Experience by Design

Memories are central to our lives, and how we form a sense of who we are as people. How we remember and engage with the past speaks to our identity in the present. Both events good and bad can form deep impressions in our minds, cutting grooves  and building pinnacles that create the topography of our experiences. Low points and high points, trauma and triumphs, all are part of the past brought to present in our memories.But memories are not ours alone to make. Rather, memories can be built, constructed, framed, and recalled in the context of others, society, and culture. We can see this today in American society, where there is a lot of contested territory regarding what is being remembered and how. When we broaden out the voices being represented in these collective memories, the challenge becomes even greater to be inclusive and to negotiate memories in these contested spaces.To explore the creation of memory and place, Julia Beabout from the company Novaby visits the Experience by Design studios. Julia is the CEO and Creative Director at Novaby, and was involved in the Monumental Conversations project in Richmond, VA. The project combined augmented reality with local community institutions to tell different stories about place, history, and memory. She describes herself as “On fire for Fairness”, trying to create engaging experiences that capture the collective memories of community members. ‘Place making’ as she calls it is about co-creation with the community, and then making augmented and virtual memorials to commemorate in ways that are themselves memorable. By doing so, we make environments that are inclusive and representative in a continuous ways as our understanding of who we are evolves.

While we are celebrating Earth Day on April 22nd, it might feel more appropriate to be planning the Earth’s memorial service. Earth Day was founded in 1970 as a way to learn about environmental issues, highlight sustainability of natural resources, and direct our attention to the fragility of our world. In the intervening 52 years, things haven’t gotten much better. Attempts to change our energy production, usage, and pollution have run into the wall of politics, conspiracy theories, and denial. It seems that when we need action the most, it is hardest to come by. Despite people increasingly coming to terms with the reality of climate change, adequate action is still not being taken, leading to worries about it being too late.To help us explore some of these questions, Professor Frans Melissen visits the Experience by Design studios. Frans has spent a career examining not only the impact of people and society on the environment, but also the larger question of sustainable experiences. We talk about the nature of how systems based on profit cannot necessarily act in ways that are environmentally responsible. He tells us about his idea of being a ‘scholactivist’, or combining scholarship with activism. By finding ways to communicate more broadly through new mediums like TikTok, scholars can have a greater impact.

Organizations may often think of change, but they are also often not serious about actually changing. When it comes down to making changes, where the rubber hits the proverbial road and orgs have to consider resourcing, people, budgets and time horizons, the reality of what it takes to change runs up against actual desire to change. Change can be even more difficult when things seem to be going well. Why change when we don’t need to? Because when things are going well, it might be the best time to start thinking about changes.Andy McDowell, of Generate Your Value, stops by the Experience by Design studios to talk about how self-transformation is the key to making transformative experiences. The mission of Andy's company is "to serve as a powerful catalyst for entrepreneurs to experience extraordinary success in business and life.” To help clients achieve this transformation, he applies organizational change and innovation strategies to individual lives. We talk about how going to and then leaving Boeing lead to his own realization of achieving individual change. We also chat about how it is hard to be heard within your own organization when trying to lead innovation and change initiatives. Anyone who has tried to be recognized and ended up being ignored knows what this feels like. We discuss his own challenges in Boeing to be heard, how he uses this experience to fuel his own work, and how that work has translated into helping others to transform their own work and lives. 

With the Russian invasion of the Ukraine, there has been a lot of discussion of the military in the news recently. As we see images on television of these conflicts, the service of those in the military comes into clearer focus. There are those who are giving their years, themselves, and even their lives. Even in 'peace time,' military members can go on long deployments not take them away from their homes and their families. While we often are reminded of the sacrifices of those in uniform, it can be easy to forget the sacrifices of those family members who also are affected. On this episode of Experience by Design, we talk to Dr. Shelley Kimball, formerly of the Military Family Advisory Network. Shelley was the Vice President of Research and Program Evaluation at the MFAN, and is now Senior Lecturer and Program Coordinator at the Johns Hopkins University. In her role at MFAN, it was her job with her team to not just count how many services were delivered, but how many positive experiences were created. In our conversation, we talk about how she and her team use experience design principles in the evaluation of services and programs provided by MFAN. Central to their work is to treat everyone with dignity and that they are a customer. They use qualitative measurement approaches to understand the meaning behind the experiences they provide. Their goal is to make sense of everything from the point of view of those who are their target audiences. As Shelley notes, while AI and ML can perhaps get you 80% of the way in your analysis, you can’t yet replace the human brain. Also, you can't just deliver services and count that as success. You need to see the meanings that are created for those you are serving. 

