Transformation design
Encyclopedia
In broad terms, transformation design is a human-centered, interdisciplinary process that seeks to create desirable and sustainable changes in behavior and form – of individuals, systems and organizations – often for socially progressive ends.
It is a multi-stage, iterative process applied to big, complex issues – often, but not limited to, social issues.
Its practitioners examine problems holistically rather than reductively to understand relationships as well as components to better frame the challenge. They then prototype small-scale systems – composed of objects, services, interactions and experiences – that support people and organizations in achievement of a desired change. Successful prototypes are then scaled.
Because transformation design is about applying design skills in non-traditional territories, it often results in non-traditional design outputs.3 Projects have resulted in the creation of new roles, new organizations, new systems and new policies. These designers are just as likely to shape a job description, as they are a new product.3
This emerging field draws from a variety of design disciplines - service design
, user-centered design
, participatory design
, concept design, information design
, industrial design
, graphic design
, systems design
, interactive design, experience design
- as well as non-design disciplines including cognitive psychology
and perceptual psychology
, linguistics
, cognitive science
, architecture
, haptics
, information architecture
, ethnography
, storytelling
and heuristics.
This move was in response to Prime Minister Tony Blair’s desire to have public services “redesigned around the needs of the user, the patients, the passenger, the victim of crime.”3
The RED team, led by Hilary Cottam, studied these big, complex problems to determine how design thinking and design techniques could help government rethink the systems and structures within public services and possibly redesign them from beginning to end.3
Between 2004 and 2006, the RED team, in collaboration with many other people and groups, developed techniques, processes and outputs that were able to “transform” social issues such as preventing illness, managing chronic illnesses, senior citizen care, rural transportation, energy conservation, re-offending prisoners and public education.
Because transformation design tackles complex issues involving many stakeholders and components, more expertise beyond the user and the designer is always required. People such as, but not limited to, policy makers, sector analysts, psychologists, economists, private businesses, government departments and agencies, front-line workers and academics are invited to participate in the entire design process - from problem definition and solution development.6
With so many points-of-view brought into the process, transformation designers are not always ‘designers.’ Instead, they often play the role of moderator. Though varying methods of participation and co-creation, these moderating designers create hands-on, collaborative workshops (a.k.a. charrette
) that make the design process accessible to the non-designers.
Ideas from workshops are rapidly prototyped and beta-tested in the real world with a group of real end users. Their experience with and opinions of the prototypes are recorded and fed back into the workshops and development of the next prototype.
2. http://www.designcouncil.org.uk/ Design Council's homepage
3. http://www.designcouncil.info/mt/RED/transformationdesign/TransformationDesignFinalDraft.pdf White Paper published by RED which discusses transformation design
4. http://www.designcouncil.info/mt/RED/transformationdesign/ RED's website page which talks about transformation design
5. http://www.torinoworlddesigncapital.it/portale/en/content.php?sezioneID=10 Interview with Hilary Cottam at World Design Capital
6. http://www.hilarycottam.com/html/RED_Paper%2001%20Health_Co-creating_services.pdf Whitepaper on co-creation
7. The Experience Economy, B.J. Pine and J. Gilmore, Harvard Business School Press 1999. Book discussing the economic value and importance of companies offering transformations
8. The Support Economy, S. Zuboff and J. Maxmin, Viking Press 2002. Book discussing the need for companies and governments to realign themselves with how people live
It is a multi-stage, iterative process applied to big, complex issues – often, but not limited to, social issues.
Its practitioners examine problems holistically rather than reductively to understand relationships as well as components to better frame the challenge. They then prototype small-scale systems – composed of objects, services, interactions and experiences – that support people and organizations in achievement of a desired change. Successful prototypes are then scaled.
Because transformation design is about applying design skills in non-traditional territories, it often results in non-traditional design outputs.3 Projects have resulted in the creation of new roles, new organizations, new systems and new policies. These designers are just as likely to shape a job description, as they are a new product.3
This emerging field draws from a variety of design disciplines - service design
Service design
Service design is the activity of planning and organizing people, infrastructure, communication and material components of a service in order to improve its quality and the interaction between service provider and customers....
, user-centered design
User-centered design
In broad terms, user-centered design or pervasive usability is a design philosophy and a process in which the needs, wants, and limitations of end users of a product are given extensive attention at each stage of the design process...
, participatory design
Participatory design
Participatory design is an approach to design attempting to actively involve all stakeholders in the design process in order to help ensure the product designed meets their needs and is usable. The term is used in a variety of fields e.g...
, concept design, information design
Information design
Information design is the skill and practice of preparing information so people can use it with efficiency and effectiveness. Where the data is complex or unstructured, a visual representation can express its meaning more clearly to the viewer....
, industrial design
Industrial design
Industrial design is the use of a combination of applied art and applied science to improve the aesthetics, ergonomics, and usability of a product, but it may also be used to improve the product's marketability and production...
, graphic design
Graphic design
Graphic design is a creative process – most often involving a client and a designer and usually completed in conjunction with producers of form – undertaken in order to convey a specific message to a targeted audience...
