Friday, August 7, 2009

The Cultures of Design

In this month´s issue of Connect, the newsletter of the Design Management Institute (DMI), Steve Portigal outlines several archetypes or Cultures of Design. These archetypes respond to the classical choice between design processes based on a strong internal vision versus those centered around the customer.

The Squeaky Wheel and The Cult of Personality archetypes are those in which one individual strongly influences the design outcome. Portigal mentions Apple or Dyson as examples of these archetypes.

Although many organizations claim to have a Uncover New Needs and Solve Them approach most of the times they are just implementing literally what customers ask under a User-Pleasing archetype.

Portigal´s last archetype is The Department of Committee Meetings, in which there can be room for the customer´s voice although most of the times is the squeaky wheel approach the one taking over.

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