Tilt

What a great talk! On August 19th we had a chance to really connect and talk openly and candidly about what is going on in our industry. Conclusions were definitely made and we were able to share a lot of our ideas as a group. Elaine, Eric B, Eric K and myself were the primary group. We had a few people come in and out, but we didn’t include any other team members.

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This Month’s Talk:

When: September 16th, 2010 at 6pm EST, 5pm CST, 3pm PST
Where: http://www.tokbox.com/tiltstudioinc/ddsc
Topic: “Design Tithing: Making a living, finding time to make a difference”

• How do you balance billable hours and/or meeting company deadlines with working on issues that matter to you
• Is it feasible to simply earn a living doing what you are passionate about? (How much does a living constitute?)
• Who does this most effectively in the industry that you know of?
• If you could find a utopian balance, what would it be?

Here is my rather spotty dialogue that I recapped. Hopefully some of it is interesting! We are seeking ways to record the conversation in the coming months, but for now you get my recaps!

#1 What does it mean to become Obsolete and is that really happening?

Elaine: 5 year undergrad with an architectural degree. Working in Baltimore at Gensler Baltimore and then being from Oklahoma. Special projects and urban issues on how architects can be apart of cross-disciplines. As architects we are basically getting phased out as things change and grow. Takes a special client that can see how this can be. What we bring a very valuable experience. Looking at it as more than just a bottom-level design and not just an overall cost. Competing against in-house architects and then just stamp stuff.

Not just an architect anymore you are filling more roles.

http://mediatedspace.wordpress.com/2010/04/14/thawed-debates-on-design-recording/

Eric B.: Do you think that one way to change this into a way to refurbish current structures? Especially in a downturn.

Elaine: Sustainable solution isn’t building a new building, its reusing an old space. Not possible as often as we would like. But really in the end it comes down to education. Quality of life, sustainability.

Eric K: Doesn’t seem like there are fewer opportunities, but I think that there are more. Struggle with what I do and not what it was when I started. Use more words than anything else. Invent more terms to see how we can work. We will evolve to a spot where we have more terms and things that we do.

Rachael: So, you have really taken on the role as manager and business owner?

Eric K: Not really removed from the process, but now I am working with the client side of things. Clients just are very interesting.

Rachael: I asked Elaine as the 3D designer, Eric K as the digital version, Eric B as the educational version.

Elaine: My title has become Design Strategist and those are the people that go beyond design and think about it as a tool and thinking about it in terms of a process and how it works.

Eric B: Designing thinking role, maybe? The reason I brought it up, is that Donald Norman post about Design thinking and strategy is that it is overwhelmingly selling better services. Its a Racket. Don’t agree with it, but found it to be something interesting. http://www.core77.com/blog/columns/design_thinking_a_useful_myth_16790.asp

#2 Question: What is our role now?

Eric K: He was saying that it its how all people solve problems and for us to take ownership of this it is how to make things exclusive. We think that it is a process that

Elaine: Professions that design and solve a problem.

Eric K: Writer was deliberately bating what other people were thinking to drive people to the blog.

Eric B: “Designers just make things pretty” is what he talks about.

Rachael: Question – Do designers just make things pretty?

Eric B: People that don’t want to try to understand what we do, they just call it that.

Eric K: There is a part of what we do that makes things beautiful. We have solved a problem so that there is a solution.

Eric B: We don’t spend a lot of time to qualify what we do to the general public. A lot of it I put the blame on ourselves because we don’t do anything about it.

Eric K: This is a design problem, then. If our clients and the general public don’t believe it than we aren’t doing our job. The first meetings with our clients are about what they will see with us and how the process works. 100 hours minimum.

Elaine: Just the bottom line is the driver. What we see is not about the experience. Clients have a hard time accepting things outside of what they understand. Had a completely different solution and a result than what they had in mind. Clients not trusting the solution that they had conceived already. If you want something done cheaper and faster you have to think outside the box. You have to be freer and more flexible and you end up with things that are bastardized because people don’t want to go back to something. It is always a great client when they take the leap of faith with you.

