Learn, Make, Learn

Design Thinking: Failure or Fall Guy?

• Ernest Kim, Joachim Groeger • Season 1 • Episode 14

Share episode
Ernest:

Hello and welcome to Learn Make Learn where we share qualitative and quantitative perspectives on products to help you make better. My name is Ernest Kim and I'm joined by my friend and co host Joachim Groeger. Hey Joachim, how's it going?

Joachim:

I'm great. I always do that. I've realized it's that I'm great I don't know if I should change it up we'll stick with it for now. But, today we got the first glimpses of what felt like summer maybe up here in Seattle. So that was very nice. We took advantage of that. So all in all pretty chill and pretty good. How about you?

Ernest:

Yeah, the one, bit of stress I've got is, as I mentioned just before we started, I need to, get on a flight first thing tomorrow, six o'clock flight, so I have to get out of the, out of here probably by about four, uh, to get to the airport in time. So that'll be painful, but, um, it's for a fun reason. So I'm still looking forward to it.

Joachim:

yeah, that's, that's an early flight. Do you have TSA pre, can you skip the lines?

Ernest:

Yeah, fortunately, uh, you know, gosh, if anyone is on the fence about that, it's absolutely worth it. If you do any amount of traveling by air, it's absolutely worth it.

Joachim:

We still have to do it. I have to do it. Yeah, we suffer through the security lines. Or we just use the fact that we're a big family and plead with the gate agents to let us use the VIP lane because we have so many little people. There's no way for us to do this. So, sometimes that works.

Ernest:

Play the family card.

Joachim:

Yeah, exactly.

Ernest:

All right, well, this is episode 14, and today our topic is design thinking: deservedly derided or unfairly maligned. We'll dive into this in great detail in just a minute, but let's start with some follow ups to our previous episode, Time to Learn. Joachim, do you have any follow ups you wanna share?

Joachim:

Yeah, so we timed our episode, of course, to come out just before Watches and Wonders, which is the big trade show that's happening in Geneva right now. And, people are releasing their new watches, which is quite fun to watch. And I only wanted to mention my wildcard choice, which was the brand Hublot, because they've released some interesting watches. And one of So excessive. It should really upset me. And I, and I want to get upset about it because it's so ridiculous. But then, when you look at the pictures of it, it's, it's really kind of cool. Uh, so it's just very bad. But they have released the Hublot BigBang MP11 in a water blue sapphire. So it's a, case, which is absolutely ridiculous. There's no reason to have it. It has a 14 day power reserve. It looks like a internal combustion engine or something. And it costs of course, uh, 171, 000. So it's completely insane. speak of no constraints, in keeping with the, the, uh, With what we were talking about last time of trying to cater to a broad audience, still have these ridiculous time pieces, but still operate within, within some means that people could maybe access, they're still excessively expensive, but they have released, time only big bang watches recently in new materials, including the blue ceramics that the chronographs have the flyback chronograph. So those are quite fun. They're very expensive, 15 to 20 K, but. I've, uh, another reason to go back to the Hublot website and just start questioning everything regarding my taste and my sense and rationality, as we were discussing last time. So wanted to flag those because they're really fun releases, fun to look at and just ridiculously over the top. Did you have some stuff, Ernest, from Watches and Wonders as well? I wonder now.

Ernest:

Yeah. Yeah, there were a couple of things. Um, one, just a quick one is, um, I think I highlighted them as my positive case study is, uh, Cartier and, uh, I think they continue to bring great energy, um, to the market. And one example of that is, um, a new. version of the Santos they, uh, unveiled, which is called the Rewind. And it has this really beautiful striking red dial. But what is really interesting about it is that the hands actually turn anticlockwise. Uh, so the, the Roman numerals are reversed and there's no reason for it. You know, it's just fun. fun. And I think that's just an example of the sort of energy they're bringing to the marketplace. The other example is very different, and it's a brand that I I really haven't paid much attention to, um, up until now and that's, uh, I'm going to say it terribly. My pronunciation is going to be terrible, but Jaeje leclout, or JLC let's say from now on, uh, they released some really striking videos. High complication watches probably the, the peak of it was, um, there it's part of this line called the duomet or duometer. Uh, and the peak of that is this model called the helioturbion perpetual. Um,

Joachim:

Insanity.

Ernest:

Yeah.

Joachim:

insanity. At its best, at its best, for sure.

Ernest:

And, uh, it would take way too long to explain it, so we'll just provide a link. But, uh, the tourbillon is this really crazy complication. It's probably one of the most complicated complications. And then the heliotourbillon version of it is, is just even, you know, times a hundred. Uh, but. They did some really interesting and fun things in the design of the case to, and dial, to really show off these complications, uh, in a way that I thought was pretty fun and unique. Um, you know, certainly not an accessible piece. I don't even know, want to know what, how much it costs, but, um, uh,

Joachim:

ask, you can't afford it.

