From Chaos to Clarity in the Design Process

Chaos. That is how the design and innovation process can feel to someone who’s new at it. It can even feel that way, at times, to people who are more experienced. Designer Damien Newman illustrated it this way [1]:

Notice his annotations. The process goes from noise and uncertainty to patterns and insights, to clarity and focus. The chaos on the left and the clarity on the right is always present, regardless of designer experience. It’s the nature of design.

Victory for some, defeat for others 

I have observed hundreds of passionate student teams wade through the chaos. Some get stuck and give up, others make it through and hope to never do it again, while others emerge victorious with an amazing innovation with real market value. 

Why are some victorious while others get eaten up and spit out without much to show for it? The difference, as I observe it, is almost always connected to the designer’s willingness or reluctance to do the following:

Listen

We don’t have all the pertinent data. We need to listen to what others are saying. We need to listen to the market, listen to teammates, listen to advisors, listen to the data, listen to the prototype. By listen, I mean really listen. Even when it’s not what we want to hear. Try to identify patterns observed by listening to various sources. As a self-test, ask are you willing or reluctant to listen?

Test [2]

Things won’t work as we expect them to. We need to poke and prod and challenge our work. We need to test our concept, test prototypes, test the product usability, test the overall user experience. We need to test the ad campaign, the consumer’s willingness to pay, the website. We need to test the details, test the broader system, test the unknowns, test the knowns, test the tests. Some people are so worried about getting an undesirable result that they would rather not test at all. It is extremely valuable to test an idea/concept/product under various conditions – not just the ideal conditions. This helps expose the range of performance/limitations that can be expected [3]. Any test that produces more knowledge, understanding, or more insight is valuable, even if it tells us something we didn’t want to know. The important part is what actions we will take based on what the tests tell us. Are you willing or reluctant to test?

Make Decisions

Design is decision-making. Stop making decisions and we’ve stopped designing. Decide on a concept. Decide on a market. Decide about whom you’ll seek feedback from. Decide on a shape, on a material, on a manufacturing process. Decide on what test to run next, what models to make, what to spend your resources on. Decide what conditions need to be satisfied to move on. So many people hesitate to make any decision, afraid of making a wrong decision. The only wrong decision is to make no decision at all. Some people are hesitant to make decisions because not enough information is known. We’ll never have as much information as we would like. Working in an uncertain environment is a natural part of the design process. Are you willing or reluctant to make decisions?

Iterate [4]

A desirable fully formed solution will not emerge without repeated evaluation and improvement. We need to expect the solution to evolve through iteration. Iterate on the product. Iterate on the testing. Iterate on the ads. Iterate on the style. Iterate on the pricing. Iterate on the user experience. Iterate on your understanding of the market. So many young designers/innovators are frustrated, disappointed, and/or demoralized when they need to return to and repeat an earlier design activity to make the design better. That is iteration, and it is so fundamental to design, that without it, the outcome of design is never good. Are you willing or reluctant to iterate?

The Value of a Self Test

Think of a project you're working on now, or one that you recently worked on. How would you rate yourself in those four areas (listen, test, make decisions, and iterate)? An honest assessment of whether you are heavily reluctant/willing or are leaning reluctant/willing in each category will likely expose the source of frustration/excitement, disappointment/satisfaction, and difficulty/ease related to moving from the chaos of the left side to the clarity of the right side of Newman’s illustration of the design process.

References

[1] The Process of Design Squiggle by Damien Newman, thedesignsquiggle.com, accessed 18 April 2022.

[2] Mattson, C., “Verification Versus Validation,” BYU Design Review, November 10 2020, https://www.designreview.byu.edu/collections/verification-versus-validation, accessed 18 April 2022.

[3] Mattson, C. A., and Sorensen, C. D., Product Development: Principles and Tools For Creating Desirable and Transferable Designs, 2020, Springer, Cham.

[4] Mattson, C., “Iteration: The most important concept in design,” BYU Design Review, 2020, https://www.designreview.byu.edu/collections/iteration-the-most-important-concept-in-design, accessed 18 April 2022.