Archive for August, 2007
A LEGO Factory making LEGO Cars..
I just couldn’t resist this one – pure genius!
Imagine the time, talent and skill it took to create this. I’m humbled! My hat off to LEGO fans world wide!!
And to all those who would like the real factory making a LEGO car of their very own, don’t forget LEGO Factory.
Add comment August 23, 2007
Designers as Facilitators of Collective Creativity
Back in the day when I went to design school, the greatest aspiration uniting all my fellow students was to become the next Philippe Starck. The idea of the lone genius, the one people always called upon to create beauty and join form with function, the duck that consistently always laid golden eggs for his clients – this was, and in some circles still is, the ideal for designers.
Creativity and why designers are not artists
What’s the difference you may ask. A good question to ask as both rely
heavily on their creative skill to create solutions. According to
Arthur Koestler, the most-cited authority on creativity, every creative act involves bisociation,
a process that brings together and combines previously unrelated ideas.
He contrasts bisociation with association, saying that association
refers to previously established connections among ideas but that
isociation involves making entirely new connections among ideas.
Koestler’s definition addresses all forms of creativity, whether in
art, science or humor.
So designers, artists, scientists, you name it
all rely on creativity for coming up with solutions, but the difference
between designers and artists is ego. Designers (at least good ones
anyway) divorce their egos from a project early on to immerse
themselves in research, ethnographic studies, insights of various sorts
to come up with solutions that best serve the needs identified by users. Artists on the other hand delve in much greater luxury, not
necessarily materially speaking, but in terms of accountability. Their
works of art are born out personal briefs, passions and ideas – not a common need or problem and are specifically bought, because of their personal interpretation of
the reality we all live in. It is their synthesis of subjects in
to visual, interactive or 3 dimensional form that evokes an
emotional and intellectual reaction in an audience. You can argue here that the above is similarly the reason why we buy certain products, because the name of the designer has become synonymous with compelling design that we appreciate. That is entirely correct, in some areas the roles are particularly blurred as is the case with fashion design for instance, where the designers behave more like artists (some more than others), but who are still commonly referred to as designers.
The Advent of Collective Creativity
Fast-forward to 2007 and our CEO at LEGO, Jorgen Vig Knudstorp, speaking about collective creativity and its power to create stunning products and solutions; ‘Why have 100 designers, when you can have a 100.000?’, he poignantly asks. And I think: absolutely! Why not indeed – whereas I can in my mind’s eye hear all those designers gasp quietly in the background, this is the sound of their dreams vanishing before them.
What does he mean? Knudstorp is referring to the power of collective creativity. Collective creativity occurs when bisociation is shared by two or more
people. We are beginning to see that collective creativity can be very
powerful and can lead to more culturally relevant results than
individual creativity does. This is what happens with really good
collaboration based on teamwork.
Liz Sanders from SonicRim articulates this very well her article on the subject. All people who touch and are touched by the “product” that is being
designed should play a role in collective creativity. (By “product” I
mean products, interfaces, spaces, etc.) These people fall into two
main groups: “makers” and “users.” “Makers” include all the members of
development teams from disciplines such as marketing, engineering and
design. “Users” include people who shop for, buy and end up using the
product.
Collective creativity is already being practiced in industry today by
“makers.” In fact, most design firms sell their interdisciplinary
product development experience. The
biggest opportunity for improving the quality of products that we
design today is to practice collective creativity with "users." Others
agree. Design critic Rick Poynor has argued that "since design is
something fundamental to being human, it can’t be left solely in the
hands of designated practitioners."
Architect Christopher
Alexander writes “People need and have a right to determine and shape
their own environment. . . . They are the only ones who know in a
profound way what they need . . . .Good architecture can only come from
wholehearted involvement of the users in the shaping of their buildings
and streets.”
Why is collective creativity important?
To quote Liz Sanders here: Collective creativity, when practiced with "users" in
the design development process, can result in useful and relevant
innovation. This is important because useful and relevant innovation
can be commercially successful at the same time as it is culturally
beneficial. The shift from individual to collective levels in thinking and doing is occurring today in many domains. We see this shift taking place especially today in the world of
business. Design education needs to keep up with the shift to meet the
challenges created by new levels of thought and action.
The changing role of the designer
The days of the super-star designer are numbered. The skills needed to facilitate collective creativity are very different from what the lone genius does in his corner. First there is humility and the profound appreciation of the role ordinary people should have in shaping and creating the project of their dreams. It is no longer the designer who tells the world what the solution should look like, it is the designer who uses his/her expertise in unlocking creativity to enable others, who perhaps habitually are less confident in the creative realm, to unlock their thoughts, ideas and creativity.
At LEGO work continues to expand the ability of ordinary people to create the product of their dreams. An approach pioneered by the Mindstorms NXT development process of involving the Mindstorms community in designing the hardware, software, the toy and pieces for the new robot, has rapidly continued into completely user-designed products sold through the company’s LEGO Factory channel, where users can indeed create their very own LEGO model and buy exactly that model as well as be inspired by and buy the creations of others. This of course in parallel with existing product development of LEGO toys, still handled by designers themselves – but even here community interaction is becoming more and more commonplace as the insight and ideas coming from LEGO users are simply too valuable to ignore. Long gone are the days of the lone genius – instead here we are at the advent of collective creativity where the power of many creates far better products and experiences than any one of us could have dreamt up on our own.
Add comment August 23, 2007
75 Years of ‘Only the best is good enough’
Last Friday the global workforce at the LEGO Group all stopped whatever they were doing and joined in to celebrate the 75th anniversary of the founding of the company that has brought play and creativity into the hands of millions world-wide.