Ernest:

Yeah, that's true. So those were two, um, that struck me. Um, I did have a couple of follow ups as well, um, outside of the watch world, uh, and they're both actually listener comments. Um, the first comes from a friend of the show and friend in life, Tina, uh, following up episode 12, where we discussed whether or not products should be political, Tina wrote in with the following. I'm quoting her now, quote, sharing my favorite company, innovating products and policy in so many ways, unquote. And the company she highlighted is called Bobby, which was co founded by two moms and offers organic infant formulas. Last year, the company started a social and policy impact arm called Bobby for changed. I'm sorry, Bobby for change based on the realization that giving parents across the U S the support that they need. Would require more than just products alone. Uh, so a really nice example of a company that's, you know, making politics a part of who they are, you know, um, at the core and being, you know, driving great success from that. So big, thank you to Tina for sharing this one. Um, and we'll include links to Bobby and Bobby for change in the show notes. The next piece of feedback comes from another friend, Matt, and is also in response to our should products be political episode, he wrote quote. Politics is so divisive these days, makes me think of Byron Sharpe and his advice to make brands accessible to as many people as possible. Having said that, I used to work at Kessel Kramer, who always preached, if no one hates it, no one loves it. I think that's probably useful advice for early stage businesses, but if you've already got decent market share, being apolitical might be the best starting point for business success and your chances of changing the world. So much depends on context, but definitely got me thinking. It's an interesting layer to add to briefs. Unquote. Now for background, Byron Sharp is a professor of marketing science at the University of South Australia and is the author of a popular book on marketing titled How Brands Grow. Unquote. So thanks so much, Matt, for sharing those thoughts. And I definitely agree that context is vital. Uh, and overall, we just love hearing from you. So please keep the comments and questions coming to learn, make, learn at gmail. com. All right, now let's move on to our main topic for today. Design thinking deservedly derided or unfairly maligned in case you're not familiar with design thinking. The term design thinking, the famed design consultancy IDEO is credited with coining it, so I'll reference their definition. Quote, design thinking is a human centered approach to innovation that draws from the designer's toolkit to integrate the needs of people, the possibilities of technology, and the And the requirements for business success, unquote. About a decade ago, design thinking was just all the rage amongst executives across the corporate world, as Rebecca Ackerman wrote in an excellent piece for MIT technology review, design thinking took hold of the collective imagination during the Obama years, a time when American culture was riding high on the potential of a bunch of smart people in hope filled rooms to bend history's arc towards progress. At the same time, consultancies like IDEO, FROG, Smart Design, and others were also promoting the idea that anyone, including the executives paying their fees, could be a designer by just following the process. Perhaps design has become too important to leave to designers, as IDEO's then CEO Tim Brown wrote in his 2009 book, Change By Design, unquote. But in recent years, the tide turned, with many now describing design thinking as a failed experiment. In fact, the Ackerman piece I just cited is titled, Design thinking was supposed to fix the world. Where did it go wrong? So is design thinking a failed experiment or is there still value in the concept? So long as it's applied appropriately, you know, you want to jump in with a perspective on this,

Joachim:

from The outside as a non designer guy, always been fascinated with these design consultancies. They bring together a lot of interesting people. From the outside, always really looked at these consultancies as having some secret source that I wanted to understand more about and absorb more. So I've been very open minded to everything IDEO, FROG and these design consultants is doing. And I, in the past welcomed their encroachment into what would be considered the traditional strategic consulting world Their brand and their whole ethos. means that companies approach them with way more open minds than if they went to like a McKinsey or something like that. McKinsey is a brand and is expected to do a very specific thing. And IDEO's brand is one, I think that is so much more open minded and playful and design thinking leans right into that. I think the cliche about design thinking is always. stack of colored post it notes and Sharpie markers and brainstorming sessions and stick things on the wall. that, playful open mindedness is something that I think if a company is approaching a consultancy with that branding, everyone on the team is open to be shown something that they have not seen before. So I admire that ability to have a brand that's so focused around that. As part of preparation for this, I thought the best place to start is of course, changed by design, the book that you referenced at the beginning by Tim Brown. And, It was somewhat disappointing, to be honest. Design thinking is a tool and it's one of many tools. And I realized that what makes IDEO special is not necessarily that they've have this term to describe what they do. They just have an incredibly unique group of people coming together that are attracted to that business who want to work there. I've met people who are graphic designers who are doing, business consulting. And I think that's what the magic is, is it's the group of people that have come in there. So I don't think the actual framework of design thinking has that much secret source in it. And so the one thing that was interesting, you mentioned, of course, the fact that the article from Ackerman references the Obama years as a period of, design thinking's ascension to, you know, serious way of fixing world problems and change by design is filled with little anecdotes about how design thinking can change society. And a lot of it reminded me of, uh, the Obama administration's love of nudges as well, which is those small behavioral tricks to that you play on people to get them to behave well. When you look at them a little bit more closely and look under the hood a bit more, you just ask yourself, how generalizable is this? You know, does this actually work in more complex settings? So one of the examples that stood out is actually a chapter six in change by design. I don't want to read a whole section of it, but, an advertising agency in Japan called Hakuhodo, were asked to help the ministry of the environment come up with a way to lower emissions by 6%. And one of the things they figured out is that what they could do is they could just let the AC units go from, about 79 degrees Fahrenheit to 82 degrees Fahrenheit. So if they just did that, that would help them a long way to reaching their goal of reducing emissions. Problem was that that temperature had been picked because That's the perfect temperature for a man in his business suit. It's the worst temperature for anyone who does not dress in a full suit with a jacket, trousers, shirt and tie. Anyone that deviates from that will feel cold or uncomfortable in those temperatures. And so the advertising agency itself created this idea of cool biz. and so from June 1st to October 1st, everyone who worked in the office would be allowed and encouraged to wear more casual clothing. And in that way they could increase the thermostat temperature to. 82 degrees Fahrenheit and save the environment. And so they did a lot of ads and things that told a story about how this is cool. And they also realized they should create a fashion expo. So people would see how they could still dress in a certain way to be professional and, uh, wear lightweight materials, have open necks, et cetera, et cetera. At the time, the prime minister, Johnny, Joe Kozumi was also featured it. Wearing sleeveless shirts, all of these things. And so it caused a sensation according to Tim Brown. And this was a huge deal in creating cool biz as a strategy for reducing emissions. When I heard that it just, I said, Oh, that's a nudge, right? Cool. It kind of works, but beyond that quirky little example I ask how many other settings could you do something like that. Tim Brown's book is, uh, I think maybe 15 years old now. So we haven't done very much to do more to help the environment. Things are just getting worse. And design thinking, feels pretty weak. And hence it reminded me of nudges. Like you put a, an image of a fly in a urinal, then men will aim better, when they pee And again, you say, okay, from that, how do I then go to reforming? You know, the criminal justice system, like the leaps from these small stories that are so wonderful and great for, upper middle class dinner party conversation anecdotes, when it comes down to the grind of how do we figure this out? How do we do something really meaningful and big? Get. It's difficult, and so I felt that I was a little let down. I thought there'll be some more meaty stuff, but really what it comes down to that summary is get good people into the room with varied backgrounds who are open to, trying out new ideas, have a company that is it's open minded and willing to innovate and change the way they've done things. It seems like those are the only two ingredients and then the rest is kind of just work through the problem. I, maybe we'll get a chance to talk about. That the shortcomings of human centric design in a bit, but let me leave it at that and then pull you into designers. That was a bit of a monologue as always from me, but where are you coming down on this? I feel like you have experienced design thinking actually as a client. Is that right? That was part of it. I don't know if that's where you want to start, but, I remember that you've had more experience with this directly as a problem solving framework.

