Exploring Life-Centered Design: Insights for Sustainable Transformation

[00:00:00] Gerry Scullion: Hey folks, and welcome back to this state cd, the podcast dedicated to exploring the world of human-centered design and beyond. I'm Jerry Scion, and whether you're new to human-centered design or a seasoned practitioner, this podcast is here to help you expand your thinking, challenge conventions, and drive meaningful change.

[00:00:18] Gerry Scullion: Now before we dive in, don't forget to like, subscribe and share this episode with your network. And if you're looking to bring a human-centered service design approach into your organization, take the first step by signing up for my free five day email course. The link is in the description. In today's episode, I'm joined by two brilliant guests, Steve Beaty, who I know from Australia and Martin to Mitch co-authors of designing tomorrow.

[00:00:42] Gerry Scullion: Now we discussed the evolution of design from a human-centered design approach to a broader life centered perspective, tackling the complexities of say, sustainability systems thinking and a role of design and really helping shape the future, which is three key takeaways from this episode. Number [00:01:00] one, the shift to life centered design and human-centered design, as you know, has served us well, but as we face global challenges.

[00:01:07] Gerry Scullion: Designers must expand their scope to include environmental and societal impacts in their decision making. Number two, design's role in governance and business strategy Design is no longer just about crafting these wonderful experiences. It has a role to play at the board level, helping organizations navigate on uncertainty and ask the right questions for long-term impact.

[00:01:29] Gerry Scullion: And number three. Resilience in design careers as designers work to embed more ethical systemic thinking in organizations. Maintaining resilience and finding support through communities and industry networks is absolutely critical to long-term success. This episode is packed with insights and if you want to go deeper and giving away a copy of Designing Tomorrow, so check out the description below and uh, for links and how you can find out to enter.

[00:01:55] Gerry Scullion: To win that book. Now let's dive into the conversation with Steve Beatie and Martin to [00:02:00] Mitch.

[00:02:09] Gerry Scullion: Maybe we'll kick off, um, tell us a little bit about yourself, where you're from and what you do. We'll, we'll start off with alphabetical surnames. We'll start with Beatty, Mr. Beatty, Steve Beatty. Tell us a little bit about yourself, where you're from, what you do.

[00:02:23] Steve Baty: Well, thanks Jerry. I am a Sydney local, so born and bred in Sydney, Australia.

[00:02:28] Steve Baty: I currently live, um, just to the sort of northwest of the Sydney CBD on the banks of the Parramatta River, uh, traditional lands of the Wonell clan, part of the OR nation in Sydney. Um, I'm a design strategist. Um, have worked in the sort of service design and strategic design space for a while now. Um, some people may know me as the host of UX Australia.

[00:02:56] Steve Baty: Others may know me from my work at MELD Studios. [00:03:00] Um, I've been involved in the Australian Design Council, um, and I'm currently involved with the Product Stewardship Center of Excellence. Um, among other things.

[00:03:10] Gerry Scullion: Yeah, absolutely. You've been active for a long time. As long as I've been in Australia anyway.

[00:03:15] Gerry Scullion: But Martin, let's tell us, uh, tell us about yourself.

[00:03:19] Martin Tomitsch: Uh, yeah, so I am joining joining you today from, uh, Gadigal Country here in Sydney. So I am, um, at the moment still here in my, uh. UTS office, um, where I'm working at the transdisciplinary school at, uh, UTS, the University of Technology, Sydney, uh, I, uh, I'm originally from Austria, so I studied, uh, I did my PhD at the Vienna University of Technology.

[00:03:45] Martin Tomitsch: I. Um, I'm born in Austria and I grew up on an organic, uh, small farm in the, in the mountains. Sort of like the three Alps, the end of the Alps. Yeah. Uh, and, uh, moved to, yeah, moved to Sydney about 16 years ago. [00:04:00] Uh, spent quite a few years at the University of Sydney, uh, in the design discipline. Um, and, and yes, now have been at the transdisciplinary school here at UTS for two years.