, systems design
Systems design
Systems design is the process of defining the architecture, components, modules, interfaces, and data for a system to satisfy specified requirements. One could see it as the application of systems theory to product development...
, interactive design, experience design
Experience design
Experience design is the practice of designing products, processes, services, events, and environments with a focus placed on the quality of the user experience and culturally relevant solutions, with less emphasis placed on increasing and improving functionality of the design...
- as well as non-design disciplines including cognitive psychology
Cognitive psychology
Cognitive psychology is a subdiscipline of psychology exploring internal mental processes.It is the study of how people perceive, remember, think, speak, and solve problems.Cognitive psychology differs from previous psychological approaches in two key ways....
and perceptual psychology
Perceptual psychology
Perceptual psychology is a subfield of cognitive psychology that is concerned specifically with the pre-conscious innate aspects of the human cognitive system: perception....
, linguistics
Linguistics
Linguistics is the scientific study of human language. Linguistics can be broadly broken into three categories or subfields of study: language form, language meaning, and language in context....
, cognitive science
Cognitive science
Cognitive science is the interdisciplinary scientific study of mind and its processes. It examines what cognition is, what it does and how it works. It includes research on how information is processed , represented, and transformed in behaviour, nervous system or machine...
, architecture
Architecture
Architecture is both the process and product of planning, designing and construction. Architectural works, in the material form of buildings, are often perceived as cultural and political symbols and as works of art...
, haptics
Haptic communication
Haptic communication is the means by which people and other animals communicate via touching. Touch, or the haptic sense, is extremely important for humans; as well as providing information about surfaces and textures it is a component of nonverbal communication in interpersonal relationships, and...
, information architecture
Information Architecture
Information architecture is the art of expressing a model or concept of information used in activities that require explicit details of complex systems. Among these activities are library systems, Content Management Systems, web development, user interactions, database development, programming,...
, ethnography
Ethnography
Ethnography is a qualitative method aimed to learn and understand cultural phenomena which reflect the knowledge and system of meanings guiding the life of a cultural group...
, storytelling
Storytelling
Storytelling is the conveying of events in words, images and sounds, often by improvisation or embellishment. Stories or narratives have been shared in every culture as a means of entertainment, education, cultural preservation and in order to instill moral values...
and heuristics.
History
Though academics have written about the economic value of and need for transformations over the years7,8, its practice first emerged in 2004 when The Design Council, the UK’s national strategic body for design, formed RED: a self proclaimed “do-tank” challenged to bring design thinking to the transformation of public services.1This move was in response to Prime Minister Tony Blair’s desire to have public services “redesigned around the needs of the user, the patients, the passenger, the victim of crime.”3
The RED team, led by Hilary Cottam, studied these big, complex problems to determine how design thinking and design techniques could help government rethink the systems and structures within public services and possibly redesign them from beginning to end.3
Between 2004 and 2006, the RED team, in collaboration with many other people and groups, developed techniques, processes and outputs that were able to “transform” social issues such as preventing illness, managing chronic illnesses, senior citizen care, rural transportation, energy conservation, re-offending prisoners and public education.
Process
Transformation design, like user-centered design, starts from the perspective of the end user. Designers spend a great deal of time not only learning how users currently experience the system and how they want to experience the system, but also co-creating with them the designed solutions.Because transformation design tackles complex issues involving many stakeholders and components, more expertise beyond the user and the designer is always required. People such as, but not limited to, policy makers, sector analysts, psychologists, economists, private businesses, government departments and agencies, front-line workers and academics are invited to participate in the entire design process - from problem definition and solution development.6
With so many points-of-view brought into the process, transformation designers are not always ‘designers.’ Instead, they often play the role of moderator. Though varying methods of participation and co-creation, these moderating designers create hands-on, collaborative workshops (a.k.a. charrette
Charrette
A charrette , is often Anglicized to charette and sometimes called a design charrette. It consists of an intense period of design activity.-Charrettes in general:...
) that make the design process accessible to the non-designers.
Ideas from workshops are rapidly prototyped and beta-tested in the real world with a group of real end users. Their experience with and opinions of the prototypes are recorded and fed back into the workshops and development of the next prototype.
Sources
1. http://www.designcouncil.info/RED/ RED's homepage2. http://www.designcouncil.org.uk/ Design Council's homepage
3. http://www.designcouncil.info/mt/RED/transformationdesign/TransformationDesignFinalDraft.pdf White Paper published by RED which discusses transformation design
4. http://www.designcouncil.info/mt/RED/transformationdesign/ RED's website page which talks about transformation design
5. http://www.torinoworlddesigncapital.it/portale/en/content.php?sezioneID=10 Interview with Hilary Cottam at World Design Capital
6. http://www.hilarycottam.com/html/RED_Paper%2001%20Health_Co-creating_services.pdf Whitepaper on co-creation
7. The Experience Economy, B.J. Pine and J. Gilmore, Harvard Business School Press 1999. Book discussing the economic value and importance of companies offering transformations
8. The Support Economy, S. Zuboff and J. Maxmin, Viking Press 2002. Book discussing the need for companies and governments to realign themselves with how people live