Month: February 2010

Industrial Design

Debugging Healthcare by Design

By Delphine Hirasuna |

Hospitals are notorious for making people sick. In the U.S. alone, the government estimate says that one in ten hospital patients catches a hospital-borne infection, and such infections contribute to about 90,000 deaths in the nation annually. What’s particularly disturbing is that studies have shown that one-third of these infections are considered preventable. Thorough sanitizing of surfaces, for instance, has been effective against staph infections and gastroenteritis.

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Interviews

Another Lesson by Milton Glaser

By Delphine Hirasuna |

What can we say, we have always been inspired by Milton. He is a born teacher that always inspires. In 2006, Chris from C. Coy shot this short video of Milton Glaser sketching a portrait of William Shakespeare and musing about how the act of drawing makes him conscious of what he is looking at and focuses his mind on the world around him. In addition to the thoughtfulness of his comments, it’s impressive to see that he draws confidently without ever pausing or erasing — or losing his train of thought.

Publishing

iPad Raises Questions, No Answers

By Delphine Hirasuna |

Sports Illustrated and Wired are the latest magazines to demonstrate a prototype of how its online content could work on an iPad-like tablet. While dazzled by the possibilities, as someone in the communications design field, I started wondering about all kinds of practical production matters. This may seem silly but I wondered if reporters and designers would be “joined at the hip” creatively, assigned to sit side-by-side, desk-to-desk, in the editorial office and work in unison to produce “content”? It used to be that editorial and art departments were separate entities and sequential processes. And the interactive staff often was not even in the same part of the building. Now, more than ever, visual, interactive and editorial content have converged. How will that change the physical configuration of an editorial office?

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Design Quizzes

Is Your Company Traditional or Designful?
Take This Quiz and Find Out.

By Marty Neumeier |

Transformation is in the air. Business leaders across industries are recognizing that “old school” management isn’t up to the task of nonstop innovation. As a result, companies that were once run from the top down are steadily shifting to a more networked style of management in which employees and customers play a greater role in driving innovation. Networked cultures tend to be more creative, more agile, and better able to anticipate the needs of customers.

How do you create a culture of innovation? By recognizing one simple fact: If you want to innovate, you’ve
got to design. Design and design thinking are the tools that create new products, new services, new business
models, new markets, and new industries. The best way to leverage innovation—as outlined in my latest book—is to build a “designful company”.

To find out where you are on the culture curve, take this simple test: Share a total of 10 points across each of the
10 pairs below. For example, if your company is more siloed than collaborative, you might score it 6 and 4.
When you’ve finished, add up the two columns to measure your progress. If your totals come out to 60 and 40, for example, you could say that you’re 40% along the path to an innovative culture.

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Sustainability

Shedding Light on Light Bulbs

By Delphine Hirasuna |

Since Thomas Edison invented the incandescent light bulb in 1879, designers have often used the familiar pear-shaped product as a graphic device to represent a “bright idea.” Think again, designers, because the European Union restricted the sale of incandescent light bulbs in favor of compact fluorescent light (CFL) bulbs in 2009. It also targeted the phase out of Halogen bulbs by 2016. Cuba and Venezuela actually started phasing out incandescent lights in 2005. Other nations have scheduled phase out plans – Australia, Ireland and Switzerland in 2009; Argentina, Italy, Russia and the UK by 2011, and Canada in 2012. A late adopter, the United States will begin phasing out incandescent lights in 2012.

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