[00:04:12] Gerry Scullion: Amazing. Now listen, uh, I dunno if you've ever seen Star Wars, but like, this is my attempt of Star Wars. Oh, beautiful introduction. Do you see what I'm doing there, Steve? Perfect. Not I, I got a, I got a smile. I got a smile. I am what's known as a jackass sometimes. So you, you were wrote this book Designing Tomorrow.

[00:04:31] Gerry Scullion: Um, how long is it out? About a year or No, six months. Is it six months a year? It was

[00:04:36] Steve Baty: been, it was released in Australia in April, uh, 2024. And it. Previously it had its European release. Yeah, I think it's sort of November, 2023. Martin, I think was the formal release in, out of Amsterdam and in the, in Europe.

[00:04:49] Steve Baty: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:04:50] Gerry Scullion: Nice. And it's on BIS, which is one of my favorite publishers as well. So instant.

[00:04:56] Martin Tomitsch: They're great. They're

[00:04:57] Gerry Scullion: great. They're, yeah, absolutely. Like, I mean, they, they give a voice to, [00:05:00] uh, a community of people who want it. You know, inform better outcomes for planet and society. And that kind of encapsulates what I think a lot has gone on in this.

[00:05:11] Gerry Scullion: So, so let's talk you, you're both design strategists. Um, in, in, I think, dunno if you called yourself that Martin, but there's been a shift in the last maybe. Five to 10 years in particular from human-centered design into this life center design. We're taking into consideration into planetary kind of considerations as well.

[00:05:31] Gerry Scullion: What do you think is driving this? Where does it come from?

[00:05:36] Martin Tomitsch: Um, do you want me to start, Steve? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Um, and you jump in. Um, so, um, I don't, first of all, I don't know if I would call myself a design strategist. Okay. And, uh, and we also, um, actually do make a subtle but important distinction between design strategy and strategic design.

[00:05:54] Martin Tomitsch: Okay. Um, I do see myself, I mean, I'm trained kind of like more in information design and. [00:06:00] I've been teaching, um, and practicing UX design, interaction design, um, human-centered design, uh, but certainly also working in the university sector as a strategic designer. Um, yeah. Uh, and Steve sort of complimenting that in the book narrative through his practice in industry.

[00:06:18] Martin Tomitsch: Um, so for, for me, life centered design is an important, uh, shift away from. Centering everything we do as designers in terms of the decisions we make, the things we design, the things we create from centering those around the needs of the human, which is often the user or the customer, the consumer. And considering sort of the broader environment, the broader picture, uh, which means decentering the human.

[00:06:47] Martin Tomitsch: Yeah. Which means considering, uh, other groups that might be, uh, marginalized groups or groups of fringes, um, and also considering the needs of those, that, those entities that are [00:07:00] non-human, I. So that's also a really important aspect of life centered design. And another important, um, uh, consideration in life centered design is having both a systems thinking approach and a futures focus.

[00:07:16] Gerry Scullion: Yeah, absolutely. I mean. It, it's great to get a, a kind of a definition of that, but I, I'd be keen to understand like where you see the industry shifting towards more of this life centered approach. Like up until 10 years ago, a lot of the community and from my experience and my perspective was looking inwards and it was looking at, you know, kind of how to improve the processes and how we can get greater outcomes and stuff.

[00:07:40] Gerry Scullion: It seems over the last number of years, there's definitely been a societal shift towards more life centered thinking and our outcomes and actually sustainability practices. What's driving that from a human behavior do you think?

[00:07:53] Steve Baty: I think sort of part of it for me, Jerry comes from, um, a good, hard cold [00:08:00] look at the sort of ideology driving a lot of our tech industry.

[00:08:04] Steve Baty: Yeah. Um, over the last five to 10 years and just sort of looking at it as this increasingly, um, venture capital fed. For-profit hypergrowth, um, you know, with a focus on going, you know, like an an IPO, right? Like is is the point rather than. The design of something of value, the creates value rather than extracts value that solves real problems rather than, um, pretends to, or in some cases actually, you know, actively creates these problems.