Ernest:

yeah, yeah. I'll, I'll definitely, um, speak to that, but I think your perspective is great on this, and I do think that Um, the whole concept was oversold, you know, I think you're, my sense of it as well is that it really isn't going to, um, it certainly isn't a panacea for these very complex systems based issues. So I think that was just maybe Tim Brown trying to sell some books, um, in terms of business and overselling on what they had. But that said, as you noted, I was fortunate enough to have a chance to work with, um, IDEO as a client and got to see design thinking in action. And I came away very impressed. Um, but just building on your point, Our, task was very discreet. It wasn't, trying to, um, address global warming in Japan, So, uh, in, in that context, what, I think was very helpful was, uh, or a few things. One was they brought this outsider's perspective, which is, I think the value that any sort of an agency can bring, um, looking at you and your brand and your problem set from a different perspective. But, so that's really any good agency is going to offer that. But off, I'd say also they, they brought a rigor, around this approach that, um, I would say that, you know, we lacked as on the client side, We were just trying to keep it somewhat vague, but we're a company that, you know, did great design work, but did it in a very specific way. Um, and not necessarily with a lot of rigor behind it. So, it was very helpful to have, um, this partner in IDEO come in with, really, a very well thought through approach. Um and there is that well worn trope of the colored stickies, which we, we did do. Uh, and it was actually useful because it helped us to, organize our thinking in a way that, we wouldn't have otherwise. Even just, well, another thing I guess I'd say before I get to that, another thing I was impressed by was the extent to which they wanted to. give us their thinking. Um, I have worked with and worked in agencies where they try to keep their approach, their process as this sort of secret sauce, um, that they don't want anyone else to, be able to, um, steal away from them. But I was really, um, impressed by the extent to which IDEO really wanted to teach us this methodology, this framework, and, so that we could continue to apply it. they didn't act as though, oh, we don't want to teach you or else you might not hire us again. So, um, I, I found that really refreshing. To see that that confidence they had that and this belief in this approach that they had, um, they felt that if they could help us to become conversant in this approach, then we would, um, want to continue to work with them because, um, we would, um, Uh, want to approach more problems with this in this way. So uh, that was really a, a nice surprise, but just one exam, one, very specific example I'll mention is they, um, give this great little handbook at the start of the project that describes, how they approach things and just give some advice. And in, in this specific case, we were doing some field research. And so one of the things they shared was just some guidelines around. How to approach these, um, moments when we're out in the field. And one specific thing they noted was when you do this, we're going to go out there as a team of five to seven people. Let's think in advance about what our roles will be. In that engagement, because typically what would happen in this company was we do field research, you know, the fancy term is ethnographic research and you'd end up with five to seven people all basically doing the same thing. maybe one person might be the lead in terms of asking the questions, but then beyond that, everyone would be taking the same notes. Everyone would be taking pictures. I think that, maybe you could get some things out of that, but, uh, I think that would lead to some missed opportunities. So IDEO had this great guideline around, let's think in advance about who's going to do what. who's going to ask the questions, who's going to take the notes. Who's going to take the pictures, um, so that we can each then focus much more, um, wholly on that task and, um, be more effective in that task than if we're all just trying to do the same thing and kind of stepping over each other. So, you know,, that's a very simple example. It seems like It is common sense, but I think a lot of companies, even big established companies, um, just aren't quite as, um, thoughtful about these sorts of things. And so having, someone like IDEO bring that to the table, and guide you in that process can be, surprisingly helpful more than you might think. in the context of a big company who you might imagine might already know all these things. And then I'd say the outcome was very positive. IDEO definitely helped us to get to a solution that was rooted in the needs of our Customers, and kind of got us out of the norm in many companies, which is really just, um, approaching things as a reflection of your org chart or as a reflection of just the tools that you have at hand. It really, um, got us to think more from a customer led lens, uh, and led us to solutions that were built on the needs of our customers versus, our own internal imperatives. Uh, so maybe that is a good segue into the topic of human centered design.

