Sage with Design

It’s what designers are actually doing, Human Centered Design plays a part. Human Centered Design is most reliable when it comes to measurable information like Anthropometry. This information is useful when researching design directions and for presenting to the client. If you can’t convince and delight clients then your business is not sustainable. It’s important to keep all of your audience in mind while designing and strategizing.

Get better at asking questions and offering context behind prompts. Approach Ai like you approached Solidworks. You can be skilled in Solidworks but only from being knowledgeable about the software and skilled at problem solving, physics and the components being modelled. Ai is more useful when you know how to communication with it, understand how you learn, and be able to prioritize information in your prompt. Ai is the best research tool available and gathering research data is the best aspect of this tool. Tell Bard or Bing that you are a product designer looking for a plethora of Anthropometry resources and it will provide lists of great resources with explanations. Do this with design resources, design principles, psychology and other areas of study. Define your design direction and Ai will brainstorm ideas. Now generate ideas back and forth to offer the Ai direction so you get more specific ideas in return. It gives you recommendations for features and attributes of a design ...

It’s challenging to change user behavior. Incremental user changes have developed over time, like ordering dinner. Initially, people had to order takeout with a phone to order pizza delivery. Now, internet orders have taken over and you can even order food on a tv. Behavior changes happen when we need to learn new tools, it’s the only way to grow. The problem is it takes time and thought. This change often comes with a learning curve. It’s hard to learn Adobe InDesign when you’ve used PowerPoint for all your life. But if you want to have total control of your presentation, that’s the behavior you need to learn. When something comes along and human tasks become easier, the people who resist the new, better tool will be later to win. Behavior changes follow convenience for users and follows technology for creators.

We want to give people good feedback, but we don’t know everything. No one has ever known everything, so giving good feedback has never required that. Direct your attention to the design, not the designer. Describe the problems you see, not your solutions. Be prepared to be questioned. You can’t explain everything when a project keeps moving. Focus on the technical issues and lead to a discussion when possible. Good feedback is suggesting good technical changes and direction. Great feedback is when everyone learns something.

Good design is sometimes designed to be noticeable. The noticeable parts can communicate how the product works. A sofa is obviously designed for you to sit on it. When living room furniture is arranged for good Feng Shui, user centered design principles can be found. Seats should be up to 8 feet apart in order to keep a good conversation distance. There should be walking space to move freely through. Signifiers are a primary tool for design detail. They tell the user how to use a product without needing a sign or instructions. Cushions are the signifier to sit because they are softer than sofa arms. But sofa arms may be rounded so they are comfortable to sit and lean on. It’s better to make the product more usable without relying an instruction set.

The people at Pixar are master storytellers. People of all ages find insight in their movies because they’re so relatable. The movie “Up” (2009) is filled with real-life touchpoints. My favorite part is at the end when Russell talks to Carl about how he remembers the boring stuff more than the sensational stuff from all parts of his life. I love the boring stuff because that is when there’s the greatest sense of normalcy. Stories that aren’t exciting to hear can have great depth. And shared boredom can show the best parts of our character. The point of telling a story is not to be sensational, the point isn’t even to make a point. The point Russell made was that something meaningful can be boring, and sharing boredom can be a meaningful experience. When we all had our birthdays during lockdown, we didn’t crave streamers and balloons. We wanted friends and family to walk into our home ready for a big hug. Leaning into the best parts of real life ...

There is tension between uniformity and conformity and it comes from their relationship with creativity. Uniformity can be a way to create a sense of order. Products and systems are easier to use and efficient. And conformity is another concept that ties in with stifling innovation, but there is a place for both. They both serve as tools for reaching large amounts of people. Before the standardization of tools and measurements, it could be difficult for traders to even understand each other. It took effort to translate measurements for most of humanity, and errors were abundant. But uniformity is not always the best solution. There is a place for handmade and limited editions. Sometimes it’s important just to make a product that is unique and interesting. Diversity will help to ensure that products are not only functional, but appealing and engaging.

We don’t really need so many flavors of bar soap. People want options especially when a company is large and has sold the same regular flavor for years. But some people don’t want to belong to any group. And there are times when you just want the regular soap. Yet even when we pick the standard we belong to a group.

