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Findings Thoughts

Design is no walk in the park, design is tough work

„Design is no walk in the park, design is tough work“

Hartmut Esslinger, Founder frog design, 2012

Dealing with the corporate world since the 1980s, he has got some very interesting and forward-thinking ideas – which most corporations in 2020 have either still not understood or not achieved yet.

„Designers and creatives on the executive board and supervisory board!“

Hartmut Esslinger, Founder frog design, 2012

More stories and wisdom in the full interview video shot on the Stuttgart TV Tower in July 2012 (in German though)…

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Findings Thoughts

Design = intent

And who put it best? Kurt Weidemann, a renowned German graphic designer and typographer:

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Findings

Are you asking enough from your design leaders?

“[Logitech’s] design-driven transformation between 2013 and 2019 saw the company’s market value increase roughly sevenfold.”

“Companies that excel at design grow revenues and shareholder returns at nearly twice the rate of their industry peers.”

“Research shows that bold, user-centric strategies correlate strongly with higher financial results.”

“The user and market insights gleaned through this redesign process helped fuel Lyft’s strategic shift from a provider of rides to a portal enabling people to move through cities in multimodal fashion.”

“[…] it is best to place the design leader in a function that has a mandate to contribute to strategy and also with an end-to-end view of the organization.”

“These [design leaders] have a vague mandate to improve customer experience but have nothing more than their own powers of persuasion to convince other business leaders to get involved. The best companies give their CDOs a mandate and the authority to deliver on it.”

… and I’m only half through the article! So many insights and strong statements in just one article. Gold!

https://www.mckinsey.com/business-functions/mckinsey-design/our-insights/are-you-asking-enough-from-your-design-leaders

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Findings

Rethinking iTunes

interface.fh-potsdam.de/itunes

iTunes, divided into 15 single-purpose apps… Splitting up the monstrum is really overdue, if you ask me, Apple! ;-) And this is indeed a very nice project with even nicer results! (Must’ve been a hell lot of work!)

Though I don’t agree to or understand all of their decisions…

  • I’d rather disagree to split iTunes into that many apps. E.g. to organize and listen to my music on my computer, why do I need to have 4 apps: Albums, iGear, MusicFinder and Simplay? The decision which app to open to simply search for a track or album (and then listen to it) is really hard.
  • Do I really need to make a decision for an app if I want to listen to a whole album vs. a single track? Why? I find it rather limiting and patronising if I cannot mix albums and single tracks in one playlist – in one app.
  • Push “simplifies the sync process”, Sync is “sync (and space) management” and  AppControl organizes apps – and syncs them as well. But apps only. Hmmm…
  • Why is Apple Tags Windows-only?
  • Someone forgot iTunes U. :-)

Danke @andreasmaks!

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Findings

“We are really just a bunch of people working on the same thing.”

It’s easy to define and limit ourselves into the roles we have as job titles. When it comes down to it, we are really just a bunch of people working on the same thing.

Charlie Deets on Medium

… and the rest of this article is surely worth a read as well.

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Findings

Pictures of people scanning QR codes

picturesofpeoplescanningqrcodes.tumblr.com/

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Findings

The state of in-car UX

In his article on medium.com Geoff Teehan sharply and aptly describes the quality of in-car digital user interfaces, especially the central control units in the center console.

A lot of work ahead there… ?

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Findings

What is code?

This is real. A Scrum Master in ninja socks has come into your office and said, “We’ve got to budget for apps.” Should it all go pear-shaped, his career will be just fine.

“What is code?”, Paul Ford in Bloomberg Business

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Findings

Brutally Honest Job Titles

“Social Media Strategist”
=
Person with the Twitter password