Joachim:

Yeah. I think it, I think that's exactly right. where it leads us we've talked about that, understand the customer journey in the past. I hope I got the quotation right, but here's one from Tim Brown. He says a designer, no less than an engineer or marketing executive who simply generalizes from his own standards and expectations will limit the field of opportunity. A 30 year old man does not have the same life experience as a 60 year old woman. Very obvious, helpful to have someone say it. And if you've brought these people in, it opens up the conversation and allows you to. Say these things aloud like you, you were alluding to that. Some very simple things as not everyone has to take notes and then share and do all those things. Sometimes you need that external party to be able to give you permission to behave a certain way. But back to the other aspect of what you're saying is this, that has been the main criticism I've heard about the design thinking is the idea that it should be human centric. and that's where most of the flashpoints have been when I was looking around and I stumbled on this LinkedIn post from, Brian Collins, who is himself a founder of a design and branding consultancy. He wrote a whole thing about how he thinks design thinking is kind of done because of its human centricity. And it's actually really detrimental to the way you think about the world. His example is, plastic bottle. You're thirsty, you want to have a portable way to drink water. Well then, the human centric design approach says, grab a plastic bottle, it's easy to carry, lightweight. You're finished with the water, you throw it away, no problem. Human centric design has succeeded. It's a bit of a straw man because obviously a plastic bottle is a terrible idea, right? It's hard to recycle, takes energy, create a lot of plastic waste. but his point was basically, if you have such a narrow perspective on the consequences of your designs, Then it's going to lead you down some bad places and then you find yourself having created a far worse world because you've only focused on a very specific sliver of the experience and the impacts of a product. and I think that's really valid, right? And so the big movement that people would talk about is the systems thinking approach, which says everything has spillovers and feedback loops that are really hard to quantify. And so as a designer. you're really only a participant in the process. On that theme, I stumbled on this essay by Kevin Slavin, who is, one of my favorite thinkers in general right now. He has this article called Design as Participation, where he really pushes the idea that, if a designer is aware of the complexity of the system that they're dealing with, then out of that understanding comes a design perspective that says, I am merely a participant that shapes a little bit of the dynamics of the system. And I have to be very careful about how, my inputs then generate these feedbacks that I can't fully predict. And so I'll just read it quickly. It says the designers of complex adaptive systems are not strictly designing systems themselves. They are hinting those systems towards anticipated outcomes from an array of existing interrelated systems. These are designers that do not understand themselves to be in the center of the system. Rather, they understand themselves to be participants, shaping the systems that interact with other forces, ideas, events, and other designers. So this interactivity, interconnectedness. In the, when you read Tim Brown's book, kind of alludes to that being important, but never has the framework to help you really fully fathom the complexity of it. I think there's an appetite amongst. product people and branding people to take into account these consequences that they have on the system as a whole. And by far that has been the most convincing counterpoint to that, to the whole design thinking is everything. And we would just reiterate that. It's one tool guys, and of course systems thinking is another tool and jobs to be done is another framework and, working backwards from the customer as Amazon says, all these things are tools to be used together in tandem with each other. I think a lot of tech platforms that are in the gig economy or in the, resource sharing crowd sharing type of world, their websites have been designed to really hone in on the user experience but when anything moves a little bit away from that, the inherent complexity you back in the face. Everything has been obscured. so that's kind of where I wonder to what extent, a designer is taking into account the possibility that things can go wrong and you need to have that complexity. Nothing can go wrong here. And when it goes wrong, There's no way to really dig into it.

Ernest:

You know, it's funny because, um, way back, uh, in the early 2000s, in that company, I co- founded 37signals, something we talked about was just the, the fact that in any of these complex systems, Error is inevitable. And so we came up with this concept that we called contingency design, just designing for when things go wrong. And there's a lot of data around how important it is to resolve those sorts of, situations effectively. And that if you as a brand are able to do that, then you can actually create greater affinity with your customer than if they didn't have the problem in the first place. Now, we've created these technologies that try to be magical and hide all the complexity, as you said, and in the process, create these situations where as soon as something goes wrong, it's just completely unsolvable for anyone. I ran into a similar sort of situation with a shipping issue and I came to learn that the people on the back end at the shipper have access to the exact same information that I do, you know,, and in some respects, you could say, Oh, that's great. That's very democratic that,

Joachim:

Yeah.