[00:08:41] Steve Baty: Yeah, and I think as a group of people who are quite naturally empathetic and quite naturally reflective, went through their careers and saw what was effectively just a fairly grubby, greedy, superficial. Um, industry, uh, you know, like driven by this venture capital [00:09:00] money. Um. Really started to take a look at ourselves, and I've put myself in that mix.

[00:09:05] Steve Baty: But we really started to take a look at ourselves and ask questions like, well, well, why? And when we start to look around, we start to see massive piles of waste and pollution being produced. We see energy being used for no real purpose, like some really trivial and frivolous uses. Um. Treat it in a way as though they're abundant when really they're scarce, especially when there's 7 billion approaching 8 billion people on the planet all trying to live this really sort of hyper consumptive lifestyle.

[00:09:36] Steve Baty: These are not good recipes, and as I say, for an industry that is quite reflective. We start to look around and, and question, well, what is our role in that? Yeah. And is that really how we wanna be spending our time? And is there maybe something else that we want to be doing? And if you are of a certain age, maybe you've got kids and you're starting to think that.

[00:09:57] Steve Baty: Or perhaps the future that I'm creating for them is [00:10:00] not the one that I really want for them. Yeah. And so we start to make different choices and we at least start to ask different questions.

[00:10:06] Gerry Scullion: Yeah, absolutely. So let's take a, a little bit of a step back to towards the Martin and Steve relationship. How did you guys get together to write this book?

[00:10:14] Gerry Scullion: And I want to see, you know, rose Pets and I want to see lots of like, you know, fun stories woven into this. I'm only joking, of course. How did you guys get together?

[00:10:24] Steve Baty: Two, um. You asked early, earlier, um, when Martin arrived in Sydney, but we met not long after that. Um, and I don't recall exactly where we met, but um, way back at the beginning of Meld Studio.

[00:10:39] Steve Baty: So in 2009, I. When we were planning mail studios, um, I was working independently, um, and I was looking to bring on an intern and it was Martin that I reached out to to help me find an intern. Ah, okay. Um, and so Martin actually found me, my first intern in 2009, and we've [00:11:00] been connected ever since. But we both gave talks at UX Australia in 2021 looking at this issue of.

[00:11:08] Steve Baty: What is the role of design today? Uh, particularly in its contribution to, you know, modern society and the impact that we are having on the natural world and, and on our environment. Um, and looking ahead at what role design might play. In addressing those issues and maybe taking a different, uh, stance when it comes to things like, you know, who are we designing for?

[00:11:35] Steve Baty: Who gets to design, um, who gets to benefit and, and how that sits within a natural environment.

[00:11:42] Yeah.

[00:11:43] Steve Baty: Positioning us not as controlling nature, but a part of nature and, um. Martin approached me afterwards and said, you know, like, there's a lot of complementarity with those talks. Let's, let's work on that as as an idea and [00:12:00] explore as a project.

[00:12:01] Yeah.

[00:12:03] Gerry Scullion: One of the reasons why I love the fact that there's two people who wrote this book is it's not a singular perspective, like, you mean Steve's experience in industry. Mm-hmm. And Mark, I'm sure you've probably worked in industry as well, but like I guess your primary role. Over the last number of years has been looking at, you know, educational and academia and design academia.

[00:12:24] Gerry Scullion: What role do you, well, what role do you think, um, design academia has, has had over the last 20 years in producing designers that maybe were, let's just say too, too, into naval gazing, and what's their role in that space and how has it adapted now? How has the educational models adapted to design for the future?

[00:12:47] Gerry Scullion: I.

[00:12:48] Martin Tomitsch: Yeah, when, I mean, when I started teaching, uh, design at the University of Sydney in 2009, um, yeah, we were, um, we were running a, a, an interaction design program there Bachelor, which, [00:13:00] um, launched, I, I believe it launched around 2002. Right. So it was really ahead of its time. Yeah. Um, and it sort of came out of a.

