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How we can lift the influence of designers – and the potential for good design – within NZs organisations

Navigating the Shifting Landscape of Design

I’m fortunate to have worked with some incredibly talented and creative individuals and teams, designing fantastic experiences, products and services across a range of different sectors. Whatever job title they’re carrying (here on in I’ll use the term ‘designers’), they’re crafting much needed solutions to a range of important problems.


However designers have been doing it tough recently. Once upon a time, organizations invested heavily in design teams, providing them with the space and resources to deliver innovative solutions to critical challenges. Today, many of those same teams have experienced cutbacks and restructuring as organizations seek cost savings.


While design isn’t the only function or sector experiencing this challenge, we should be concerned as designers are often well placed to help organisations respond to the current economic and social climate, by developing desperately needed solutions. Why has this happened, and could there be a lesson to learn?


Embracing the spirit of countering pessimism with long-term optimism, I propose a thesis: when times were good, our industry did not adequately prepare itself for inevitable challenges. Through anonymous insights from various experts, I hope to highlight the lessons learned and support the ongoing hard work in our field.



The Twin Bedfellows: Innovation and Risk


Let’s start with a personal experience. I once worked on a project where there was a clear customer need and a space ripe for a new service that would benefit both users and my client. We went through the discovery process, envisioned a solution, and identified the need for further testing. A few weeks later, we had a playback session with senior sponsors, and everyone walked away excited. It seemed promising.


However, 18 months later, the project never saw the light of day. Despite the initial enthusiasm, it languished in the backlog, never receiving the necessary resources for implementation.


My suspicion is that the senior sponsors, despite their excitement and support at the time, have been inundated with new ideas in their career, some of which promised much but delivered little. When it came time to allocate scarce resources, less risky initiatives were likely prioritized (“no one’s been fired for buying IBM”).


Talking to a range of senior design leaders over the past 12 months, it seems clear that this experience isn’t unique.


I suspect the challenge that is being faced – a common challenge – is that the narrative we use to influence senior stakeholders has to change as we move along the process. While a more ‘value creation’ and risk-accepting mindset may work at the beginning of a project, as we move through the project cycle and start asking for greater resource, we’re likely to face more of a risk avoidance mindset.



What Does This Mean?


Many design teams are facing significant challenges, particularly in times of restructuring and budget cuts. Team leaders often ask how to maintain or build their authority within their organizations under such conditions. The key question is: what value do we deliver that the organization couldn't achieve without us?


A McKinsey study found that design-led organizations outperform their less design-focused counterparts, with profits approximately doubling. However, only a third of senior executives felt confident about how design contributes to business metrics. This gap in understanding underscores the need for design teams to better measure and communicate their impact on business performance.


It's been clear in speaking with some designers that there is a level of discomfort in this perspective – for some it infers a customer/user vs organisation mindset. This isn’t the case. We can deliver business value (however defined) and customer value at the same time. The question is, if we don’t measure it, how do we know whether we’re on the right path, and where we’ve actually delivered value?


Designers are inherently creative, empathetic, and adept at navigating complexity. However, demonstrating value requires a different skill set: the ability to measure impact and link it to business performance.



The Counterfactual: The (Design) World as It Could Be


We have a significant opportunity to more diligently measure and assess the impact of our work. One way we can do so is to take a more scientific mindset to business and design decisions, or as Richard Chataway calls it, pursuing "test tube behaviours". Basically, an idea remains just an idea until it is proven, much like a scientific theory without evidence.


In my training as a research psychologist, and later in evaluating social policy initiatives, I learned to compare our interventions (the counterfactual) to the status quo (the factual). Demonstrating positive improvements justified continuing initiatives; otherwise, they were quickly shut down.


More recently, in a lot of the commercial and not-for-profit work that I’ve conducted, demonstrating how our intervention compares to the status quo has been no less important. However, given the need to deliver projects at pace, to keep a fast cadence of progress in an often-short window of opportunity, we’ve needed to do so in slightly different ways. In these situations, the mindset of thinking through how we can demonstrate the improvement that would occur from what we’ve created is still important.


And demonstrating our impact is important. For example, a recent report from Optimizely found that only 18% of tested ideas had a positive impact, meaning 82% had no impact or a negative impact. While you might argue that your ideas are too complex or difficult to test, my experience suggests that with thoughtful discussion and planning, many projects can demonstrate impact while reducing risk.


Irrespective of your situation, the thinking remains the same – is the world that we are designing a significant enough improvement from the world as it is today to warrant the resources needed to deliver it? Also, as there’s no guarantee that our initiative will actually make a difference, can we minimise our level of risk?


As we try to convince senior stakeholders to put their reputation and the organisation’s resources towards our ideas, this demonstration of impact and reduction in risk might be just what they need. There are always competing initiatives that these stakeholders will be weighing up!



Building a Business Case that Demonstrates Value and Impact


We work in an area where stakeholders must put their resources and reputations on the line to pursue innovative solutions. While risk is inherent to progress, humans have a natural tendency towards risk aversion, both in business and personal lives.