Ernest:

know, they don't have access to any secret information, but that meant that no one had any idea where my package was. And there was no way to actually, query the people at the facility where this package was sitting somewhere. I think the challenge that this gets to is the point of incentives that's come up in some previous episodes as well as there's just no incentive to address these error cases. No one wants to, Think no one wants to raise that. Oh, what if something goes wrong? You know, no one gets brownie points for raising these possible problems. Um, and so they never get, um, the priority that they need to actually be resolved so that There's a system designed that enables these sorts of things to be resolved. So it's a great point. It's a great thing to highlight. And I think too, that the fact that these companies like IDEO are consultancies is part of this problem. You know, they go in and out, you know, they have these, um, engagements that last a certain amount of time. And then when they're done, they're out, you know,, and so. Um, they can really focus on the sort of sexy stuff on the surface, but then the folks who are left in the company kind of holding the bag, um, have to deal with the sort of grunt work of making sure the thing actually works and that when, customers encounter errors that they can actually resolve them. But, it's just not sexy enough for the folks in the C suite to want to, spend any time on that. So, um, I think the, the nature of the system that we've created does result in these sorts of challenges that you've encountered yourself. And I think all of us have encountered with these, uh, systems that are now just so incredibly complicated.

Joachim:

Yeah, I think, you were alluding to the fact that a consultancy that hops in, they've been given license to create the new shiny object. It would be nice to see how could a design thinking approach actually be used to enable more of a subtractive design process. I will give a full disclaimer here. I'm not a big fan of Elon Musk, but he does have these rules of engineering that are, exactly what you'd expect them to be from him. They're kind of, um, way too simplified and over simplification of complexity, but one of the principles that's kind of useful, but phrased poorly, he calls it try and delete something in the process. in other words, There must be a way to remove some of that complexity that's been accumulating over time because different people have had perspectives and they dip in and out, much like a consultancy comes in and says, you need to do this. And so it would be interesting to think, how does a design thinking perspective help you in a subtractive one? Remove things from the process. And could Tim Brown make subtractive innovation sexy as well?

Ernest:

Right. Yeah, that's a great point. It is a fundamentally additive sort of, experience and encounter when you bring in a consultant like this. Although I will say that in our engagement with IDEO, they did have one exercise. Uh, that spoke to this, where basically they had us, uh, you know, we went through the, context of the situation, talked about the possible, solutions, rooted in the needs of our customer, but we went through this exercise of, okay, so of these things that, you heard all of these things. You also have context into the things that you're doing. You, the client are doing. So let's do an exercise where we put on this board, uh, these different colored post its where you have some. Things that you want to start doing based on this new information that we have now, things that you might want to continue doing, and then things that you think we should stop doing as a company based on this information. So they, do have this exercise. They, they, that speaks to this, where they attempt to address this idea of, um, taking away as well as, um, adding new things. I think the challenge is in the fact that they are. And that's, this is something that comes at the end of their engagement. So then someone on the company side has to be given the, um, I guess the authority to be able to then deliver on that. And that's extremely difficult to get these big, complex organizations to get To stop doing anything, even if they know those things they've been doing are not particularly effective or efficient. Um, but I just wanted to throw out there that they did have something that, spoke to that, at least in a small way.

Joachim:

Actually I wanted to bring up something that we talked about., in our Scenius episode where, we talked about the crowd, we talked about people coming together as a group and innovating together. And you were presenting a counterpoint that was a little bit more, I'm going to use this word in a good way though, but a little bit more elitist, you're saying that maybe not everyone really needs to be in this conversation right now. Maybe only a few people really have thought about this long and hard and have the right perspective to push this forward. So do you think that, um, design thinking is maybe just. The worst aspects of crowdsourcing and the lowest common denominator stuff when we do these things, or is there more to it? I don't know where, where do you want to take that?

Ernest:

It's a really good question. I think that it can be really powerful if you do it at the right time in the process, and particularly if you're doing it early on. Um, in that it is a great, design thinking offers a great framework for bringing, people together who might typically not, um, uh, work together or collaborate together from different parts of an organization and gives them tools to be able to communicate more effectively together than they might, just in their normal day to day practice. So, you know, I think if you're in the right time in the project, it can be really powerful. I think It's kind of to your point about maybe my somewhat more elitist point of view, um, if you're getting closer into the point where you're really having to make a lot of decisions, I don't think it's quite as effective. cause to me, the, the great thing about design thinking, thinking, at least in my experience is that it's great at opening up. The, um, the scope of possibilities and rooting them, like we talked about in the needs of your customer, uh, in a way that I think a lot of companies are really bad at. So at that front end where you want to., not just pursue the same paths that you as a company would typically pursue. That's, I think, the time when design thinking can be really powerful. When you're now getting back into the point where you've identified the opportunity, You've identified the key needs that you need to address, and now you need to actually make the thing. I think that's when it's not quite as useful, because that's when you do need to sort of filter down, um, and, um, take some of the inputs away so that the team can, uh, focus on now, you know, Delivering on those things that we all talked about as a team and all identified as being the key needs and areas of opportunity. So I, you know, just to answer that point. I do think it's important where you get into it. I actually wanted to follow up on something you mentioned earlier as well. You talked about the gig economy players and Um, where this all fits in, in that context that I was just curious to hear more about that. Like, what did you mean, about design thinking and companies like, say, Lyft and, these various gig economy type companies.

