I was scrolling through the list of speakers for Innovation Explorer and a name caught my eye. It was the name of Matt McBride, VP, Experience Design at SoftServe. I hadn’t heard it before, but I’m glad I did, as Matt turned out to be a wonderful interview subject.
It’s not just a question of sweet talk – Matt is talking from experience. He has more than 15 years of it, working in the design and creative sphere for a number of industries. According to his bio, these include (and are probably not limited to) cross-platform, user-centered digital products, responsive web design systems, design languages, native mobile applications, e-commerce platforms, augmented reality solutions, and cloud-based services, as well as integrated digital marketing and social experiences. Quite a list!
A story about empathy
Matt’s story is not like that of other designers. The key point came early in his career – actually, before it even started, over his first college winter break. It shaped his pursuit of creating design with everyone’s needs in mind. He got into a car accident that limited his mobility. Experiencing a world that has been designed for walking people really opens your eyes to what design without empathy looks like. Consider a simple set of stairs. “They aren’t meant to exclude. But they do because of a lack of consideration,” says Matt. “They are just a solution for a subset of users. An incomplete solution.”
Such incomplete solutions, more or less dramatic, surround us every day. Small fonts, low-contrast website texts, unusable interfaces… So, what is the solution? McBride is certain: “Empathy. The simple consideration and understanding of how others experience our world.” Staying in touch with your users and what their needs are.
[clickToTweet tweet=”‘Consider everyone, and you will make it better for everyone.’ – and more great thoughts on design thinking by @humindesign” quote=”Consider everyone, and you will make it better for everyone.”]
Design thinking: business, users, and technology
Sometimes the most simple questions make for the most interesting answers. So I asked Matt something quite basic: What is design thinking? I hoped for a straight answer and he delivered. “Design thinking is about outcomes…at any scale,” he said. “It’s a problem-solving methodology that applies to any organization.”
It’s actually refreshing to hear design thinking explained in simple and non-threatening terms. There’s nothing too grand about it – it comes down to finding a balance between different elements. “If you are equally considering your business needs, the human desirability of a solution, and the technical cost of that solution, then you are already doing it,” says Matt.
[clickToTweet tweet=”‘The goal is to have business, users, and technology equally represented in every conversation.’ – and more great thoughts on design thinking by @humindesign” quote=”The goal is to have business, users, and technology equally represented in every conversation.”]
Design thinking for all organizations, big and small
If design thinking is as simple as that, does it mean all organizations are equipped for practicing it? Based on his extensive experience, McBride doesn’t seem to find a correlation between size, or industry and design focus. There are challenges, but they are universal: “you see the same patterns of challenges that cross industries, cultures, SMBs, startups, and enterprises”. Those challenges are related to change management.
Design thinking is much more than making your homepage pretty. When implementing the design thinking approach, “you are not only delivering a new end product or service, but you are also changing how they deliver that as an organization.” In big organizations, this is related to changing a lot of ingrained processes quickly. Small organizations are often even less well equipped with implementing new workflows. The myth of the quick-moving startup is just that – a myth.
The companies that are succeeding with design thinking are the ones who know their customers, regardless of size. “Many organizations simply just do not understand their users,” Matt explains. “Or they no longer understand their users because they, as a product or service, have failed to evolve at the pace of their users’ expectations.” So it isn’t size or industry – it’s the very pace of change that’s threatening our success. And to secure that success, we come back to that all-important word: empathy. Understanding users.
Design equals solving problems
“Empathy” sounds like such a strong word, but it all boils down to simply being aware of user needs. We might not always be right, but it’s a viable first step to try to understand them better. “The responsibility falls on the designer to make educated decisions.” But that doesn’t mean design is the sole responsibility of designers. According to Matt, it’s far too important a function to be left just to them: “Design is everyone’s job. Everyone has an obligation to the end user to solve real human problems.”
[clickToTweet tweet=”Design is not ONLY about how it looks, it’s also about how it works in order to solve problems. – and more great thoughts on design thinking by @humindesign” quote=”Design is not ONLY about how it looks, it’s also about how it works in order to solve problems.”]
Reading list
Matt is teaching design thinking to university students, so I wanted to get his recommended reading list. He was happy to oblige, so here’s a full set of titles to kick-start your design thinking journey:
- The Art Of Innovation, by Tom Kelley. A good introduction to design thinking.
- Change by Design by Tim Brown and also his TED Talk on design thinking.
- The Design of Everyday Things and Things That Make Us Smart: Defending Human Attributes In The Age Of The Machine by Donald A. Norman. Two books from The Godfather of UX.
- Program or Be Programmed: Ten Commands for a Digital Age by Douglas Rushkoff. A nice reminder about embracing technology.
- This is Service Design Thinking: Basics, Tools, Cases by Marc Stickdorn. Because design thinking is not just for products.
- Design Sprint: A Practical Guidebook for Building Great Digital Products by Richard Banfield. The design thinking infused, workshop-driven approach that Google Ventures uses for startups.
I will leave you here and start working on my user empathy and problem-solving skills with a good book. If you want to hear more from Matt, check out this great talk he gave recently:
If you want to hear Matt McBride live, join me in Sofia on February 22 for Innovation Explorer – a great event on innovation and design thinking. See you there!
