My colleague, Will Anderson and I are challenging the current one-size-fits-all agency design process. We’re running a series of experiments to see how we can break the mould. Here’s the first of our five-part series to introduce our thinking.
Companies seem to be adopting a cookie cutter approach to design, resulting in experiences that feel oddly similar. Deliveroo, Spotify, Twitter, Slack, Airbnb… They all seem so well designed for certain user needs (simplicity, transparency, on-demand) that we now adopt these services without active reflection.
Yet the risk here is that we stop reflecting on what’s meaningful vs. prescribed. Our predilection for all things “tech” is at risk of contributing to an ever more insular world, where self-referential digital products and services mimic and gloat in each other’s glory. In a Plato’s Cave of digital imitations, how do we escape?
First, a story:
Two months ago, Will and I came across an article titled “The Busy Life Of An Urban Millennial”, written by my friend, Anish Mitra — a New York-based comedian and self-proclaimed ‘cynical millennial’.
The ironic, yet hair-raising statements caught our attention:
Between conquering fitness goals (every day, no excuses), trying every Tapas restaurant in the city (I’m Paleo dieting between juice cleanses) and catching up with long-lost friends (they’re only here every 2 weekends), I barely have any time for introspection and, her fraternal twin, self-reflection.
That’s why I spent all of Saturday exhaustively grappling tough questions I’ve avoided for far too long. Should I upgrade to Spotify Premium? Should I go to Darren’s 12:45pm spin class in East Village or Stacy’s one o’clock in West Village? I’m going Hamlet choosing between Darren’s holistic fitness experience and Stacy’s (ultimately) rewarding dungeon of perspiration. That reminds me — it’s time to set some reminders on Google Calendar. If I’m not super-duper careful, I’ll end up paying for Netflix in 3 months.”
The services that Anish refers to — Spotify, Netflix, fitness apps —and his deliberate, yet frivolous decision-making redirected our gaze towards ourselves:
Are we like that? Are people really like that?
Are the experiences we design so ‘user’- rather than ‘people’-focused that we’re actually fuelling a sense of self-centredness and perpetuating an image of a world revolving around you?
We’re so obsessed with making digital products and services frictionless, streamlined and personalised that we almost forget to question, to stop — and reflect on what really matters to us. Do we really need another Uber for X? Another grocery delivery app? Do our digital products and services allow for, in Anish’s words, “time for introspection and, her fraternal twin, self-reflection”?
“By removing all friction, we remove moments for personal growth, serendipity, and self-reflection. At scale, these erode our social values and skew our lives towards intolerance and impatience, a lack of resilience and an inability to navigate change”. (Steve Selzer, Experience Designer at Airbnb)
Design is at risk of turning into a middle-class problem-solving machine, and we’re all guilty. How do we break out of it?
Let’s experiment
Will and I are running three workshops to tackle different parts of our design process:
- Best-in-class research
- Ideation tools
- Value propositions
We don’t have all the answers, which is why we’re adopting an experimental approach. Our goal is not to critique our design process, but to explore new ways in which we can work with the framework — not against it — and battle the increasing homogenisation of customer experiences.
We have released some of our workshop findings and methodology here on Medium. Feel free to send us a message or comment if you have any questions! In the meantime, Will and I will continue testing our findings from the workshops in London and Hong Kong.
UPDATE:
We got selected to speak at SXSW17! If you are attending, please say hi!
http://schedule.sxsw.com/2017/events/PP63323