Joachim:

I think a lot of platforms mask the inherent complexity of what's happening under the hood with slick user centric design. Human centric design can mask those more subtle and complex problems that you've not actually solved, but you've just plastered over with a really beautiful experience. So a good example of platform centric thinking which is focused around making the customer journey as slick as possible. Is actually the Amazon Go stores. The Amazon Go stores were these shops that you walk into, you grab stuff off the shelf, and then you walk out and it's just, Friction free environment. Everyone already has an Amazon account. You're just going to be identified by those prime details. You walk in, you walk out incredible customer journey. All frictions have been removed. Totally focused on that. Human centric design. technology is, essentially invisible, right? It's all in the ceiling. There's tons of cameras there. And then magic AI takes over. That was the story that we were sold. And now of course those stores have shut down and it turns out that. I know that it is not every single interaction is being monitored by a human being, but there were thousands of people looking at this footage to determine if someone was actually paying attention. And if they had not stolen something, should I say rather not pay? Did they steal something? They really put it, take something off the shelf or do they put it back on the shelf? This was a prime example of, Amazon's, um, one of their leadership principles is of course, customer obsession, which is just another way of talking about customer centric, human centric design. Customer obsession is they don't want frictions. They just need to be able to buy without even thinking about the transaction. that, they just ignored all of the complexity of this problem. And it was just shoved into the AI box. And then when that didn't work, it was shoved onto workers so there is this inherent complexity that we've gotten very good at plastering over with beautiful design, friction free experiences, interaction design that is very slick. But lurking under the hood, sometimes an army of human manual labor that is, that's handling the heavy lifting of the complexity of that problem. So, just another flavor of what can be lurking under something that feels very human centric and very slick, friction free, but all you've done is hidden the complexity of the problem.

Ernest:

Uh, I I think we're totally, um, aligned on this in, I love that expression you use of plastered over, um, because I had the same sort of image in my head as well, and that, You know, often these engagements with these outside consultancies are just like a salve for some issue. You know, I think that that is such a great example because it does speak to the point you made earlier about the kind of plastic bottles for drinks and how that aligns to this whole design thinking framework, that's something that's desirable people do want to be able to take their drinks with them or in the case of this Amazon go, people do want to just be able to go in and out and grab things. Um, As you know, so just to set some groundwork for this, um, IDEO talks about these three lenses of innovation that for any innovation to be successful, it has to be desirable by people. It has to be technologically feasible, you know, something that you can actually do and economically viable. That's makes, there has to be a business case and like the disposable drink container delivers on all three of those, uh, in today's economy, in today's environment. That's it. But like you asked earlier, is that really something you should do, you know,, if you were to actually apply some judgment to it, is that something that we should actually make, even though it might deliver on all three of those things. And to me, the Amazon go store example is another case of this where, yes, if you were to ask people, would you want that convenience of being able to pop in and out of a shop, um, Without engaging with a traditional tiller, would you want that? Most people would probably say yes. And, um, I guess now we're learning that maybe it wasn't necessarily technologically feasible, but let's just argue that it was, um, and that there was economic viability. I think you'd still want to ask the question. I would hope, is this something we should do? Is this, um, from a social perspective, something that. we want, uh, as a society to just completely eliminate any human interaction, uh, in the course of our lives. And maybe that's me being old school. But, um, I think just on that basis, that's maybe the one thing that is missing from design thinking as it's articulated today. Just this. I don't know what you'd call it, this maybe broader social value question of is this something, even if it's desirable, feasible, and viable, is this something that from a social perspective we should pursue? Um, it feels like it's, it's a question worth asking

Joachim:

Yeah.

Ernest:

and like you said earlier too, it's a tool. And I think if Tim Brown and, these other agencies have oversold it, you know, shame on them. But to be fair to them, I think you have to recognize that it's a tool. These things are tools. Design thinking is a tool, just like you said earlier, that you can apply like these other tools we've talked about, but they're not going to change your culture as a company. You know, you can adopt this thing that's called design thinking that's, and that's meant to be human centered. But if your, if your company culture is not built on that, then you're going to end up with these experiences that you've talked about, um, where you've got this nice shiny object, but once you get, you know, scratched beneath the surface, you realize it's actually really human, um, uh, ah, negative, I guess, you know, uh, it really is just, um, focused on reducing friction in this one interaction. And then if something goes wrong, well, then you have to figure it all out yourself. So, um, I, you know, I think there's some blame to go around. I think there was some overselling of the concept, but I also think that a lot of people were a little, um, uh, unrealistic in terms of what they, um, might've expected that they could achieve with this one tool. And so, you know, my ultimate takeaway is that, as long as you, as long as you approach it in that way, recognize that it is one tool in the toolkit that can be applied and can be effective. You know, it can be a really positive thing. But, just don't try to think that it's going to be this cure all and is a replacement for your, your company actually having a culture that's focused on your customer.

