1–10 of 36 posts
So I was thinking today, why does it seem that the equation is always technical > business/marketing. Why is designer never a part of this equation for a startup founding team.
Especially looking at Apple, designers are the core of their business.
Interested in the discussion...
EDIT: To clarify, design means product and user interface design.
A strong sense of design is a crucial attribute in any product maker, which would generally include every member of a startup's founding team, whether technical or business/marketing.
It's less important to have a visual/graphic designer in the founding team, and most startups outsource this type of work until they're big enough to warrant a dedicated resource.
It's worth noting that in the AirBnB founding team, Brian and Joe are both industrial designers, with Nate the only hacker.
It's probably helpful to distinguish between designer in the visual design or graphic design sense, and in the product maker sense. A strong sense of design is a crucial attribute in any product maker, which would generally include every member of a startup's founding team, whether technical or business/marketing. It's less important to have a visual/graphic designer in the founding team, and most startups outsource…
because "technical" encloses both "programming" and "design" (which by the way I don't think is as strategic as "Interaction Design") in the same way that "business" encloses "organization", "marketing" and "sales" (and possibly much more)
Aside from that, there are a lot of founders who have some level of design skills -- they just also happen to do other things, since that's how startups work. When you have limited resources, having a dedicated designer is generally going to be inefficient (unless design/UX are crucial to your particular startup in the early stages).
Also, non-designer founders have a lot of options regarding design -- they can outsource it, find/use a template, hack together some html/css, etc.
because "technical" encloses both "programming" and "design" (which by the way I don't think is as strategic as "Interaction Design") in the same way that "business" encloses "organization", "marketing" and "sales" (and possibly much more)
Technical encloses design? I always thought it was just the programming. By design, I mean product and user interface design.
By "design" at Apple, they mean "how the product work" — I think Jonathan Ive is to credit for that sentence. And Jonathan Ive is an industrial designer: he's not just here to make things look cute, he's there to make sure a product works well and is enjoyable to use.
In a start-up, especially a software one, "how the product work" is responsibility of the developer(s).
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Technical encloses design? I always thought it was just the programming. By design, I mean product and user interface design.
> Technical encloses design? By "design" at Apple, they mean "how the product work" — I think Jonathan Ive is to credit for that sentence. And Jonathan Ive is an industrial designer: he's not just here to make things look cute, he's there to make sure a product works well and is enjoyable to use. In a start-up, especially a software one, "how the product work" is responsibility of the developer(s).
He works out how it will look, how we will interact with it, how it will be presented, and why. [I'm generalising and condensing though
It does seem that the tech-world lags behind in terms of the role of the designer, when compared with that of Industrial Design for example.
Take IDEO. An Industrial Design consultancy at heart who over the last 10 years have evolved into a consultancy that focus's more broadly on innovation, design thinking, strategy and designing businesses.
Whereas once upon a time an Industrial Designer's job would be to 'skin' a product and bridge the gap between marketing and engineering. The Industrial Designers role at leading design focused now companies now play a more prominent part in the development of business. Providing a divergent-thought design led process to tackle problems surrounding the product and service.
Web designers are yet to take take this step. And for the most part focus on the designing of pixels as opposed to the designing of businesses.
Andrew Chen breaks down IDEO's philosophy of human led design in which they argue that there's 3 perspectives when developing a service, which for me really sums up the true value a design-founder can hold. That of Viability, Feasibility and Desirability. In which:
Viability = Business focus (marketing, finance) Feasibility = Engineering focus (technologies, agile etc.) Desirability = Design focus (customers, aesthetics, etc.)
IDEO design from a desirability focus which means that the user comes first, everything is done from their eyes with a keen focus on usability and aesthetics in result creating a product that is highly revelvant and desirable to the user.
It's a great article, read more here: http://andrewchenblog.com/2009/12/04/does-every-startup-need...
I think more and more in the tech-world are starting to realise this, both designers and non-designers. Just look at the current opportunities for UX guys.
But in my opinion what we really need is more design founders and encourage more designers to spend less time on dribbble.com and more time studying the in's and out's of business.