Organizations used to be notable for their stability. Some of the biggest companies were well-known for their established cultures, their recognizable products, and their steadfast brands. Going to work at one of those companies meant permanence and security. It wasn’t just that those companies were change adverse; it is that change was seen as irrelevant. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. But we don’t live in a world that is predictable and stable. As the saying goes, change is the only constant, and if we aren’t willing to change, then we may be on the path to irrelevance.At the same time, wanting and being willing to change isn’t enough. We have to make changes in how we see the world and change our reactions to it. Barry Borgerson has been helping organizations see and make the changes they needed to make for some time. A PhD in computer science helped him see culture from a systemic perspective, understanding how an organization is a set of interconnected parts that can have a legacy framework that impedes change. Likewise, we need to create self-correcting mechanisms to help change happen more frequently in response to the rate of change. Finally, be challenging our perceptions in how we see the world can be the cornerstone in how we create the possibility for change

It can be easy to forget that experience design, whatever the kind, is about people. More than that, it is about making not only experiences better, but more importantly their lives better. As experience designers, we can help in ways great and small. It can be an overused phrase to be customer, or patient, or user centric. And we can lose sight what that means, and what our design recommendations and decisions can mean, in people’s lives. Eleni Stathoulis is focused on delivering that difference through design. She is Principal in Design at Mad*Pow, a New England-based firm that creates innovative experiences and solutions that benefit people and businesses. She has worked with clients across a variety of business sectors and industries, but with always the same goal: to bring the voices of people back into the design process in order to do good. We talk with Eleni about her path to her current position. From her education as a graphic design major and communications minor, she has integrated both to better relate findings to clients. We talk about how by keeping the goals of the project in mind, and the needs of the people at the center, we can deliver designs that matter and create change.

We are on the verge of a new year, and with a new year comes new ideas about how we need to make changes in our lives. While individual will often make New Year’s Resolutions about how to make a “new you”, what about organization? What resolutions can organizations make to change the way they have been doing things, and enter the new year with not only the best intentions, but the best outcomes?To help us explore how to make those radical changes in our individual and organizational lives, we have in the Experience by Design Studios Radhika Dutt. Radhika is the author of Radical Product Thinking: The New Mindset for Innovating Smarter. In her book, she distills that wealth of knowledge into some clear elements that any individual or organization can use. In today’s conversation we break down what radical product thinking is and can do. It’s a skill for creating change in the world around you, and one of the most interesting aspects is that it can work for organizations, but also you as an individual, or even entities not traditionally considered products such as Singapore. One key element of radical product thinking we discuss is building out vision vs iterative product thinking, meaning how can we create guides and guardrails to foster growth in a desired direction, measure what matters, and create lasting change.

When the world can feel more divided than ever - whether polarizing politics, climate change or economic uncertainty, ethnography reminds us to come back down to earth, and into the lives of people. Because the truth is, if we want to see systemic change, and address issues larger than ourselves, we actually have to start with everyday experience. And being willing to go against the grain, challenge the status quo.Thibault Manekin has a habit of putting himself into uncomfortable situations of the extraordinary kind. In his new book Larger than Yourself, he chronicles the various moments in his life where seeking the uncomfortable was the path to not only his growth, but increased opportunities for others. At the heart of each of these stories is the rebellion against those who warn “You can’t” or tell him “No.” Hearing these phrases lets him know when he is pushing hard enough to do something truly revolutionary. If you are not struggling, what you are trying to do is probably too easy to begin with.While perhaps laudable, such an approach can easily become misguided. Putting oneself into uncomfortable situations can easily become self-serving. Such an approach can slip into a person using others to feel growthful and even a thrill seeker. To embed the action into impact, it becomes more important to align the idea with the desires and goals of those in the setting. We have to build and make change from the inside out, getting input from the various stakeholders that exist in the space in which we are seeking to make a difference.  This means a rebalancing of power, whether it be in an organization, an institution, or a community. The first shall be last and the last shall be first. The question becomes how to make people more equal in the relationship. While a CEO and a janitor may have different roles and responsibilities, they are not unequal in their tasks. Sanitation workers, not physicians, would have curtailed the plague. Physicians could perhaps treat the symptoms. Sanitation workers could remove the causes. Thus, each has a role to play that is not any less important than the other. Ultimately each has a perspective to add and value to contribute. Organizations and leaders need to do better to make that possibility a reality.  

Meaning is a key element of designing experiences. At the same time, a major challenge is to understand how people construct and achieve meaning not just personally, but shared with others. How we create meaning through language has long been a philosophical question drawing sharp arguments around a fundamental feature of our lives. Max Louwerse’s book “Keeping those Words in Mind: How Language Creates Meaning” explores how we make meaning through language in terms that anyone can understand. Based on his own cutting-edge research, Max helps us explore how words work in the mind, how people create meaning, and what it means for experience design.We also discuss efforts at creating transformative learning experiences through pedagogical technology. From augmented reality, to virtual reality, to “CAVES”, to artificial intelligence, and to not giving tests, Max talks about his work pushing the boundaries of how students learn. We engage in a critical examination of the educational system, some of the biggest challenges in higher education, and how technology is meant to enhance and supplement rather than replace. 

When looking at American culture, you can see how security minded it is. Home security systems. Car security systems. Gun ownership for protection. Locking your doors. It is a society that in many ways does not trust its own environment. At the same, we have in many ways given up pretending that we have digital privacy and security. News reports of security breaches, stolen passwords, hacking, and cybercrime all create the sense that resistance is futile. Our guest today is looking to change that by making data privacy a human right. Ben Brook went to Harvard with aspirations of studying film. Soon after arriving, he turned his attention to books on the future of AI and computer science. This led to his co-creation of Transcend, a company that aims to make managing your data and privacy an easier and seamless experience.  We talk about how cleaning up someone’s data is like throwing confetti into a ceiling fan, and how Transcend helps companies and consumers clean up that mess. Transcend also helps companies be who they wish they were but helping earn their customers’ trust in how they manage customer data. Inspired by regulations like GDPR and California’s CCPA, Transcend aims to educate end-users and give them increased control over their personal data as an enjoyable experience.