My name is Jack Moffett. I am an Interaction Designer with over ten years of experience. According to Herb Simon, that makes me an expert, so I must have something worth sharing. I have started this venture as an exercise to spur critical thinking about my chosen profession. I hope that others may find it thought provoking as well.
DesignAday will present a brief thought about Design every weekday.
The program for Interaction 10 has been posted, and it looks like it will be another outstanding conference. The keynote speakers will be Paola Antonelli, Dan Hill, Jon Kolko, Ezio Manzini, Nathan Shedroff, and a true legend in the field, Bill Moggridge. Additional invited speakers are Timo Arnall, Cindy Chastain, Liz Danzico, Shelley Evenson, Dave Gray, Tom Igoe, Peter Morville, and Denise Wilton. Looking at this list and the 28 speakers selected from 250 session submissions, it appears that Service Design and sustainability with both be significant themes running through the conference.
Registration is now open, and early bird pricing is in effect through November. The past two conferences have sold out, and I see no reason for this one to not follow suit. I’m hoping to attend again, but that’s likely dependent on at least partial support from my company. Here’s hoping.
The Pittsburgh chapter of the IxDA gathered last night in the historic Terminal Buildings, home of Gist Design. Gist led us through an exercise in which we role-played through a usability research scenario. The attendees were assigned to either the client, the research team, or the pool of respondents. Each person on the client side was provided with a card explaining their role in the company and their motivations, which they had to express in the initial meeting with the research team. The members of the research team had to probe the client for the information they would need to design their study. At the end of this first phase of the game, two judges rated us on our performance, bestowing proclamations of “nice”, “niiice”, or “niiiiiiiiiice”.
The whole exercise centered around a label maker, and the second phase saw the research team fiddling with the device and planning out their approach—what they wanted to learn and how they would go about learning it. During this phase, they were interrupted by a phone call from the client’s head of marketing, asking them to gather additional information about their target market. They were again rated on their performance before carrying out the study. This was the point at which the respondents joined in, acting as study subjects, relating their label-making needs and trying to figure out how to use the label maker. The team was again rated on their performance during the study. Finally, the research team had to organize their findings and present to the client.
We all had a great time mimicking the customers and users we have dealt with so many times in the past, and the exercise led to much discussion about approaches to research, client relationships, and the value of user research in the design process.
This month, Gist Design will be hosting IxDA Pittsburgh and leading us in a unique, fun, and educational event.
Real-World Research
Designers know the benefits that design research provides in shaping good user experiences for products and services. But practicing effective design research for technology products in the corporate environment (whether for start-ups or for international corporations), requires ingenuity, flexibility, and a sense of humor. Want to try your hand at it? Join Gist Design and other design colleagues for a collaborative game of “Real-World Research.”
Date: Wednesday, October 21. Time: 6:00pm Location: Gist Design 33 Terminal Street, Suite 425B (South Side)
Gist was founded in 2002 by John Beck and Shelley Moertel, two graduates of the masters programs at CMU. More recently, another CMU grad, Daniel Gloyd, who also happens to be an alumnus of the same undergraduate graphic design program that I hail from, joined them to open an office in Fort Worth, Texas. The firm specializes in design research, product and service planning, and user interface design, working with prominent clients in the mobile and medical markets.
If you’re in the area, you should plan to attend. It promises to be a worthwhile evening.
We had a great event last night. Hosted by General Dynamics Viz, IxDA Pittsburgh gathered for an evening of presentations about interaction design for the military. We had about 45 minutes to visit and eat before we got down to business. I kicked things off at around 6:20 with a presentation about mobile computing and the design of Interactive Electronic Technical Manuals. Then David Bishop of Maya spoke about some of the hurdles we have to face dealing with military customers in the context of his work on the Battle Management Software Suite / Dismounted Leader System—a map-based application designed for use on a tablet PC. Jake Kolojejchick of Viz followed with an inspiring presentation about the work they did with DARPA on the Command Post of the Future. The presentations spurred a number of good discussions and we didn’t break up until around 10:00.
While I found all of the work very interesting, I must admit that what I enjoyed the most was commiserating with other designers about the challenges we face in the domains in which we have found ourselves working. It’s always comforting to know that it’s not just me. I’m not the only one who finds my efforts thwarted by bureaucracy and politics. I do already know that at some level, but I still find it reassuring.
Aside from that, I must say it felt good to be presenting my work in a professional setting for the first time in, oh, 9 years or so. Hopefully this will be practice for Interaction 10. I hear they have over 200 submissions, though—many more than last year—so the chances of mine being one of the approximately 24 selected are rather slim.
This Wednesday, IxDA Pittsburgh is holding an event centered around military-related, interaction design projects. Here’s the announcement:
The challenges that face the Warfighter are like no other, and Interaction Designers are tasked to design products, systems, and services that address their unique needs. The decisions that we make affect their operations, situational awareness and decision-making, and have the potential to save lives. Please join IxDA Pittsburgh and GDC4S|Viz for an evening of discussion on interaction design for military users.
Date: Wed. Sept 16 Place: GDC4S|Viz (in the Southside Works)
Event Schedule 5:30-6:00pm hors d’oeuvres sponsored by GDC4S 6:00-6:40pm Jack Moffett from Inmedius 6:40-7:20pm Dave Bishop from Maya Design 7:30pm-8:30pm Jake Kolojejchick from GDC4S|Viz
I’ll be kicking things off with a presentation about my work on Interactive Electronic Technical Manuals (IETM). The very first project I worked on as a full-time-employed interaction designer was an IETM for the Air Force. Since then, I’ve designed no less than 10 other IETM viewers—most of them web browser-based applications. I’ll be giving an overview of the challenges involved in designing IETMs for military customers, from the environmental conditions and hardware considerations, to the interesting problems that must be solved through the user interface design. I’ll show examples from a number of different projects, including an IETM prototype specifically designed for a wearable computer, and my most recent work in this domain, a viewer for the Navy that introduced collaborative work as one of the core features. I’ll also cover design considerations such as touch/stylus input, questions of liability, emergency situations, and other concerns typical of military contexts.
