Design is [Vision] is a monthly speaker series focusing on the future of design and creativity. Every public talk is based on a theme, and consequently, the series highlights a wider range of perspectives on everything from human-centered design to VR and ethics.
Designers have been helping define the future by envisioning and crafting product experiences. This is done in a number of ways, whether it is by helping to create a strategic product vision through storytelling or through insights-driven, human-centered design. Effective product strategy requires the ability to define a vision that actively works alongside business and technology to design experiences users want in the face of behavioural and computational change. Designers articulate abstract ideas and give them form by reconciling meaning usernames with business goals and advanced technologies. Data may persuade people till some extent, but it doesn’t inspire them to act in the way stories do. A product that serves as a tangible artifact that provides teams the 10000 foot view and aligns them around a shared Northstar to inspire innovation.
Design Is [Vision]
Visioning is the process of evaluating and creating oneness around a product narrative, and it can be harnessed as a tool to align teams toward a north star. When grasped effectively, visioning encourages proactive innovation that displays across products, teams, and companies. In this talk, each speaker presents their own examples through experiences to illustrate how visioning strengthened products at their respective companies.
In tech, the concurrence of repetitive progress is a strong motivator. The mantra “release early, release often” promises the endless ability to build and mend, or add and reunite, as a product grows toward its potential. In contrast, speakers from Google, Airbnb, and Wolff Olins describe the benefits of shifting one’s perspective to see the full context and future potential of a product more clearly.
Highlights of the Show
Building Meaning Through Storytelling
Ratna Desai explained product visioning; utilizing storytelling to advance business strategies. Examples of filmmaking, Francis Ford Coppola’s Godfather was given to signify the importance of storytelling. Lately, a comparison is drawn between storytelling and product visioning. This approach of building meaning true storytelling helps in designing products. Designers should always actively observe, listen and refine their solutions as the narrative plays out against the cultural backdrop. Rather than sticking to a single intention, we should constantly co-create and reset our expectations of products. We, being the designers, are blessed with tools to understand human behaviour and envision design solutions that make business outcomes tangible.
Using Visioning to Reach Goals (Steve Selzer)
Fluidity
According to Forest Young, in visioning, goal posts can be set, but ultimately en route to that goal post, and during that journey, we may deviate and pivot away from it and it may no longer be relevant. He used examples like typography and photography. He also emphasized the failure stories through examples.
The show was concluded with a Q & A session, involving all the three speakers.
Conclusion
Envisioning shows us a way for working towards the future. It’s good to envision, but sticking to it blindly ignoring the consequences isn’t right. Hence whenever needed, it’s completely fine to change our routes towards that vision or even altering the existing vision. After achieving a certain vision, we shouldn’t stop and keep going. After all, it’s all about the process of connecting dots.
Bibliography
Youtube.com. 2021. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ZVR07vlj6o
Google Design. 2021. Video: Design Is [Vision] – Library – Google Design. https://design.google/library/video-design-vision/