[00:13:09] Martin Tomitsch: Being a stream in the Bachelor of Architecture, looking at computing in architecture and using computing as a tool. And then it became its own degree in its own right. But it was at a time when there was no UX industry really

[00:13:22] true.

[00:13:22] Martin Tomitsch: And so, um, at the time of course, we were very much focusing on user experience assigned industry started to emerge.

[00:13:29] Martin Tomitsch: It was still really hard to talk to students, uh, to explain to students and parents at open they what it is. Um, it became easier every year as to sort of to field grow and people became more aware of the role of UX design and what good design means in the, in particular, in the tech and in the tech sector.

[00:13:47] Martin Tomitsch: Mm-hmm. Um, so I remember, yeah, when we, when we first, um, connected with Mel Studios and Steve and, and as, as a design academic, I also was very. Very closely observing what the industry was doing and very much [00:14:00] engaging with the industry, going to meetups, and also connecting industry into the programs so that we can connect what we do in academia and how we teach our students with what's happening in industry.

[00:14:11] Martin Tomitsch: And so I, I also met Steve again a number of times at UX Australia, where I spoke a few times, and usually I was the only academic at UX Australia. You and benra. Yeah, me and Benra who has since left the university sector. Yeah. I'm still here. Um, so, uh, I think for, for, um, for me it's always been really important to, to connect those two perspectives so that we as academics are not, um, completely operating in isolation.

[00:14:43] Martin Tomitsch: At the same time, it is really important, I feel, I, I believe for, for, uh, academia to,

[00:14:51] yeah.

[00:14:52] Martin Tomitsch: Kind of explore a little bit what the future might look like and maybe sometimes we have the advantage. We don't have clients that [00:15:00] pay that, that, um, pay for our projects. We can sort of decide as an, as a design researcher what we want to explore, um, and what we want to focus on so we can be very experimental.

[00:15:10] And I

[00:15:11] Martin Tomitsch: think what's happened in mostly reflecting on my own practice, I guess, is that there was a shift over the last 10, 15 years from. Focusing on the interaction design. Um, so we are looking at the more detailed experience that people have with technology, and again, in our case, much often very experimental settings to looking at the broader perspective and looking at the methodology and how, how we can shift from.

[00:15:42] Martin Tomitsch: The, from a human centered design to a more responsible approach to using design and also therefore bringing that more responsible approach to students and, and into the design education. Yeah. So I was really interested, uh, that you mentioned that life centered design is becoming an increasingly used approach in industry.

[00:15:59] Martin Tomitsch: It's really [00:16:00] amazing to hear that. Um, I've been teaching, uh, I've been helping our students to learn about this approach for a number of years now, but I've. And also it's recently starting to become aware that this is, this is a term that is actually finding traction in industry, which is really, really exciting, I think.

[00:16:15] Gerry Scullion: Hmm. Absolutely. I wonder if you know Ko Vandyke, um, and bass from standby in Amsterdam and London. They were the ones who introduced it to me 2018. Mm-hmm. So, um, it was at that point, uh, it was actually, this is me name dropping. It was John Akra actually in, uh, when I was doing a conference in Barcelona when I came home from Australia.

[00:16:39] Gerry Scullion: He just said something along the lines of like, you know, when are you gonna realize that human-centered design isn't gonna solve the world? And I kind go, I, I know that, but at the same time, like it's a stepping stone to where we all want to get to. Mm-hmm. Um, and then Ika joined that conversation. I remember the red side.

[00:16:56] Gerry Scullion: Um, and we started talking about life center design. And I was like, actually, you [00:17:00] know what, maybe that's too far away from some of my clients at that stage. But it's defin. I think it's definitely picked up traction. And you can see, all you have to do is Google Life Center design now. Mm-hmm. And I did have a moment where I was like, man, maybe I've Rena, I need to rename the business to to life center design, or this is life center design.

[00:17:18] Gerry Scullion: And it has crossed my mind. I'll tell you what, more than one.