Before your flight takes off, flight attendants show you safety procedures by speaking and demonstrating what to do in cases of emergency. If attendants only spoke over the intercom, passengers would have no clue what to do before an emergency landing. When we haven’t experienced it, or at least seen it, it’s hard to think in the thick of it. Instruction sets and video tutorials are helpful, but they always require more imagination than watching someone walk through it in person. And when it’s important for us to learn how to prepare, we prefer to see it. We don’t want to read about the heimlich maneuver. We watch someone who knows how. And we practice it so we get it right when someone is choking. Short, simple demonstrations are easy to share, so they are when we find them important. A picture is worth 1000 words, a good demonstration is worth 1000 conversations.

It’s a product designer’s job to be the translator between the user and everyone else involved in the product development process. So, when a user says that something feels off about a design, it’s your job to find out what that means. Most people are capable of using a level because they understand the concept of balance. People with no design background can look at a design and know that something is off because it looks off. The trouble is that designers can identify what is off about a design, people know that something is off. To navigate this, designers ask questions and learn to read between the lines. New problems don’t come from filling out templates with approximated user experiences, they come from speaking with people. Templates are only the sharable summaries of the findings. In the same vein as a product designer helping users, a therapist can’t help someone who they haven’t shared sessions with.

Perhaps the most common design rule of thumb is that like goes with like. Books go on a bookshelf, pencils at the pharmacy are in the office supplies aisle, and a bottle of acetaminophen doesn’t come with a package of Peeps. My grandmother is the only person I know to extend the saying to, “Like goes with like, like in nature.” She argues that people like to group things because the concept is a natural phenomena. Grass grows with grass, stars are in the sky, animals flock and herd, and humans gather in tribes. There are a number of reasons for grouping to occur in nature, but it boils down to survival. Humans survived in groups to protect themselves against predators and other humans. People also had to detect patterns in order to be safe, like that thunder means a storm is coming. Our neocortex is excellent at detecting all types of patterns from years of people relying on them. Not everything can conform, be uniform or fit a perfect category. There needs to be a nat...

I jot down at least 10 notes / day anyways, but they’re not as well formed as the blog posts. Writing down thoughts can help sink roots into what you know, clear your mind, and ready it for decision-making. There are a lot of reasons I bother to keep up with the blog. My biggest reasons are to understand my thoughts more clearly and to be able to literally look back on them, even if I no longer agree with something. What’s the adage? Write your ethics in stone and your opinions in sand. The important thing is to write it all down somewhere.

If it can go wrong, it will go wrong, and at the worst of times. It's a law more popular than Cole’s Law, which is ground cabbage usually with a mayo base. My professor advised our class to estimate the amount of time we think we need to work on a 3D digital model and multiply it by 4. That’s enough of a safety net for things to go wrong and you are still likely to make the deadline. 3D models are created with precision and accuracy, but issues will arise in the future. Take proactive measures and back up files, but give yourself time like you would for generating ideas. Because something probably will take more time than you think. There’s more tweaking. There’s testing. There’s an error message because of a loft. Then, there’s the fact that 3D software likes to crash at the worst of times. If nothing goes wrong, it will next time when you need it not to.

Pepsi’s new positioning will better distinguish itself from industry leader, Coca Cola, by appealing to a younger, bolder, “unapologetic” audience. The usage of black and dark blue reference Pepsi’s zero sugar designs because all Pepsi products will see a reduction in sugar content. Pepsi is a large company that navigates through vastly different strategies than a smaller company would. This is why a company like Sprecher Brewing Company, producer of Green River soda, is not a direct competitor to Pepsi and strategizes differently to stay relevant in their region. Airbnb, before anyone knew about Airbnb, offered their value to a niche group of travelling, early adopters who connected deeply with what the company was doing. Airbnb focused on 100 of their most loyal customers, because if they could make 100 customers love everything about Airbnb, then they could surely reach 1000 customers. If there are 1000 customers who love you and each one gives you $100 per y...

When two design paths are discovered that could be equally successful, how do you determine the right one to pull the trigger on? We know to prioritize user needs, desires, pains, and expectations. The emphasis should be on the minimum viable audience’s culture. Look at the variety of insights and prioritize them to the best of your abilities. Ultimately, it’s about what you can argue to believe in. There will be contradictions, the most convincing argument you can make will win.

Gather and keep resources organized throughout projects and you can create a sharable, growing archive of useful tools. With enough projects and information to other peoples’ findings, you can make increasingly better decisions over time. It’s particularly important to keep statistics-based research to objectively analyze data. This information can improve networking, reinforce your users’ security, and reduce your number of designer errors.

