LIFE IN A PRODUCT DESIGN SERVICE STARTUP!
Before I start giving you a brief idea of how work is done in a Product Design service start-up, let me explain you what a product design service is.
Product design service is an industry that caters the clients / organizations that do not have a design team of their own and would like to outsource the design work to other firms that can provide the service. In India, many industries generally do not have a Design team. That’s why they need such Design service companies. Design services covers a wide range of tasks starting from market research, industrial design, engineering design, production design, CAD services, design consultancy etc. One major obstacle in design services is that the firm offering the service, sometimes, have to stick to the client’s vision and his perception about the product.
In a world where almost every startup you hear about is VC funded, ours was a self-financed one. Unlike a VC funded startup, a self -financed startup depends on the profits earned from the clients for survival till maturity.
Our startup was mostly into hardware product design service. Our team comprised of mostly mechanical and electronics design engineers. I was the sole industrial designer.
Here is a small, very small insight into my life as a industrial designer in design service, self-funded startup.
Please note that I had no prior experience of doing Industrial design (ID).
None at all!
First day at work…
Senior: Hi! Welcome to the company. This is our team. So, how do you feel? Excited?
Me: Yeah!
Senior: Good! So here is your first ID project. We have to freeze the ID for this in next 2 weeks. Prepare some concept designs by tomorrow evening. We will present it to the client.
Me: (Still excited) yeah sure. Let’s do it!
Day two…
(After completing some concepts designs and client presentation)
Senior: Our client expects rich design, something similar to the Apple products. Can you explore few concepts in that direction?
Me: Ok, I will try.
Day three…
Senior: How is the work on 1st project going?
Me: I am exploring more ideas.
Senior: Good! We are getting a 2 new projects which have scope for ID and Engineering. Try to complete the first project early so that you can work on the others. You have 1 month to work on 2nd and 3rd project. And both these projects are going to go parallel.
Me: (Not so excited anymore; highly worried about how I am going handle 3 projects at a time) Awesome! Anything else?
Senior: Not as of now.
So, felt the heat?
Three days into the startup and I already had 3 projects on my desk. All three of them were equally important for company’s growth. So I had to take each one of them seriously and do justice to the responsibility given to me!
Sometimes, there Workload is less in ID as the industrial design phase was over and the entire work load was then shifted to the engineering design team. So, I did feel Bored as the work wasn’t that intellectually stimulating and I had to travel all the distance and complete my office hours with little work on my hands.
But such startups are always trying to get more and more clients. So, you never know. That same work load may return at any moment.
Curious to know what happened to those 3 projects?
1st one was delivered with a few week’s delay. The client liked the design. However, as the design developed into a production design, we realized that the design had few challenges in terms of manufacturing.
2nd project was delivered on time and clients were impressed with whatever we proposed.
3rd project was terminated during the Industrial design phase itself as the client ended up in financial trouble.
The past one year was definitely a roller coaster, but it gave me some deep insights about the industry and a valuable experience. Some important things that I learnt are:
· Decisiveness and thinking on my toes
· Importance of frugal innovation in Indian industry
· Time and Resource Management
· Interpersonal Communication skills with clients and vendors
· Designing under a variety constraints (For e.g. time, economic, manufacturing, resources etc.)
· Importance of detail in the entire design thinking process
· Need of a good team for project execution and good sync between industrial designers and engineers.
· And most important of all, I learnt perseverance.
To conclude, I understand that working in a startup might sound a terrible idea as, you might have to postpone your IPhone 7 purchase date but it’s worth it! It’s an amazing experience. Every startup offers a different experience. You get a lot of freedom to explore and express your thoughts. In comparison to MNCs, you gain a lot of knowledge and exposure in a very short time. Often you would be the sole designer in such a startup, which is a lot of responsibility but you get to call your design your ‘own’, as compared to working in a large team where the design roles are well-defined. All in all, the risks are worth taking, because the opportunity to grow is exponential.
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The opinions shared in this post are my own and based on my own experiences.
