Re: The Interaction Design Public Intellectual
This is my response to an article in the Interactions magazine, written by Cameron Tonkinwise, the director of design studies at CMU Design school. The article is a call to action for Interaction Design scholars to take more public positions. He mentioned Don Norman as the only scholar criticizing a company’s UX, with a note that it is possibly more motivated by his previous time in that company, not as a scholar.
The author criticized Interaction Design scholars for staying too much in academic forums and keep sharing views and arguing only with fellow scholars. He rarely saw Interaction Design scholars sharing views publicly, compared to scholars in data security/privacy who are prominent public critics of private enterprises and governments. Quotes from the article are in-line below.
Interaction designs now mediate almost all the experiences of the global consumer class. With the maturing of e-commerce, social software, and mobile computing, interaction design structures almost every aspect of everyday life. There are therefore a huge number of topics on which interaction design scholars could and should be taking positions.
I cannot write about Interaction Design on behalf of the scholars, because I am no longer attached to any academic institution. I bear no academic title. However, as a former scholar, I feel the need to voice my concerns here and there. Especially as I am now practicing in “the world of tech” as quoted below.
I often wonder what my interaction design colleagues think about many of the current developments in the world of tech. Do interaction design faculty endorse the Lean Startup-derived MVP approach that is the dominant form of “research” in tech development at the moment? Do they worry about the labor practices that are the back end of an Amazon Dash button? What are their views on the social systems consequences of the massive investment in autonomous vehicles at the moment?
The first part of the above quote is about development in the tech world. I do not have problems with the MVP approach, because it is actually aligned with my basic principle as a product designer. Designers explore in order to improve their product iteratively, which is different from what I did in my software engineering past. Back then I only learned to perfect the art of technology development. After I switched to product design, I learned the art of iterative product development by means of prototyping and user testing. This is the process I do before letting a prototype go into production and get released as an MVP. An MVP doesn’t mean a first prototype.
The second part of the above quote is about ethics. This kind of issues have been discussed among scholars. In an academic institution, usually there is a board of ethical review. However, only the practitioners of human-related science such as Medicine and Psychology involve such a board in their projects. Interaction Design practitioners could have now joined the fellowship. If you stay with a company that continues to consciously practice unethical approach, are you still a human-centered designer?
Our societies right now need interaction design experts in the public domain, explaining the difference design can make — the habits that follow making certain activities more convenient, the values reinforced by systems that reward this or that behavior, the complex dependencies associated with automating some actions and prompting others with predictive analytics.
I agree with the above quote. We do not have enough interaction design experts who talk about the difference Design can make. Instead of seeing Design as an enabler of convenience, the industry sees it as a mere crafter of a pre-defined recipe for convenience. Instead of seeing Design as a value creator, the industry sees it as a mere channel of marketing efforts. Instead of seeing Design as a master of complexity in dealing with automation and analytics, the industry sees it as a mere tool for increasing conversion rate.
Design students begin to internalize the critiquing they receive, developing the capacity to crit their own designing, with the expertise that marks a “reflective practitioner”. Without higher-level critique of overall directions, the reflective practitioner is at risk of validating, through tight action research cycles, a response to a situation that works but is heedless of wider consequences.
With regard to the above quote, critiquing and being reflective come in one package. Without critiquing we cannot be reflective. Learning to be reflective is what has really added to my previous education. I continued to have a reflective attitude until I met so many designers in “the world of tech” who cannot think of the result of their design activities in terms of wider consequences. This also gives the wrong message to the industry, that designers are egotistical people who only care about growing their babies. Without properly trained designers, or having too many premature designers jumping too quickly into the fast-pace world of tech development, we will soon lose the meaning of Design (or we have?).
I am only a former scholar, practicing in “the world of tech”. I do ponder about many products and services influencing our everyday life as a global consumer. I have been called theoretical or philosophical, just because I show the interaction designer in me. I critique. I am reflective. I do have ethical considerations in my practice. I try to show what differences design can make. This is the way I choose to influence, rather than writing in public with a scholar label.
Thank you, Mr. Tonkinwise, for reminding us to be seen in public by initiating a discourse. Here I am, writing on Medium, not behind a paywall. I invite all interaction designers out there to respond to this article. You can also respond to the original article, because the author has provided an alternative link to the one behind paywall.
If you want to read more about Design, Innovation, and Human Behavior please follow Design Strat instead of qonita’s profile :)
