February 16, 2006, Chris Vanstone
After invaluable input from many of you who read this blog the Transformation Design paper is now complete and available for download. Click here to download
We believe that there is huge potential in this approach. This paper is a call to action to all designers and non-designers wishing to work in this way to join us in developing transformation design as a discipline.
The paper begins to set out the characteristics of the emergent discipline of Transformation Design. It identifies a nascent but growing community of practice. It highlights an under-supply of designers equipped to work in this way. And it explores the market for, and the challenges facing, designers who are starting to work in this new discipline.
This paper forms the basis of ongoing work at RED. We are keen to build a community around the practice of transformation design.
We have highlighted a small number of examples in this text. There must be many more of which we are unaware, and many other groups who are beginning to work in this way. If you are part of this, we would like to hear from you.
Our work is open source, so we are open for you to fervently agree, violently disagree, and above all to share your views with us and to share other examples by commenting below or sending us an email.
CATEGORY: TRANSFORMATION DESIGN
Hey Chris - I guess my main concern is how this document is peceived and gets interpreted by it's potential audiences. From a simplistic perspective there have been so many "xxx design"s of late (interaction design, experience design, service design, etc) that people get lost navigating the nuances. I wonder if the word "design" itself alienates key allies? - not that I want to throw the baby out with the bathwater... n.
Thanks for your comments Nick, several people including Joe of engine share similar concerns. We thought long and hard about creating another @*#! Design, but the distinction between, product, interaction, service, transformation is a useful one...for designers and design consultancies.
This paper is aimed squarely at the design industry. We wanted to bring to the attention of designers an emerging way of working and make clear its' differences. We think this approach is different enough to warrant a new design discipline. From a new discipline it follows that there is a new skill set and new mechanisms required to acquire those skills.
When it comes to marketing - getting people to buy the stuff it's a different matter and here I take your point. I don't think we yet know the best messages, but we're working on it...It's significant that IDEO call their practise 'Transformation by Design'. I always though fits well with the philosophy of the approach.
If you or anybody else has ideas on a better 'client facing' name we'd love to hear them.