[00:17:22] Steve Baty: I think Jerry, like we, a, a, a a lot of the work that we are talking about and the, yeah. Um, and I'm, I'm sure this is true for a, a lot of the audience of the podcast that. We approached, um, the practice of design within a context that was largely technological, um, for a lot of us, right?

[00:17:44] Steve Baty: So human-centered design as we think about it, a lot of it sits within a technological domain, certainly UX and interaction design and information architecture, or within that technological domain. Um, and it was an attempt to overcome a very engineering [00:18:00] centric approach to the creation of. Technology and, and technological products.

[00:18:06] Steve Baty: Yeah. Um, we didn't involve people in, in that practice. And so positioning it as human-centered design was an important way of taking an engineering centric approach. And we still fight that today. We still see these large tech firms that are heavily engineering, um. Centric. But, um, like I, I remember when we started Melt Studios, um, you know, like back in 2010, we had this clear, um, arc that we were following away from the design of technological systems and interfaces and these sort of, you know, sort of detailed design of interfaces out into these larger things.

[00:18:46] Steve Baty: It is an article I wrote in. 2010 I think it was, um, which talked about the strategic arc of interaction design and it got out to things like public policy and, and transportation systems and, [00:19:00] you know, open systems and the way in which you would approach that differently. So the roadmap has been there for quite some time.

[00:19:08] Steve Baty: Um, the inclusion of actors and non-human actors in the, the map of who needs to be taken into account and what needs to be taken into account and for whose benefit we are designing is a really welcome addition to the tool set. And that idea of saying, well, actually I need to have some. Um, presence or some questioning in the design process that says, well, what about our waterways and what about our wildlife and what about our, you know, precious natural resources that will be depleted or polluted, um, in this process?

[00:19:46] Steve Baty: How are we gonna protect those? How are we gonna regenerate those along the way? Um, and it's really good to see those sorts of tools. Yeah. You know, non-human personas. Martin is one that we talk about in the book as, as a particular example. Um, it's [00:20:00] good to see those sorts of things coming into more regular practice.

[00:20:04] Gerry Scullion: Yeah. I wanna go back to the, the question from Martin, uh, where we were talking about educational systems and stuff there. What I'm hearing when you, you were answering that question was like the, the exploratory nature of exploring the full domain, um, of what's kind of out there in, on earth and on life.

[00:20:27] Gerry Scullion: If we're producing those designers with that massive, uh, mindset and that capability to think like that, which is fantastic, there seems to be a disconnect if they go out into industry. The outcomes that we measure most likely from academia is placement into jobs if they're too broad thinking. Is there a risk there that industry might see it as their too blue sky, their they're two, um, greenfield.

[00:20:54] Gerry Scullion: We wouldn't be able to work with a designer like this. We just want them to be able to hit the ground running. I know the answer [00:21:00] to that question in terms of, well, you know, we still need to get them into the business. So there's this kind of tension between the two worlds. Um. And I think the people listening to this podcast most likely are in that world at the moment.

[00:21:14] Mm-hmm.

[00:21:15] Gerry Scullion: What advice do you give to other academic practices out there at the moment? So question number one, to make sure that they're still able to get into the organization to hopefully transform it and help enable a better outcome. And then two, for people listening too. Who are in businesses that want to experience this transformation?

[00:21:35] Gerry Scullion: This kind of thinking, this exploration, dropping the seeds across the organization to let it flourish, both of you. What advice do you give to those people, to those two questions?

[00:21:46] Martin Tomitsch: Do I establish one? Stephen, you go to two. Yeah. Look at this. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You, you probably also have perfect different perspective on one and me, so let's start with one.

[00:21:55] Martin Tomitsch: Um, you go with one. So, um, I mean, for me, and that's, um. [00:22:00] One of the things that attracted me at, with, uh, in terms of moving to the Transdisciplinary school here at UTS, is that we have very strong industry engagement in our programs. Um, and while from the, the program sort of spun out originally out of the design school and from the outside, people still think it's a design thinking, uh, based.