#1 Topic: Economy and design

Eric B: Kids are getting hired, but just for a lower income. One student opened a Thai restaurant and another opened a vegan restaurant in Austin. What they learned in school as a designer taught them how to plan. They know how to brand. There are a lot of people working in Starbucks, etc. A lot of people working as contractors not just starting their own students. I have to work for a place. They use the process and move beyond it.

Eric K: Last year was horrible, now things are doing better. Shift is a little bit better and we are doing better with it. We are looking at a very good fall, but I turn off the news a lot.

Rachael: Social enterprises and NGO’s starting and happening new sectors being created.

Elaine: People being able to do small things and downsize the machine. Creating new connections and energy and taking advantage of the opportunity and see how we can change. Let’s seize the change.

Eric K: I’m seeing that from a microcosm and how things are skewed. I was able to write a book. This year we are aggressively going after work. Seeing the US feeling it a bit more.

Elaine: Seeing it in my personal world more. A lot of these people that were laid off last year are now creating new things.

Eric K: Watched people creating their own IP and see what is happening. Want to see things like this that will create a designer/client relationship. That would think beyond the hourly client relationship.

Eric B: Similarly to Elaine, I see a lot of people laid off and I see a particular trend in how things are going with only 1 skill set and they are not interested in learning anything else. They are very Myopic. My salary was cut 2% each year and i still feel creative and it doesn’t make me feel less intolerant that I make less money. Glad I have a job. People in academia seem to have trouble with finding jobs. I know a lot of architects that are laid off. Chicago is 18% laid off. Design in print is not as sought after as much anymore.

#3 Question: Do you design ahead of time for pitches?

Eric K: “Hell No!”

Elaine: We went to far with a client on what we were showing them. Architects are getting into more of a secretive competition. Some clients will ask for it, but other people will just show up and have the full sexy rendering. Sometimes we just go over board. Clients want things upfront. Definite minus if you don’t show something. Creating a negative vibe and we are creating competition and giving it all away for free.

Eric K: A while ago a bunch of companies allowed a bunch of designers took on a statement that they were going to do anything like a pitch. For every time that they pitched and the number of hours that were spent on it. For everytime that happened they are subsidized everything that is coming from it. this is a really sucky practice that what everyone is getting paid by. We would never think about giving anything away. We will meet with them for a couple of hours and that’s it.

Elaine: Different in architects is that it is still just an idea, the final document is eventually just a full construction document. Huge leap, which makes it different. Not right in the long run.

Eric K: Since we work in a digital space, it is a semi-dimensional state. It is a little bit distracted for those that are apart of a lower-common denominational projects. We have a rounded project from start to finish. We are kind of immune to worries from clients that are going on.

Eric B: Have a lot of people that are doing this here. So many designers are doing this now. Makes us change whatever we do here. Design Thinking

Rachael: Experience designers, not just designers anymore. So many more of our daily interactions are more experience based.

Elaine: Memory and take away for what we want to take back. Whole experience with layers and make people want to work with as well.

Eric B: Hard sometime for people to understand because they create objects, now the transition is creating something obsolete from happening. Being mediator in the culture. Let’s look at what our design outcomes are going to improve to. If you got offline you might have a great experience shopping without buying. When i was kid I went to Disney world and was always interested in how we wait in line. Ride is 5 minutes, but the waiting is forever.

Eric K: It strikes me that whenever we are going to talk about change the concept is that we would be rendered obsolete. Everytime that we are concerned that the paradigm is shifting but in fact it just becomes something new.

Elaine: Wired mag article on the web being dead. The editor of wired was talking about how it was in its teenage years and now it is growing and changing.

Eric B.: Asked my students what the websites that the students like to look at and it was very minimal. News comes through Facebook and their friends.

Elaine: Someone in there has to be reading something.

Rachael: Read Eric K’s article. http://www.ideasonideas.com/2010/08/dark-forces-are-gathering/

Eric K: Read the Whole Earth Discipline.http://www.amazon.co.uk/Whole-Earth-Discipline-Ecopragmatist-Manifesto/dp/0670021210

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