Not a year in review, because it’s nearly February…so it’s more an annual post! (Still with the long titles though)

Jiminy wowsers! It’s been a long time since I last published a post here, huh?!. That’s not to say I haven’t been doing, thinking and writing design. In fact, I’d say just about every week I come to desonance to reference something I’ve written or thought through here. So it’s serving exactly the purpose I’d hoped.   : )

This isn’t quite a “year in review” post – I’m just in the mood for some writin’ and mullin’.

Some writin’

I have written a number of pieces on design at my company blog, DMA with my biz partner Justin Barrie. The ones I reckon have relevance on desonance are:

Technical Explorations

• Innovation: Two Perspectives – With Video, With Slides only (July 2013)
• Breaking down users of services: User Typologies (November 2012)
• Visualisation progression: Loving the sketch (August 2012)

Creative Exercises

• Creative Boost 2: Playing in a different design discipline to learn more about my own. (April 2013)
• Creative Boost 1: Visualising and pattern making (August 2012)

Industry Exploration

• In the vein of my just shut up post, we spoke and explored the shades of grey

Also, pretty freakin’ cooly and thanks to this blog I’ve been published in a number of publications

My Customer Experience Map

• Airport Operations (Third Edition) – Norman Ashford, HP Martin Stanton, Clifton Moore, Pierre Coutu, John Beasley. My Customer Experience Map was used to illustrate the value of mapping customer experience.
• Designing for Behaviour Change: Applying Psychology and Behavioral Economics – Stephen Wendel

My illustration of service

• Interactieve marketing, 2e editie (incl. XTRA) – Marenna van Reijsen, Theo Zweers en Huub Janssen

Let that be a lesson to the kids out there to just put it out there.

Some mullin’

Two things that have preoccupied me most about design for a wee while now:

1. Professionally, the notion of service design to focus internal service deliverers (such as IT, management) and arm them for change, from the inside-out. At DMA, we explore this in many a-conversation, and have been doing it with a couple of clients – to great effect! It’s exciting, and I believe it’s a really cool, decidedly un-sexy way to use design to effect real change. Engine are the only others in the service design space I see consciously talking about this. To me, it’s the notion of building a platform for design to be sustainable (which was part of the discussion I had with Joe Heaphy so many many yeas ago). And there’s something that resonates with business. And it’s super fun if you like dealing with complexity.
2. Personally, maybe this one hasn’t excited me, but it has given me pause to accept. My creative thinking process is one of introversion. Introversion and reference (ie. I look up stuff – everytime). I often feel slow – in both the conceptualising and in the creative opportunity when teamed with an extroverted, quick and smart partner. This is not an enjoyable state. But it just means I need to find that solitary space early or later in the day to work through things. I get there. Or sometimes I have to say “I just need some time to think this through”… or words that effect. One night I was so frustrated with my self-defined “slowness” I drew it out. That was when I realised, it’s ok. It’s just different. I really like the place me and my brain can get to. And return to.

Hmmm, what to end on …. Here are some pictures I found on my phone that represent some creative, design-y, worky, inspiry stuff. See you sporadically in 2014!