[00:22:20] Martin Tomitsch: Course in many ways, but from the inside it's, it's not, not design thinking at all. It's transdisciplinary. So it's using different approaches, different ways of thinking. And a really important one that our students here have to learn very early on is systems thinking. And then there's also futures thinking and, and there's creativity and, and other, um, other approaches.

[00:22:41] Martin Tomitsch: And so. The, we sort of really stretched the minds of our students in that way and helped them to ask the right questions, to make the right connections, use creativity to connect the dots, and at the same time, we also bring industry into the classroom. [00:23:00] Working alongside the students and with the students to make sure this is still grounded.

[00:23:04] Martin Tomitsch: That's also really important aspect of transdisciplinarity, that it's still grounded in the real world and there's a real impact.

[00:23:10] Yeah.

[00:23:10] Martin Tomitsch: And that makes, that produces actually really highly employable graduates. Um, we, we, we, so we, our, our employability of the employability of students is, um, like in mid 90%.

[00:23:23] Wow. That's

[00:23:24] Martin Tomitsch: compared to 76% or so. Um, the university average. That's, I think really both because of the way they learn to think and because of the industry engagement. And so, yeah, I, I don't think those two are sort of contradicting each other in a way, or they've, there's, there's not, students are not disadvantaged by learning about life centered design and other approaches, systems thinking.

[00:23:48] Martin Tomitsch: It's actually absolutely not. I think it's a super power for them. But having said that, when I, when I give, um. As, as head of the school, I don't have so much time to teach these days, but when I give guest lectures, and especially with the new book, talking about [00:24:00] the new book and life center design, I always have students come up, design students come up to me afterwards and say, I want to do this.

[00:24:07] Martin Tomitsch: I wanna make this my career. Where can I go and work? And that is really tough because even absolutely, even even a strategic designer in a sort of more additional way, there's not, there's not that many roles still. Um, and so. That's still, I think that, that the industry still is a little laying behind potentially.

[00:24:25] Martin Tomitsch: Yeah. But, um, what I'm hoping is that those students equipped with the skills can go into the industry and start a guest source of shit. Having it, having a conversation about these new ways of thinking and, and, um, and working and using and doing design.

[00:24:40] Steve Baty: Absolutely. I think on the, on the flip side. Of that question.

[00:24:46] Steve Baty: So how does the business respond when a student comes in who's thinking and wants to work in a particular way? Um, and you know, that's not the way the business works. So are these students really right for us? Is [00:25:00] the university doing its job to produce students like this?

[00:25:03] Gerry Scullion: Exactly.

[00:25:03] Steve Baty: The, the other thing that happens is the students get disenfranchised as well, and they get disillusioned and they think that maybe they're in the wrong career.

[00:25:11] Steve Baty: Or at least if, if all workplaces are like this one, then maybe I've taken on the wrong, the wrong role in life. Right? Yeah. So there's, there's that aspect to it as well. But, um. Let me start with a story. So in 1974, I think it was, um, the, uh, state Library of Victoria was in the process. They had decided they were gonna digitize their index, um, cards.

[00:25:35] Steve Baty: So, you know, like most libraries at the time, they had these sort of analog index cards, rows and rows and rows, and draws and draws and draws of. Physical index cards that kept the collection. They were in the process of digitizing it and they realized that they had no idea how to go about doing it. Yeah.

[00:25:52] Steve Baty: Like they just weren't skilled enough. It needed to be done. They had the funding to do it, but they just didn't have the personnel. They certainly didn't have the [00:26:00] capacity to do it, let alone the capability. So they went across the road. If you're familiar with. The State Library of Victoria just across the road is RMIT, or at least one of r MIT's buildings.

[00:26:10] Steve Baty: They went across the road and they went and spoke to the graduating class in library science in 1974. Um, and they said, Hey, you are studying digital record keeping and digital information systems. Do you want a job at the library? And they basic hired out the graduating class in 1974 and took them across the library.

[00:26:35] Steve Baty: And when I was there working in 2014, a lot of them were still there. They were older. Wow. Reference librarians, 40 years later, still working in the thing. Uh, still working in the library. But the thing that got them in the door in the first place was an, uh, an externally imposed need upon the library to modernize.