Human Factors is an all encompassing title for being knowledgeable and thoughtful about people. There doesn’t have to be a difference between designing a vegetable peeler for a stranger who has arthritis and reorganizing a living room to be mobile-friendly for a grandparent. When a group of people who are not designers face a problem, they talk it through to solve the problem. No one has a design background but people problem solve every day. They anticipate what someone will like or need and designers are just leaning into that idea. There are designers who show up to work to do a job where empathy is filling out a series of graphs. They are focused on the problem to solve when they should focus on the person who experiences the problem. That’s how people come up with the best solutions for helping someone they love. It’s not about the problem, it’s the person.

A project you pick at each and every day is like taking a shower, it helps to be naked. It’s also about doing it every day at 7. Maybe you have a constant in your life like an iconic grocery store cashier. These are my favorite people because it’s never about going above and beyond at work, it’s about their life. There isn’t question of whether or not they will be friendly, witty and entertaining today. That’s what they will be and they make a point to be that. It’s about attitude and sharing the knowing laughs with people who get it. My dad is the ultimate annoying boss and shows up to work with a joke of the day, everyday. As terrible as the jokes often are, there were times where it was important to hear or to say something silly, for both him and his work friends. Now there are people who suffer through his Reddit and popsicle stick jokes regularly who have not worked with him in years. The right people know the kind of person he is and love him f...

Write like you talk. Tell a story. Be persuasive. Involve other people. Why is it, how is it, what is it? Ask unique questions, often specific. Which is a way of saying that a good analysis is an interesting and insightful conversation. It’s worth it to write down the witty anecdotes and ironic observations that we would have said at the party.

it pours, and designers should collect the abundance of water now to save a trip to the reservoir later. Crisis can lead to amazing ideas. It forces us to confront the truth about how our systems work, or rather, don’t. Many of us remember the engineers and designers who 3D printed ventilators for over-capacity hospitals. Crisis is not something we should seek in order to design great healthcare tools, but it shows that purpose can best drive a creator’s work. Vulnerabilities in our system were highlighted, finely tuned processes were upended from market instability and new consumer behaviors forced new design thinking. It’s urgency. Urgency caused by the rain to solve the problem of getting wet, and by the opportunity to solve the problem of needing to drink.

Thomas Edison didn’t invent the lightbulb, he invented the first good one. Edison liked to test the limits of electricity so he could make it do something new. His discoveries were used to improve upon other scientists’ ideas. He tinkered and thought and used other people’s understandings, because Edison was an innovator. Edison’s peers all invented their own lightbulbs while Edison still tested the hypotheses for his. Other designs influenced Edison the same way that incandescent bulbs influenced LED light designs. Designers focus on practicality, an inventor wants something new. Innovation happens in between.

A maker makes because they have something to say. Makers are initiators with a voice, a vision, and a value. Each day they contribute to make their difference in the world. I am the designer, my grandfather is the maker. My grandfather has carved realistic, wooden ducks for over 40 years. He started small. He began woodworking with only a pocket knife, nothing else. Time slowly filled his garage and basement with equipment. As a result, he’s since filled the house with ducks, too. Our first project together was too early for my memory, but we carved a wooden fish on a stand. He said he showed me how to shave the edges down, and then I watched him add the details and finish. The opportunity to learn was always on the table. Mistakes happened while he worked, and he showed me how he navigated through them. For some periods of time he couldn’t work, but he jumped back in when he could. He still had the latest information on ducks, materials, tools, and processes to try on the next project...

Expensive guitar picks were my introduction to premium priced products. After guitar lessons started at 10 years old, I experimented with guitars and accessories. I discovered that my $2,400 dream guitar (a Martin Vintage Series with a slotted headstock) sounded better than my Yamaha at home, but expensive guitar picks were worse than the cheap ones. Premium picks were metal, stone, glass, thick plastic, or wood which were far too rigid for my taste. The best picks were mid-range and made of cellulose. We are drawn to top shelf items because they could be better than what we have, but spending more money can also lead to FOMO. Sometimes the cheap product is your premium one.

You can tell who is in an unfamiliar grocery store, or at least, that’s what it feels like being that person. Like goes with like, and the parameter of a grocery store displays the healthier options, so shopping at a new store shouldn’t be an issue. Not unless someone breaks the rules. Now, napkins aren’t next to the paper towels and this store seems to be the only one without 20 milk alternatives. It isn’t until after you complete your first lap that you see “health conscious” products grouped near the storefront. This isn’t just a shelf with high-protein “nutritional” items. These are rows of small aisles for products that are paleo, keto, gluten-free, organic, plus the 20 milk alternatives. Which would have been great to know before shopping and settling on my 2nd preference groceries. Then again, I was the only confused person in the store. What an annoying reminder that value and differentiation are accomplished when one person...

