Consistently describing design

I’ve been writing about the design process, suggesting that different models can give different perspectives on what designers do when we design. I’ve suggested that design is a process of translation and balance — transforming ideas from abstract ideas to concrete instantiations. In my last post I used the metaphor of scaffolding. I suggested that we can introduce supporting structures within the design process to create space to do this translation.

Why am I doing this? I’d like to arrive at a model of the design process that can work from abstract “big picture” to a “concrete” level of design activities. The double diamond is a fine simplification of design — but it doesn’t answer questions about what to do next when you’re stuck in a design project. I think an effective model could help you sell the “idea” of design to non-designers and also help you justify (and navigate) the process that follows that sales job.

I want a way of not just describing what design is or and what it can do for an organisation, but also provide a map for people to follow to do design. The consistency in what you say and what people see about design will aid understanding and credibility. To achieve this, I think I need a coherent set of descriptions at different levels of abstraction.

An aside about why metaphors matter

Humans have analogical minds — we make sense through comparison. We compare something we know well with something new. We use comparison as a way of understanding the new situation and we draw analogies between different levels of abstraction when we don’t have direct equivalents.

The affect of metaphors and using them consistently is noticeable when you consider organisational culture. The dominant metaphors within an organisation shape the culture. Is your organisation full of targets, missions, chains of command? This militaristic language might have an impact. Is your organisation an organism, an engine, a family… each of these will affect the way it feels to work within the organisation. We also feel the disconnect between “espoused” metaphors and “lived” ones. If leaders talk about the organisation as being a “family” and they act like it’s a machine or engine, the disconnect is likely to be felt.

The same is true for the way we think about and communicate design. If we don’t move beyond abstract formulations, it’s harder to convince people of the tangible benefits, and practitioners will spend more time filling in the gaps at the bottom of the ladder of abstraction with concrete methods. When these methods don’t ladder up to the abstract model that we’ve used to talk about design to stakeholders, the dissonance undermines the case we make for design and makes it more difficult for less experienced designers to develop a coherent practice.

Back to my metaphors

I like the metaphor of scaffolding because it suggests a sort of skeletal support structure. It’s not over-engineered. But it does introduce some stability. Jason Hobbs has also written about information architecture in the design process providing a scaffolding-like structure. He also references Richard Rumelt and “points of leverage”. Levers are powerful because they find a fulcrum and use the mechanics that this focal point provides to exert more force than you would otherwise be able to generate.

So — I like the idea of fixed points within the design process. These are the anchor points between which you can construct the structure of a design process. The anchor points might be deadlines, deliverables generated from a specific tool you favour; they might be landmarks that help collaborators all orient towards similar goals; they might be checkpoints that prompt reflective practice and evaluation.

Design as a temporary structure (the tent)

In the model I shared last week I introduced junction points within the scaffolding-like structure. I didn’t really develop the idea of leverage. In my metaphor these points serve as both landmarks and junctions which support a structure. I pictured this model a little like a tent.

The lines of the structure mark a series of boundaries — and create separate “spaces”. There is the larger structure of the entire design process — marked by the outer, thicker continuous lines. Through framing activities we set the boundaries around which we’ll construct our design process. The structure within (the thinner broken lines) demarcates different stages or processes that need to be completed as part of design.

The tent metaphor gives me a lot. The triangular structures means I can still invoke the divergence and convergence of other models from Banathy through to the double diamond. A tent is placed onto an existing foundation — it works best when this is stable and level — so the analogy gives you a chance to talk about context and framing activities which surround and define the design process. And by making the lines within the structure broken I start to explore the relationship between the spaces/activities within design and the boundaries between them.

But design is all about trade-offs and managing variables to improve outcomes — so what happens if we explore another metaphor…

Summary of the “tent” metaphor:

• Points of anchorage (more so than leverage although the two ideas are quite close to each other)
• Placement of the structure/process within a context — Framing
• Specific activities/regions/spaces within a broader category of “design”
• Proximity and the potential of “movement” between these spaces
• Angular structures to evoke divergence and convergence — also seen in diamonds and kites

Design as a healthy organism — a cellular system metaphor

In the last post I acknowledged that the relationship between my “equation” version of design (problem = ideas = intent = experiments = experiences) and the tent/pyramid isn’t immediately obvious. I now think that I create the structure of the tent by elevating parts of the equation, literally creating “space to explore” as I extend the equation across another axis. But I worried the “tent” structure could be a source of inconsistency, so I returned to the equation to explore another axis alongside the “temporal”/sequential ordering that the equation represents well.

I created a map of the design process containing different “cells.” I labelled these with different types of activities, processes or products made during design, moving down the ladder of abstraction to categorise the actual tools a designer might use.

The cells mark different activities or types of thinking. As you move right, more people experience the design. The higher up the structure you get the more concrete things become. The “activities” are drawn from research into the value that design and design thinking can bring to complex problem solving. They also reflect the multidisciplinary integration of design with other disciplines and capabilities within the BBC.

There are multiple ways you could label and categorise this structure — I know because I’ve done it. I’ve considered how and when designers will be focused on collaboration, testing and developing ideas with the team vs. when we start to look outside and engage in an external perspective.

I then tried categorise the different activities — I’m searching for a consistent model that can operate at different levels of abstraction — so that I can move from describing the design process in broad terms and then move down to specific tools and toolsets that can be employed to ensure design makes the most valuable contribution that it can.

This idea of identifying toolsets and the activities used during design is appealing. But I’m not convinced that the “cells” model is better than the “tent” at the metaphorical level. In the past I’ve developed this type of model and by rotating it I’ve managed to introduce the divergence and convergence of the diamond shape — Dan Ramsden’s Fish of Design. But in this case it results in a structure that looks unbalanced and leaning backwards, not a useful visual representation of what design is and how it works.

Summary of the “labelled cells” metaphor:

• The granularity of specific activities is useful to suggest tools
• Breaking the design process down across time and levels of fidelity is useful (See John V Willshire — Fidelity, Non-linearity, and the Double Diamond)
• This more granular level of description provides a checklist or set of heuristics to judge design projects — identifying unpopulated regions within the map might reveal how to unlock progress and what to do next.

Conclusions

Analysing the strengths and weaknesses of each approach leads to a further evolution of the model/system as a whole. The equation provides the highest level of abstraction and introduces the points of leverage that design creates for an organisation.

We can use these points of leverage to “lift” the later elements of the equation and create structure and space for design to operate within — we fold the equation back on itself — sort of zigzag-like to create this space. This is useful to describe how design needs dedicated time, space and resources to realise the advantages it is capable of producing.

Each time we design. we’re metaphorically “putting up the tent,” creating a temporary but reliable structure to contain focused activity. The location of the “tent” is our problem space and the tent is the “frame” or structure we construct to contain (and constrain) the problem — bringing some things inside and outside of our concern. The interplay between the internal activities undertaken during design and the external realities that affect and are affected by those activities is important.

Once we have the pyramid, we can describe the spaces inside and outside the structure at different levels of detail depending on who we’re talking to. We might use broad categories with stakeholders. For designers we might delve deeper into more granular descriptions or even specific tools or methods.

This is the model I’m going to be exploring next — and building the next lowest levels of the model — which I think will be a toolset of canvas.