Here are some strategies for presenting a compelling argument for pursuing risky ventures, even in a challenging market:

  1. Align Design Challenges with Business Metrics: Clearly define and align design challenges with metrics that matter to the business. Understand what drives the organization's concerns, whether it's customer satisfaction, employee turnover, or sales figures. By aligning your design initiatives with these metrics, you demonstrate the direct value of your work.
  2. Demonstrate the World as Is vs. the World as It Could Be: Illustrate the current state (factual) and compare it to the potential future state (counterfactual) if your design solution is implemented. This comparison helps stakeholders visualize the tangible benefits of your proposal and understand the value of investing in your ideas.
  3. Identify and Challenge Assumptions: Clearly outline the biggest assumptions in your business case. By identifying these assumptions, you can test and validate them, reducing uncertainties (i.e. risks) and strengthening your proposal's credibility.
  4. Communicate Impact Widely: Ensure that the business impact of your design solutions is communicated far and wide within the organization. Use various channels to share your success stories, metrics, and case studies, ensuring that your work is recognized and valued across all levels of the organization.


The design community has the potential to drive significant value within organizations, even in challenging times. By aligning our work with business metrics, measuring and communicating impact, and strategically mitigating risks, we can build a compelling case for the importance of design. Let's embrace the spirit of long-term optimism and continue to advocate for the transformative power of design in shaping a better future.


Remember, there are no bad ideas - just unproven ones.

The Salience of Information: Why What Springs to Mind Matters More Than What People Know

By Cole Armstrong • September 4, 2024
In recent discussions about customer behaviour, a recurring theme has emerged: the belief that providing more information will lead to better decision-making (“If only they knew … then they would …”). While this perspective isn't entirely misplaced, it overlooks a crucial nuance. It's not merely what people know that drives their behaviour, but rather what information is most salient and readily springs to mind in the moment of decision. The Limitation of Knowledge Alone It's easy to assume that if customers simply knew more, they would make better decisions. For instance, knowing how to budget effectively or save money can indeed be useful. Knowing that I should save more for retirement or for investments. That I should eat less red meat for health or sustainability reasons. That I should be careful about what information I share online. These are all real-life examples of issues I’ve worked on where educating customers (or users) might have been a solution – and where helping people ‘know’ why they should do it failed to shift the needle. The critical factor isn't just having the information, but rather how accessible and prominent that information is when it’s needed. The question then is not do I know something, but rather does it spring to mind when it can actually shape my decisions? The Salience of Information in Decision-Making Consider a scenario where a customer interacts with a product or service. The decision-making process is often instantaneous and intuitive, driven by what immediately comes to mind rather than a comprehensive evaluation of all known benefits. This means that the information most salient at the moment—whether it's the immediate cost or a specific feature—has a more significant impact than the general knowledge a customer might have. As an example, I was involved in a project where my client was responding to new environmental regulations – and wanted to find out how to do this without upsetting their customers. The initial solution didn’t work because what was salient – and thus impacted customers responses – was the benefit to the brand not the benefit to the environment. While both benefits were ‘known’ by customers, it wasn’t till small tweaks were made to subtly emphasise and customer support for such actions, that complaints dropped off. A Case in Point: Council Rates Another example where this idea is relevant are the rates (tax) bills that New Zealanders receive from their local council. While residents might be well aware of the benefits their rates support—such as parks, libraries, and community services—this knowledge doesn’t always translate into a positive reaction when the bill arrives. For many, the first thing that springs to mind is the expense, not the benefits. In my case, receiving a $1,000 council rates bill (these are billed quarterly) was a stark reminder of this phenomenon. Despite understanding the value provided by these rates, the immediate focus was on the financial burden. If the benefits were more salient at the time of billing, the experience could be more positive. For instance, if the rates bill included a summary of the value received from various services—like a breakdown showing the value I obtain from the library based on the number of books borrowed—this could shift the focus from the cost to the benefits. In my case, borrowing 35 books over three months at an estimated value of $30 each amount to $1,050 worth of benefits, which highlights the value received far beyond the cost. And of course there are other services that I use as well – my local park that I go running in, the playgrounds that I take my kids to, the roads I drive along or the public transport that is subsidised. I ‘know’ these things, but do they immediately spring to mind when I see my rates bill? Seizing the Opportunity This concept of salience extends beyond council rates. In various customer interactions—such as bills, invoices, loyalty schemes, and product renewals—the opportunity lies in enhancing the salience of positive attributes at the critical moment of engagement. To effectively leverage this understanding, organisations should focus on making the benefits of their products or services more prominent when customers are most engaged and in a way that is relevant to the context. This means designing communications and touchpoints that highlight the value received, not just the cost or features.  While knowledge is important, it's the salience of that knowledge at the moment of decision that truly influences behaviour. By ensuring that the most relevant and positive information is top-of-mind, organisations can improve customer satisfaction and decision-making outcomes.