The invention of a product like the gait belt is a given. The purpose is clear: to better assist a person with a physical disability to walk, transfer to a seat, or to be lifted. They come standard at your local hospital, rehab facilities, and nursing facilities right next to the wheelchairs. It’s a given because the need has always been there, and the technology has existed since a thriving Roman Empire. So, why was such an obvious design patented only 10 years ago? It’s naïve to think that no person has used a belt, straps, or rope to help someone else sit in a chair until 2013. No, gait belts didn’t exist because no one bothered to make a specific, simple tool for the job until 10 years ago. No one bothered to research the makeshift methods, improve, and then standardize helping people to get around. Many millions of people who creatively helped someone to bed could have sold their idea. I’m sure it even crossed their minds. There’s a lesson here that t...

A young 1950’s U.S. Air Force Lieutenant discovered a fatal flaw in cockpit designs. Pilots couldn’t fit in WWII jets because the average pilot had grown. The averages of 10 body part measurements were taken from thousands of pilots to create new cockpits. Once complete, not one pilot fit all 10 dimensions because there is no such thing as a perfectly average, proportional body. The U.S. Air Force centered on fitting individual body sizes instead of standardizing around the average. This lead to the invention of adjustable seats, adjustable foot pedals, adjustable helmet straps, and adjustable flight suits with ranges that fit the most extreme percentiles of pilots. Someone with an average length torso will not be average for all other anthropometric dimensions. Human’s are not proportional, so we must design for the individual in order to design for the masses.

OXO changed the world of culinary tools with their vegetable peeler designed for people who have arthritis. As it turns out, if someone with severe arthritis can grip a handle well, then most of the population can too. “Universal design is design that’s usable by all people, to the greatest extent possible, without the need for adaptation or specialized design.” Ronald L. Mace, creator of Universal Design. People who depend on wheelchairs also depend on ramps, which can be useful to anyone. Lever door handles were created in the Tudor Period for the elderly and sick, but they’re also useful to anyone who brings groceries home. Shower benches, automatic doors, wide doorways, step-free entries, and flat panel light switches all cater to people with disabilities, and yet everyone benefits.

Human Centered Design is the wrong tool for the most important problems a designer may approach. Deep within us all lives a feeling of wanting to love and to be lovable. The best thing we can do is to let someone know that they are loved and lovable. If this seems familiar, it’s because it was Mr. Rogers’s ultimate message to you. “Love isn’t a state of perfect caring. It is an active noun like ‘struggle.’ To love someone is to strive to accept that person exactly the way he or she is, right here and now.” -Fred Rogers Love is a struggle. It’s difficult to say, “I love you,” after having an argument with someone we care about. We suffer when a loved one suffers from illness. We hurt to love ourselves when suffering changes us. And when love is overwhelming, we can struggle to express it without hurting ourselves. Mr. Rogers affects people in one of two ways: (1) they love him and (2) he’s scary. People were afraid because peop...

Because it’s a skill, or rather, a collection of skills that create a bigger picture. Both use guides for unique processes and consider customer preferences. When these processes are applied, the best of both worlds are created by teams, not individuals. I was a terrible cook for years, but the atmosphere and lifestyle drew me in. The diverse personalities, millions of sounds, high energy dinner rushes, and the thought of serving others kept my attention. My knife skills improved not from reading about knives, but because a chef corrected my hands as I cut 50 lbs. of carrots and celery every morning, 6 days a week. One morning he stopped correcting me and, instead, told me to cut faster. He stood by watching and correcting me again. Later he told me to slow down and look away while he monitored my hands. Gordon Ramsey is ions beyond my capabilities, but using a knife feels second nature to me. It’s been years since I cooked in a professional kitchen. Muscle memory and knowle...

This is my personal reminder to sketch the ideas that I am certain will not solve all the problems. A reminder that researching, thinking and waiting will never be as useful as sketching something decent now. Even the wheelchair, possibly the most universal product design in the world, is often impossible for folks to travel in without assistance. If one wheelchair design were perfect for everyone, there wouldn’t be different brands and flavors. The best products are not perfect, create something good today.