[00:26:57] Steve Baty: Now, the reason I mention that story is because the [00:27:00] same thing is about to happen to most businesses that make stuff. Yeah, that sell stuff, that distribute stuff. And it will have implications because of the supply chain nature of modern society and modern production. It will have implications as well for anyone who develops software.

[00:27:18] Steve Baty: Anyone who runs an app, anyone who runs a digital service, a data center, or the energy that supplies them, and that is the eus, um, extended producer responsibility and carbon, um, carbon adjustment border mechanism. Border adjustment mechanism, border adjustment mechanism, which will require organizations to have a very clear understanding of their entire end-to-end supply chain.

[00:27:46] Steve Baty: Yeah. Will put in place not only the reporting about those things, but some mandates in place around where they source their materials, that type of materials they source, the durability of those materials. The repairability of the things that they're producing [00:28:00] and the provenance of all of it. Yeah. And Australia has recently adopted a similar framework, and that kind of external shift is going to hit organizations.

[00:28:10] Steve Baty: Australia has 20, 30 deadline for hours. I think the EU is even shorter.

[00:28:14] Yeah.

[00:28:15] Steve Baty: And suddenly an awful lot of organizations are gonna be turning around and looking at schools like Martins and saying, for God's sake, can we have those kids please? Yeah, we need them. We have those students. 'cause suddenly it used to be a bit painful having these kids, you know, with ideas that we didn't want anything to do with, and now they are going to need that thinking and need that skillset.

[00:28:37] Steve Baty: The ability to think in systems, the ability to map, uh, supply chains, the ability to undertake lifecycle analysis and various other tools along the line.

[00:28:46] Yeah.

[00:28:46] Steve Baty: And it will be a regulatory requirement for them to do so. Yeah, absolutely. And I think we're gonna have something similar and those students are gonna replace the 1, 2, 5 or 10 years ago were disillusioned and didn't keep [00:29:00] up with those skills.

[00:29:01] Steve Baty: Yeah. But they're absolutely gonna come out of schools like UTS and go, okay, I can help.

[00:29:07] Gerry Scullion: Absolutely. I mean. Any of the students that I met when I was in Australia that came outta UTS, university of Sydney cofa, they were all brilliant. I don't know what it is about the, the DNA in, uh, the Australian Design School system, but every single person that I met, I was just like, wow, okay.

[00:29:23] Gerry Scullion: They're, they're pretty remarkable. So it's absolutely not, uh, a question pointing the finger at any anyone there about like. Producing the wrong thing. Think absolutely

[00:29:33] Steve Baty: not. Right?

[00:29:33] Gerry Scullion: Yeah. Yeah. It's fantastic, you know, but it's the

[00:29:35] Steve Baty: environments that they go into, Jerry, and I think that's sort of part of the point of the question.

[00:29:39] Steve Baty: It's huge problem

[00:29:39] Gerry Scullion: are,

[00:29:40] Steve Baty: are the organizations who are hiring them ready to make good use of that mindset and those skills. And I think the time is coming where they are forced to, where they won't get, say no.

[00:29:54] Gerry Scullion: Absolutely. I mean, I remember years and years ago leaving as an industrial [00:30:00] designer in 2002 and I could not find a job.

[00:30:03] Gerry Scullion: Mm-hmm. I was like, you know, I remember being interviewed in Sydney in 2002 or 2003 the first time, and they're like, so did you study psychology? And I was like. Nope. They were like, they weren't, they weren't really interested. 'cause it was, it was a field full of psychologists at the time. Mm-hmm. Um, and then suddenly a few years later, like whenever the UX scene started to open up, I was like, all that stuff that I studied is suddenly relevant now.

[00:30:27] Gerry Scullion: So. Mm-hmm. It's not about the time, it's usually about the timing. Um, and a lot of these situations is, is really interesting. So. Let's go back to the book. Okay. 'cause this is why we're, we're, we're kind of here. It's, it is called Designing Tomorrow. Okay. Um, I wanna talk about the roles and responsibilities of designers and organizations.

