about new products. It sickens me to see some of the ugly stuff out there. Yes, people might still buy it. But usually someone else will come out with the exact same thing but prettier…..and that’s the one that will have mass appeal.
Myspace was the early front runner (and still is), but facebook is quickly gaining ground. They both do the same thing. One is just easier to use, simpler, cleaner design and more elegant. More and more people are recognizing it. Facebook’s growth rate is outpacing Myspace’s. Design is a driving factor.
Ask Steve Jobs. Apple has set themselves apart from so many others simply because of their design. People like to look at pretty things. Girls. Cars. Burgers on the drive-thru menu. It’s all the same.
Today’s marketplace is more competitive than ever, it is very tough to differentiate yourself from competitors. Your product is just like the dude’s next door. The iPod and the iPhone are just like the rest of ‘em. They all perform the same functions and can do the same thing. The difference is simply design. Not just the aesthetics of the hardware itself, but the user interface and the way people engage and interact with it. That’s the difference.
Another example is Ulrich Bez, CEO of Aston Martin. Before becoming CEO of Aston Martin, he oversaw the design and development of Porsche’s 911 Turbo, 968, 963 models. Since Bez became the CEO of Aston Martin, they have celebrated their most profitable period in the company’s 93-year history. “Under Dr Bez, the Aston Martin brand has reached unprecedented levels of global recognition, winning the UK’s prestigious CoolBrands Award for two consecutive years in 2006 and 2007.” The dude knows what looks good and it’s been emphasized from the top. It has clearly paid off.
Great managers and CEOs understand the importance of design and emphasize the critical role that aesthetics play in public appeal. They create products that are both functional and elegant.
What prompted this entry was an interesting blog post I read the other day called Deconstructing a Struggling Start-Up: MyCarpoolStation.com from the co-founder of the company. The company is clearly struggling…pretty much bound to fail. This co-founder shares his story.
…So we began recruiting friends of mine who were “good with computers”. One was a software engineer and the other was a web designer, but neither could commit full-time or buy in 110% into the vision we had. So we decided to outsource our coding to India. In our subjective experience, Indian web design shops are intelligent and cost-effective, but are not creative nor are they on the leading edge of web 2.0. Most importantly though, they are contractors by nature and therefore build websites for their clients, not for the end-user….
Looking at their site almost made me puke. However, after reading their story and learning about some of their struggles, I feel for them. Aside from all their other struggles however, their site never had a chance to thrive, or even survive, with that kinda design. It started from the top, a “non-tech-savvy CEO” who didn’t recognize the importance of design.
Ouch.
There’s a really interesting piece by Bruce Nussbaum that was in Business Week a while back called “CEOs Must Be Designers, Not Just Hire Them. Think Steve Jobs And iPhone.”
Design is popular today also because Design Thinking—the methodology of design taken out of the small industrial design context and applied to business and social process—is spreading fast. Hate me if you will, but I am a believer in Design Thinking. In the world of business, there is no value proposition left for most companies in controlling costs or even quality. All that outsourcing has leveled this playing field. Cost and quality are commoditized today, merely the price of entry to the competitive game. Design and design thinking—or innovation if you like–are the fresh, new variables that can bring advantage and fat profit margins to global corporations. In today’s global marketplace, being able to understand the consumer, prototype possible new products, services and experiences, quickly filter the good, the bad and the ugly and deliver them to people who want them—well, that is an attractive management methodology. Beats the heck out of squeezing yet one more penny out of your Chinese supply-chain, doesn’t it?
Let me emphasize this. I think managers have to BECOME designers, not just hire them. I think CEOs have to embrace design thinking, not just hire someone who gets it. I think many business schools have to merge with design schools, not just play poke and tickle with them.
That’s all I have to say.
P.S. Check this washing machine out. Sexy. Very sexy.
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northernmost settlement in the United States. This “experiment” is a story of his whale hunting adventure captured through photography, but later “told” through technology. He goes with Andrew Moore (a Princeton professor) and together they capture an image every 5 minutes(at least) during their entire journey, from the beginning moments of in Newark Airport all the way to the end moments on the frozen Arctic Ocean. The pictures are quite stunning.
