ON DESIGN VISION AND STRATEGY

WHAT IS A DESIGN VISION AND A DESIGN STRATEGY?

A design vision exists to provide top-level inspiration and guidance for the design team and serves several purposes, including:

• To support the broader business group or company mission vision and strategy.
• To inspire.
• To unify the approach, codify the purpose and reinforce the value of design within and outside of design teams.
• To provide a consistent reference both aspirational and measurable to which the design team and design leadership can periodically refer, elevating their efforts beyond the day to day noise of projects and micro feedback from clients and executives.
• To create a means of benchmarking works so progress can be qualified and in some cases quantified in its alignment with the vision and progression towards strategic goals.
• To produce better work which adds value for customers, generates a strategic market advantage for your company, supports and builds brand value and generates year on year profits.

To create unique and compelling products one must create and defend the time and resources necessary. Being aligned to a design vision and strategy will foster innovation and push ideas forward by aiming consistently towards a common target.

A successful design vision document will primarily serve to guide design teams and design leadership, however, the design strategy document will go further; acting as a bridge between design and business teams.

The design strategy document will take the vision statements and translate these into clear measurable goals or economic benefit; for example, increasing profit margins, decreasing time to market, increasing daily active users, reducing data entry errors, etc. The strategy document will then highlight the tactics and timelines that will be employed to deliver on these goals.

Both the design vision document and the strategy document succeed or fail upon the quality of research and understanding of the company, its vision and strategy, the market dynamics, and the user/customer.

HOW TO FORM A DESIGN VISION / STRATEGY

A design vision and strategy are not born in a vacuum. To be successful it must be informed by the following:

1. A cross-functional team should be formed to push the process through to completion.
   This team should be headed by the design leader under the charter of an executive sponsor to deliver the vision and strategy within a defined period of time and budget.
2. The mission, vision, objectives, and strategy of the company. The design strategy will need to nest within this to support and complement the business group and corporate strategy. Furthermore, it may need to build upon or re-frame existing company relationships with the design proposition.
3. Customer Research: Clear customer segmentation through rapid ethnography to validate/invalidate assumptions and understand the following:

• Goals / Needs / Motivations / Gains they are seeking.
• Pain points.
• Current solutions, what works and what doesn’t and why.
• What they would like to see.
• What motivates the customer.
• Their purchase process.
• Overarching customer trends.

1. Market Research: Market trends and insights are required along with the above deep dive into customer intelligence. This body of work will look at market sizing, segmentation, competitive positioning, technology assessment, regulatory assessments, core IP within the company, etc. From this look at trends and emerging opportunities, and how the design disciplines can support the growth of the company within these conditions.
2. Analysis, Synthesis, and Revision: Reviewing the market insights and company strategy, one can then begin to synthesize a design vision and design strategy. This should be reviewed with the executive sponsor, and members of the design team and revised accordingly before being disseminated to a broader audience within the company.

DESIGN VISION CONTENTS

The design vision should be discipline agnostic in its framework. It is the top-level document, and as such addresses three key open-ended questions in the following order of priority:

Why?_________________What is your belief, purpose, cause.

How?____________Your USP, Your IP, Where you invest, Your differentiator.

What?_______This is what you produce for your customers.

People don’t buy what you do, they buy why you do it. This is the design vision, this is why everyone in the team gets out of bed in the morning to practice their craft and further their mission.

One can begin to see why the design vision needs to understand, nest within and support the broader company vision and as such should have the following minimum characteristics:

• It should contain or directly refer to the vision, mission, and goals of the broader organization.
• Be as brief as possible and ideally be able to be summarised in one single sentence/strapline.
• Be aspirational, passionate, emotional and focused on success. It should be an imperative statement for action and innovation.
• Should be supported by imagery.

The vision statement may be multi-variant in that it may need to address several core themes, which may correspond to core markets, core technologies or core values.

DESIGN STRATEGY CONTENT

With a clear body of research in place and a cross-functional team with an executive charter, a design strategy can be formed. I am partial to building a strategy based on Hambrick and Fredrickson strategy diamonds approach as it produces a concise, well rounded actionable proposition covering:

ARENAS: Where the design team(s) be active? (i.e. product categories, channels, market segments, geographies, technologies, business pipeline stages)

DIFFERENTIATORS: What are the factors that allow the design team(s) to succeed in reaching the vision/goals. Reducing design time? World class ethnographic research? An innovative design process? In house hardware and software development?

VEHICLES: How will the design teams operate in these Arenas? Internal development, strategic partners, joint ventures, licensing /franchising/outsourcing, mergers etc?

STAGING AND PACING: The stages of development and time associated with this development. Will you address certain product categories or technologies first? What is the road map?

ECONOMIC LOGIC: What is the economic logic to this? This reflects how all the pieces fit together in a means that should satisfy key stakeholders. Will the strategy results in increased profit margins? Increased speed to market? Increased customer loyalty?

One may want to include case studies, in an appendix, of works completed by the company/business group that align to this vision, or if necessary, other aspirational businesses that successfully executed a design strategy.