Jake is going to be presenting the Command Post of the Future project, and while I don’t know Dave’s topic, I know he does good work and is sure to give an interesting presentation.
If you happen to be in the Pittsburgh area, come and check us out.
I’ve mentioned before that my company does contract work for the military. Much of my most interesting work, in fact, has been on such projects. This makes it rather difficult for me to speak about my work in public.
My local IxDA chapter will be holding an event in September that is centered around interaction design for military projects. I was planning on presenting the work I’ve done for the EOD, some of which I published in Luke Wroblewski’s book Web Form Design: Filling in the blanks. I was further planning to submit a variation of the presentation to Interaction 10. Unfortunately, it turns out that the approval process is prohibitive. I would have to produce the finished presentation and send it through three organizations just to get the right person to review it, at which point it could be denied.
I’m falling back on another project that isn’t as current, and isn’t as interesting, but I think I can still get a decent presentation out of it.
The announcement went out this week that IxDA is now accepting submissions for Interaction ’10 to be held in Savannah, GA, February 4-7, 2010. There are four different types of sessions that you can propose. From the conference website:
Discussions. Got a burning question that you think the interaction design community should be asking itself? Let’s sit down and discuss it. You are the discussion facilitator.
Activities. Let’s try out something together. Field trip? Interview play acting? A new prototyping technique? Propose something that we DO.
Demonstrations. Want to show off something cool? Success or failure from a project? New technology? Prototyping technique? Launching something? Share it with your community.
Presentations. Want to do more of a traditional talk? We love those too.
In addition, there will be two community documentaries you can submit video for, an interactive art exhibition, a student competition, and a local design challenge that will benefit the Savannah community. This is all in concert with the invited speakers, half-day workshops, and receptions that were hallmarks of past conferences.
The deadline for session submissions is September 15th. Registration opens on October 15th, and November 1st is the final day for art and video submissions.
Today is the final day of the IxDA fundraising effort. If you have not already, please make a contribution. The organization will be engaging developers to implement its design for a new platform that will include a more robust forum, sections and tools for local groups, social networking features, a job board, and many other capabilities that the current site can’t support. This organization is growing rapidly, and we need infrastructure in place that will enable us to better serve the design community.
There are a lot of us, which means it doesn’t take much from any one person if we all chip in. If everyone would give a dollar or two, we would surpass our goal. Please consider the value this organization brings to our field. It’s worth a lot more than a cup of joe.
The Interaction Design Association started as an email discussion list back in 2003. I subscribed and made my first post to the list in January 2005. Since that time, I’ve been an active participant. As I am the only Interaction Designer at my company, the list has been an invaluable method of staying connected with others in the industry and keeping up to date with everything from books and conferences to firms and best practices. It has been an outstanding resource, and every post is available and searchable. In 2005, what was the Interaction Design Group (IxDG) incorporated as a not-for-profit organization and became the IxDA. The discussion list moved to the web, and 2008 saw the first conference. In addition to the global organization, IxDA has around 70 local groups around the world.
One of the things that makes the IxDA unique among professional organizations is that there is no cost for membership. All it takes to be a member is to declare that you are one. Hopefully, if you do so, you’ll take it a step further by actively participating through the discussion forum, your local group, the conference, one of the many initiatives, or any combination thereof.
As there are no dues, IxDA relies primarily on the money it makes from the conferences. Currently, however, it is developing a next-generation platform to serve the needs of the community. This effort requires additional funding, and we’re looking for contributions. The goal is to raise $30,000 in the next four days. A drawing will be held each day, giving those who have contributed that day a chance to receive a complimentary registration to next year’s conference, interaction ’10 in Savannah, GA.
Have you benefited from IxDA? Have you had questions answered on the forum? Have you made a contact at a local meet-up? Would you like to give something back to the organization and help it continue to give value to our community? I’ll be supporting it with my donation, and I encourage you to do the same.
To be a truly outstanding designer, you must be passionate about your work.
This was the final advice I relayed to my students. It is possible to be talented without passion. You can even be successful without passion. But every designer I’ve considered to be inspiring—and I’m not just referring to design celebrities—has been passionate about their profession.
Certainly, this isn’t unique to design. There are many professions I believe this applies to: teaching, medical and social professions, and political positions, to name a few. That doesn’t make it any less important to design.
It’s a passion for design that drives me to continually strive to increase my knowledge, add to my skill set, improve the quality of my process, and refine my craft. It is passion that finds me spending much of my free time reading other designer’s blogs, industry publications, and the IxDA forum. It is passion that pulls me into volunteering to co-chair the local IxDA chapter, serve on the planning committee for the next conference, or participate in the organization’s initiatives. Passion has landed me in an adjunct faculty position teaching design. Passion often sees me writing for my blog at 1:00 am.
A passionate designer sets his own standard. A passionate designer produces good work, not because she is trying to meet her supervisor’s expectations, nor because she is looking for a bonus or praise, but because it is the way it should be done. When it comes down to soup and nuts, good design is about helping people—improving their experience in some way—and that is a mission worthy of passion.