Developing persuasive touchpoints

By Cole Armstrong • March 15, 2024
How do we create persuasive touchpoints that make a difference? By considering how simple ways of reframing our messages, using insights from psychology and behavioural science, can create greater motivation to act.

The fallibility of memory

By Cole Armstrong • July 19, 2023
If I asked you to think back about an event, maybe a holiday or your last plane trip, your last dinner out, or a shopping experience, what would you remember? If I asked you to describe the experience, chances are you’d feel pretty confident about your memory, or at least some of the key elements. It turns out though, that confidence you’re feeling - it doesn’t relate to the accuracy of your memory. Faulty memories You’re not losing your mind, it’s just that your mind is playing tricks... sort of. We’ve spent quite a bit of time using eye tracking technology through our client projects. It enables us to see a participant’s behaviour – what they actually see and engage with - and the journeys people take through a physical environment, like a mall or retail setting. One project saw participants navigating a store with eye tracking glasses, getting items off a shopping list. As soon as they’d completed their journey, we asked which way they’d walked. Participants confidently recounted their route, and yet despite having literally just finished their journey, consistently missed out details. In another project we asked focus group participants about an image we’d shown them 20 minutes earlier. This elicited quite a spirited conversation about skin colour and how the illustrator’s choice of using a dark skin colour for all of the characters pointed to the racism of the illustrator and client. The thing was though, the characters weren’t dark skinned. Not one of them. And yet all of the participants convinced themselves this was the case. We’re certainly not the first to have encountered this phenomenon. There’s quite an active scene looking into issues with eyewitness testimony, and under which conditions our memory maybe unduly swayed or prone to errors. As you can imagine, the consequences of this could be huge. How can we stop getting it wrong? We’re not saying that our memories are always wrong – clearly that’s not the case! But there’s a rhyme and reason behind how our memory operates – both for good and bad. Our brains are BUSY. It’s like a hamster wheel going full on 24/7. Even when sleeping our brain is taking stock of the day, filing away moments into short and long-term memory. In order to look after us, our brains have to prioritise its resources, and it essentially takes shortcuts wherever possible, driving the same way to work each day, ordering the same coffee and so on. Imagine the fatigue we would face if we had to make every decision and action consciously, rather than letting our brains run the show. Which moments matter? So when our brain – a lazy but efficient workaholic – is sorting through events and the happenings of our day, it throws out the mundane, peripheral information it deems unimportant. It instead focuses on creating a highlight reel, and takes the moment of the events and experiences that were the most emotionally intensive, and the final moment. The concept is known as The Peak-End rule, and comes from Daniel Kahneman and his colleague Donald Redelmeier. Their 1996 study, which I am very pleased to not have been a participant in, involved 154 colonoscopy patients rating their level of discomfort at 60-second intervals throughout the procedure, as well as being asked to retrospectively describe how uncomfortable the procedure was. The level of discomfort during the procedure had no correlation to the discomfort they reported retrospectively. As an aside, they followed-up this study with yet more colonoscopy patients, who were split into two groups. One group had the standard procedure and experience of the camera being somewhat painfully removed, and the other had an amended experience that lasted three minutes longer, but which the camera removal was more uncomfortable than painful. The second group – with a longer procedure but less discomfort in the final moments – rated the procedure as less painful than the first group and were more likely to return for subsequent procedures. What was relevant was the peak level of discomfort experienced, as well as the level of discomfort in the final, end moments of the procedure. So what does this tell us? Firstly, that our memory is more fallible than we’d like to realise, more often made up of a series of stitched together moments and thoughts that can be revised and reinterpreted after the fact. Here’s an example - one of the best flights I’ve had was on Air New Zealand to Sydney – the first time we’d flown with my then-infant daughter (you can imagine our nerves!). At the end of the flight we apologised to the man next to us who’d (somehow) been working the whole 3.5 hours. We were suitably self-conscious at the amount of screaming he’d been subjected to but were greatly surprised at how nice he was – telling us that she’d been great, and how his (now teenage) children had subjected him through worse. Then some of the other passengers near us congratulated us on surviving a flight with an infant and how good a flyer she’d been – alongside the cabin staff who were making faces at our daughter to get her to laugh. It's honestly one of the best flights I remember – but clearly it wasn’t that pleasant at the time! The Peak-End rule in action – our actual and remembered experiences diverting wildly. How to apply these learnings to your work Don’t rely on people providing an accurate testimony of their experience. It’s more important to look at what a customer does vs what they say they do. When reviewing a process, journey or customer experience, focus on the moments that matter – the peak emotional moment and the final moment. This provides direction, stopping you from spreading your resources too thin and helping concentrate efforts on the moments most likely to have an impact. Be creative when designing experiences. Because our remembered experience is more important than our actual experience, you have a unique opportunity where you can creatively leave customers with an experience perhaps better than what they had… If you know there’s a frustration or issue during a process, while working on a fix for that, make sure your final moment knocks their socks off.
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