Joachim:

Yeah, I agree with that. I think that's the broader, it comes back to our, All of the things we've been speaking to about this point, right? Is the design influences behavior, influences society. We have to be aware of that. And so part of that toolkit is thinking about that chain of things that comes after the transaction has been completed. Right. Yeah.

Ernest:

right, well, now that you've heard our perspectives, we want to hear from you. Do you see value in design thinking? Or is it, as Rebecca Ackerman describes it, a failed experiment? We want to hear what you think. Please share your thoughts by emailing us at learnmakelearn at gmail. com. Now, let's move on to our recommendations of the week. Joachim, do you have a recommendation you'd like to share?

Joachim:

Yes, I do. I just watched this film with my family and we really enjoyed it. It's called, Your Name. It's an anime that was released in 2016, written and directed by Makoto Shinkai, who is considered to be kind of the modern day Miyazaki., the animation is stunning and it's great. the broad plot of the movie is about, teenage girl and a teenage boy body swapping, and one lives in the village outside of the city and, and Taki, the boy lives in Tokyo. And of course they envy each other's lives because they're so radically different. It's a very, very sweet film. It's uncomplicated for a lot of it. And then as every good film, second act is always the complication. It's really well done. I really loved it. There is one recurring, really adolescent joke that I just could have done without that. It just was very awkward that I didn't, and it kept coming up. But other than that, if that could have been toned down, I think the story is very, very sweet. There's just so many little bits in it that are, you know, when things come together, um, it's, I think it's Chekhov's Gun. It's the idea in, in writing plays and movies. Like if you're gonna show a gun, it better get used at some point. Um, and so there's a lot of moments where things are just shown to you in passing and then. In the end, it all comes together. It is also to give it that extra seal of approval on, on the criterion streaming service. So as part of the criterion collection, if you, if you need a third party to verify, this is a good recommendation, but, uh, that that's actually where we have. So, um, I definitely recommend that. It was good fun. Aside from that one adolescent recurring joke that just keeps popping up. I just wish he'd cut that out. And soundtrack is just really fun. It's a very cheesy soundtrack, but it's very sweet. It has moments of the typical Studio Ghibli by Joe Hisaishi type soundtracks. Then also just J pop and J rock stuff. popping out. It's really very fun, matches the mood of the movie perfectly. Um, Yeah, it's really good. Wonderful film.

Ernest:

Oh, that's great. I've heard great things about it. I think this will finally put me over the edge and get me to watch it. Ha ha ha. Well, uh, I'll actually stay, um, in Japan, um, and If you don't mind, I was going to refer, just do one, but then something you said made me want to add another one. Um, so the first one I'll, um, suggest is this series on Hulu titled Shogun. Um, People our age might recall the original miniseries that aired, gosh, many decades ago in the U. S. and was just a sensation based on the novel, um, gosh, do you remember the name of the author by any chance, Joachim, I

Joachim:

I don't. No, I don't. I'm so sorry.

Ernest:

I think it's maybe James Clavel might be the name, but, um,

Joachim:

Yes, it is James Clavel.

Ernest:

Okay, great. Um, but it was, uh, it's been remade, um, on and is airing on Hulu. And I think the, the original miniseries, you know, I hadn't, haven't seen it in ages, so I can't recall exactly, but it's really a remarkable thing in that it was actually all shot in Japan. Um, and there was quite a bit of dialogue in Japanese and they made the very interesting choice, this was in the original, of Not subtitling the Japanese because they all, they wanted the experience to be through the point of view of the English character. So, you know, he didn't understand Japanese. So when people were speaking Japanese around him, they didn't, uh, subtitle it because they wanted you to feel what he was feeling. Um, now in this new, uh, remake, they, um, Do subtitle, this Japanese, uh, and interestingly, even though it's very, there's a really focused on authenticity was not shot in Japan. It was actually shot in Canada for the most part, I believe, which is really interesting, but um, it is really beautiful. And the interesting thing is it's really more of a show in Japanese that happens to have a few Western characters who every so often speak English. And so, you know, I think for some people, maybe that might, it might be off putting, but, uh, I've just really fallen for it. And they do a remarkable job with translation in that, I think, in many shows and movies, translation becomes a real, uh, kind of thing. thing that you're trying to solve for, you know, this thing that slows everything down when you have to basically say the same thing twice because you have to translate it. But they do this remarkable job of making translation part of the experience of, um, the show and what you're seeing and the way words are translated becomes very important. So, um, The reason I wanted to highlight this is you made the point about Japan being this place where they're, you know, all these disasters happening. And that's something that comes up in Shogun as a theme and, you know, kind of speaks to why, you know, at least in the story, they suggest it might be an influence as to why the culture is the way that it is. So that's what brought to mind Shogun. But the one I was going to suggest was, um, Another series set in Japan, in this case, a series called Tokyo Vice, uh, that's on, um, Max, uh, formerly known as HBO. But in this case, I thought it was very interesting in that this series, Tokyo Vice, has had two seasons and, um, uh, the second season just wrapped up and it's really interesting to look at this. In the two seasons, in contrast, the first season, um, had Michael Mann, the famous director who directed, um, Heat and the, uh, film version of Miami Vice. Uh, so it, you know, made a lot of sense that he would be involved. He was, uh, an executive producer and also directed the first, the pilot episode. And I think for many people, His involvement was a big draw for season two, he was not involved because he was making the movie Ferrari and it gives the second season a very different feel. And I have to say personally, I far prefer the second season. Um, my sense of it is that the first season really. It feels like it's coming from the perspective of a tourist, someone looking at Japan and the culture of Japan and giving very much a Westerner's interpretation of that. Whereas my sense, at least of season two, is that it's much more told from the perspective of a Japanese person. Person of Japanese storyteller, even though it wasn't, um, the, the, um, uh, showrunner is the same across both, uh, seasons, but I just feel like the Michael Mann influence really shaped season one and gave it this sort of outsider's sort of tourist perspective, whereas his absence gave them the opportunity to Tell the story differently. So it's the same characters, the same setting, and it's just a continuation into, you know, from season one to season two, but very different feel and, uh, for anyone who maybe saw season one and wasn't such a huge fan of it, I'd say definitely give season two a try because it, it. is very different and to me much stronger. And one really interesting contrast is that the last episode of season two, I won't give anything away, but I'll just say that the last episode of season two is in many ways, a mirror of the first episode of season one. And there are actually some sequences that that are very, very similar. Um, but you know, the execution is incredibly different. So it's really cool to see this contrast when you have different creatives involved, um, how that can really influence the storytelling, even though you have the same cast, uh, involved the same, you know, fundamental story you're telling and it's being told in the same context. Um, so, um, Tokyo Vice, uh, Season 2 in particular is, is what I wanted to recommend. Had you seen either of these, uh, Joachim, Shogun, or Tokyo Vice?

Joachim:

I have seen, uh, we did all of season one of Tokyo Vice. And at the end of it, we didn't feel the need to watch anymore. Um,

Ernest:

yeah.

Joachim:

and as you said, the vibe was very neon noir, which is Michael mann's feeling to all of his movies since Manhunt. Since Thief, his, movie with James Caan has a neon noir. vibe. and so I think that, that kind of neon noir ish view of Japan is very much an outsider's view of it. And there are many movies that kind of made everything in Japan about the neon lights. And I mean, Blade Runner is a prime example of, you know, what the future looks like. It's, it's Japan, but just, More neon and then, um, a movie that also reminds me a lot of that vibe is black rain by, um, Ridley Scott as well, right? It's all neon. Everything's drenched in these neon lights. And, and I think season one really, they pushed that harder. That's really interesting that his absence has helped this show. So that's made me also think about maybe we should try and go into season two with a bit more of an open mind, because we really did, we were left pretty, reasonably satisfied with what we'd experienced. Um, It wasn't earth shattering but yeah, I would be up for it if the vibe is a little less of that, I don't know. I don't want to call it Orientalism, but this exotic outsider perspective and, you know, it's, it's really not like that. I think that's what's so fun about, your name, the, the anime is, um, Tokyo is shown and just as Tokyo and it's very realistically rendered, crowded trains and it's still so, Wonderful. But not those tropes of neon Japan, so yeah, it'll be interesting to see a non neon Japan.

Ernest:

If you do see it, I'd love to hear your perspective. And actually, I, We really, Joe, my wife and I, we enjoyed season two so much we actually went back and restarted season one and we both found it just kind of repellent. We, not only the, the whole, uh, you know, neon noir thing, but just also really objectification of women, you know, and obviously that, That's a theme because it deals with the Yakuza and, you know, they deal in that world, but, um, it really in season one, I found just kind of glorifies that in a way that, you know, I think you have seen in some of Michael Mann's older movies as well. So, uh, you really, they get away from that almost entirely in season two. Um, so yeah, if you do have a chance to see it, I'd love to hear what you think. All right. Well, that does it for us. Uh, thank you so much for joining us here at learn, make, learn. As we mentioned, we want to hear from you. So please send any questions or feedback to learn, make, learn at gmail. com and tell your friends about us. In our next episode, we're going to focus on famed economist, psychologist, and author Daniel Kahneman, who passed away this past March at the age of 90. Kahneman is perhaps best known for his work in behavioral economics, for which he and Vernon L. Smith were awarded the 2002 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences. I'm quoting from the Wikipedia entry on Kahneman here, quote, The Harvard psychologist and author, Steven Pinker, said of Kahneman that his central message could not be more important. Namely that human reason left to its own devices is apt to engage in a number of fallacies and systematic errors. So if we want to make better decisions in our personal lives and a society, we ought to be aware of these biases and seek workarounds. That's a powerful and important discovery. Unquote. Kahneman's passing offers an opportunity discuss his legacy in the context of product creation. And that's what we'll do in the next episode of learn, make, learn.

People on this episode

Head Shot

Ernest Kim

Co-host
Head Shot

Joachim Groeger

Co-host