“Industrial Design”?

What is industrial design in the broader context of a corporation, and how can designers use this information to be more effective?

When I tell people that I’m an “industrial designer,” I get a broad variety of responses. So many images come into people’s minds when they here those words together. “Do you design factories?” is the classic question. Nope! “Oh, so you design the way products look?” Getting warmer, but that’s only a small part of it!

The short answer is that Industrial Designers design all three-dimensional objects except buildings (and there are exceptions, obviously). ID people are much like “architects for objects.” Look around you. You may be sitting at a computer desk with a monitor, a keyboard, some pens and pencils, speakers, a coffee cup, a laptop bag, and a desk lamp. Every single one of those things, including the table, was almost certainly designed by an Industrial Designer. A good designer doesn’t just design what the product looks like, either. There are many important factors in designing a successful product (see below).
But he doesn’t do it all alone. Either directly or indirectly he works with Engineers, Marketers, and others to bring the product to a useful fruition. The aim of this article will be to outline what a designer does in the grander scheme of a corporation, not just from his own perspective.

Design = Communication

My basic thesis will be that an industrial designer is first and foremost a communicator. Designers communicate with everyone in every part of the product development process, from conception to shelf, and from shelf to living room. He doesn’t just communicate about design, he communicates through the designs themselves.
Designers use sketches, models, computer modeling, prototypes, brand elements, quality cues, on-product graphics, and virtually any other medium necessary to communicate an idea to an audience, large or small.

The first and foremost responsibility of a designer is to communicate thoughtfully, appropriately, and effectively.

What about “Innovation?”

One of the central requirements of an industrial designer is that he/she be a strong innovator. Despite this, I omit innovation from my definition of Industrial Design.

Everybody does it. Marketers, engineers, and industrial designers–anyone involved in the product development process–is and must be an innovator. It is a waste of resources to staff any individual in any capacity who is unable to contribute to innovation in his/her field.

Itâ??s Fundamental. Just as the ability to read and write is absolutely critical to any aspiring journalist, creativity and innovation are fundamental to design. So fundamental, in fact, that I donâ??t even bother listing it in the job description.

Itâ??s absolutely a hugely important part of the job, but itâ??s not what makes us unique. What makes designers unique is not our ability to come up with ideas, but the knowledge and expertise to bring ideas to fruition. â??Having an idea is not in itself an accomplishment.â?? –Peter Drucker

Designers can make ideas into marketable realities… using effective communication.

The Holy Trinity of Product Development

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Marketing, Engineering, and Design are the key players in the product development process. Each has its own important roll in the process, along with its own motivations and world-views. The following are obviously can not be complete or accurate, but are merely intended to lend a basic understanding of the differences between our three distinctly important rolls within a company.

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In my experience, the most effective way of looking at the product development process would be to merge all three ideas together:

â??The point of the product development process is to create thoughtful, appropriate, and effective products that are profitable for all parties involved.â??

–Adam

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Industrial designers understand the engineering and manufacturing process well enough to make intelligent broad-stroke ME decisions in their designs, but they also have an understanding of marketing and user needs. In this way ID serves as a bridge between the needs of the user, the corporation, engineering, and manufacturing.

In some companies designers are “extra.” They are considered a “value-add” for something that is primarily either engineering or marketing driven. Increasingly, however, corporations are recognizing that by integrating design into product strategy for all aspects of a program the greater good of the corporation is served. Use of designers should mean more effective communication, yielding better products and product messages, yielding better ROI. I do not espouse that designers are any more important than anyone else in the corporations we serve, but the roll we play in an efficient organization is as important as the Marketing and Engineering components we serve.

If Marketing and/or Engineering feels that ID is an obstacle as opposed to an asset, it’s possible that the ID team is not doing its job. A good ID group should make everyone’s life easier, not harder.

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Designers are often pulled in different directions by the competing interests of other departments in the organization. Our job is to take all of these diverse needs and reconcile them in a way that is appropriate, profitable, and effective. That said, we are not “just” administrators of other people’s needs: we have our own distinct deliverables and ideals.

When the deliverables of a product are irreconcilable or inconsistent (with each other, design ethics, or the true needs of a user), industrial designers propose revisions and compromises to help create solutions. This is real innovation: using constraints to take advantage of design opportunities. Anyone can come up with a touch-screen PDA: the idea is obvious. It takes a real designer to turn that idea into an elegant reality. (Complain about the iPhone-mania as you might, the engineering and manufacturing quality is unbelievable.)

Progress.

Everyone should seek to leave a better place to live than he was given. This includes designers. Environmentalists’ message seems to be “less, less, less!” But I can not in good conscience live a life of “less” until eventually I’ve spent my entire lifetime doing as little as possible. Designers should focus on creating “more” of what is good, and turning what is bad into good. “Less” is fundamentally negative.

That said, designers seek progress. We seek to work with corporations to progress the interests of shareholders, marketers, salespeople, accountants, engineers, factory workers, customers, and consumers alike. Our job is not to overcome these people as obstacles: it is to enrich them as teammates.

about adam: Adam O'Hern is an industrial design consultant specializing in visual brand languages, and has designed products ranging from laptops to power tools, classroom toys to bathroom fixtures, and robots to lint rollers. He has published with 3DWorld Magazine, CGTuts+, and Luxology, and works with Josh Mings of SolidSmack.com on EngineerVsDesigner.com.