It was a time of reflection for all of us as well as a great celebration and I was particularly pleased to be joined by several prominent members of the Brickish Association here at our party in the UK, where the weather for once was all blue skies and baking hot – a freak incident amidst solid months of torrential downpours. Talking to these fans one truly is reminded of the fact that despite many people seeing LEGO as a toy, it really is a creative material and the only limit to what can be created is your own imagination. These are individuals, many with serious high-powered jobs – whose sheer brainpower is at the heart of their day-to-day working life as well as it is at the heart of their LEGO hobby. So is LEGO the thinking person’s creative material of choice? I’d like to think so for sure.
The motto for the LEGO Group has always been ‘Only the best is good enough’ and that has kept us on steep path of continuous self-improvement in terms of product innovation, quality as well as play value – but it is also an ethic, which I see disappearing more and more from society around me. Not just from so many companies, intent on making a quick buck by cashing in on consumer’s inability to tell the difference between one product and the other, their lack of information or even society at large, where image and spin is what wins elections as this article details, not rolling up your sleeves and getting things done. It is a curious world where as we have lost the safety of jobs-for-life in companies passed down from father to son, we are increasingly also losing the accountability that comes with that. We as employees are quite happy to stand by and witness shambolic behaviour by our colleagues and employers, comfortable in our knowledge that in a year or two, we will have moved on and our decisions and theirs, however unethical, will not stick to us, our reputation as individuals will not be tarnished. Shareholders, more intent on dividends, don’t care about the means that earned the profit, as long as it’s there and companies are getting so desperate about paying dividends we are seeing them taking out loans from banks for no other reason than to hand the money to their shareholders.
As LEGO still remains a family-owned company, we still adhere to the same principle of ‘Only the best is good enough’, originally articulated by the founder of the company, because whether we like it or not – longterm that is exactly what it comes down to. The Kristiansen family have a name, a reputation, a history and a responsibility to children all over the world as they see it, and all of us who work for LEGO feel the same. We like to stand for something good in the world, and that only comes from taking a long-term view and carrying the responsibility for your actions and behaviour rather than copping out for short-term profit.
Add comment August 14, 2007
What Makes Us Wise?
Recent quiet time on this blog induced by excessive cycling, the surrender to Facebook and a workload that simply refuses to diminish are my excuses for depriving you of my musings, hopefully some of you still haven’t given up on me and will return to read this post… if so, Welcome back!
The autumn is almost upon us and if you live in the UK, it has been since about June. A lot of time for reflection in all this rain and a great quote by Yoko Ono I saw recently got me thinking about age, wisdom – why some grow wise and others just grow old.
Yoko Ono was asked recently whether age matters in her opinion, to which she answered: "The advancing of age matters when it gives you experience – the kind that adds wisdom, power and self-confidence to you – and thereby makes you a more attractive individual for the satisfaction and joy of you, your family, your friends and the world."
This captures the sensation I woke up with today – a dream of two racing cars, one symbolising the left brain and the other symbolising the right brain. These two cars were in a very close competition, side by side, each in turn inching away in front of the other only to be caught up and challenged again. The dream ended with a strong realisation about bridge-building, how wisdom is really about bridging the two halves of how we function.
On one hand we are emotional beings and emotions sometimes take control of us completely and experiences create many connections in the part of our brain which deals with emotion. Many religions, even psychoanalysis, tries to temper the emotions and make us think about the consequences of irrational, emotional behaviour – whether it is through ethics, thinking about treating others the way you wish to be treated and so on.
However, someone also recently pointed out that radicalisation is about emotions devoid of reason and why radicalism is so infectious particularly among younger people is that many don’t have a clear understanding of the rational implications of radicalism, nor a strong ingrained will to prevent human suffering in all its forms. This expert continued to point out that the reason Islamic radicalism is so dangerous is because emotions have been infused with Islamic rationalisation, apparently lending legitimacy to otherwise irrational emotional desires of hurting fellow human beings. And the most depressing of all, whether we are talking about politicians, Islamic radicals or society at large is that the desire to eliminate human suffering, today and in the future is still not the top priority of our actions – we think human suffering can be justified in the name of the right cause.
On the other hand pure reason and rationalisation without the emotional dimension is no good either. I once read that the reason why Nazism was so destructive during WWII was through its ability to institutionalise and rationalise the process of elimination of those less desirable in Hitler’s Germany. The cold rationalisation and institutionalising of the most horrific human atrocities somehow made it easier for people in all parts of the Nazi bureaucracy not to think of the human (emotional) consequences of their actions – how many lives were lost, families torn apart, contributions is science, literature, art, medicine etc. never realised as nascent careers or even young lives were snuffed out through an effective process of elimination, logistically perfect and emotionally completely sterile, revealing the horror of pure rationalisation unrestrained from emotional considerations.
How does one navigate this minefield of emotion and reason. How does one make sure in every case we ensure the consequences of our actions are always on the top of our minds and that we methodically strive to eliminate destructive thoughts and behaviour from ourselves and focus on nurturing the good in each of us? Is that was true wisdom is? The ability understand others and an ability to consistently choose a self-less path where we refrain from greed, jealousy, anger, hatred, aggression and so on. Is it that wisdom really gives us a distance to things, a weariness to react to soon, judge too quickly, but instead to be determined in looking for and seeing the big picture, understanding how many things are really interconnected and attacking one may indeed simply worsen the other thing we’d rather keep. Is wisdom the ability to understand cause and consequence, the capacity to judge emotion and reason side by side, not favouring either on the expense of the other – but indeed seeing the world as a whole and bigger than the sum of its parts?
4 comments August 14, 2007