[00:30:50] Gerry Scullion: Um, we've, we've touched on it a little bit around if you want the, the producers of designers, I guess the design schools in academia, but. Where do you [00:31:00] see the, the future of design in regards how it lives within organizations and governments as well, uh, to ensure that we're actually moving forward. And if you've got any practical advices, uh, in under a hundred words and how you can get this started in governments, I'd love to hear it.

[00:31:17] Gerry Scullion: How many joking. But I'd love to know any advice that you could give to people listening who are in governments at the moment who have been talking about this stuff? A lot of my clients have been talking about this stuff. For a very long time and they're struggling. They're struggling at the moment.

[00:31:33] Martin Tomitsch: The, maybe, maybe I'll start, I'll start again.

[00:31:35] Martin Tomitsch: Yeah, go for it. See if that's okay. Um, in particular, again, you're probably a better place to answer the second part of that question. Yeah. Um, and, and way we also haven't actually answered your second question from earlier, but it's connected, I think, um, in terms of it's connected, how people can start within organizations.

[00:31:50] Martin Tomitsch: Yeah. And that's, that's how we really thought about, um. The book and also what trove the structure of the book. Um, so the, the book presents [00:32:00] um, three pillars for strategic design. And, and each of those pillars has three strategic design tactics. So nine strategic design tactics, um, in, in total. And each, um, include tools and strategies.

[00:32:13] Martin Tomitsch: So we really try to make it really. Um, accessible and actionable and, and allowing people to start small. And we make a big point about this idea of 1% change in the book.

[00:32:25] Yeah.

[00:32:26] Martin Tomitsch: Um, and we can maybe later unpack what that means, but to come, to, come back to your, to your question. We, I mean, I. For me, the, the way the role of design is changing.

[00:32:37] Martin Tomitsch: Um, and I've been asked by a colleague to give a, a lecture, I guess lecture about the future of design in a few weeks. So I need to think about that actually. Um, for me that's really shifting towards, it's not like ai for me, that's shifting how we do design and, and the role of the strategic designer. And, um, I dunno if you've read the book, um, a fine line, but Har er.

[00:32:58] Martin Tomitsch: Founder of Frog [00:33:00] Design? Um, no, it's not a very widely, um, noted book. Wasn't widely noticed, um, and had, didn't have a big uptake, which is interesting. It's, it's really brilliant. And he, he talks about his experience, of course, founding Frog and working with, um, I think Sony and Apple. Um, and, um, he, he also presents quite a clear vision for the, what a strategic designer is and how a strategic designer is able to.

[00:33:25] Martin Tomitsch: Understand people and the needs, but also has the understanding of technology and is able to apply business and economic thinking. And I think that's the key that strategic designers are able to connect all of those things. And that's why, coming back to what I said earlier for for what? For, for, for me, uh.

[00:33:44] Martin Tomitsch: Uh, design strategies. It's in a strategy department. Yeah. There's often confusion and critical in the, in the us Um, design strategy and strategic design are used in the same way, but it's usually kind of using design thinking or human-centered design to help a company develop a strategy. [00:34:00] But strategic design is completely embedded.

[00:34:04] Martin Tomitsch: Strategic side organization. It's part of the DNA of the organization. It works across the departments. That's also about transdisciplinary, again, being really important. Strategic designers have to be able to think in transdisciplinary ways and speak different languages, be able to bring all of these things together.

[00:34:20] Martin Tomitsch: So yes, the tools we influence strategy. But they also, um, understand the customers, they understand the bigger system, the, the, uh, unintended consequences. So they're able to bring all of these things together to shift the organization, and really importantly, have the ability to apply futures thinking, um, or bringing methods for future thinking into the work.

[00:34:41] Martin Tomitsch: And so they can slowly nudge the organization in the right direction. Um, yeah, in very subtle, but, um, powerful ways, me meaningful

[00:34:49] Gerry Scullion: ways. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. Steve, would you like to add to that?

[00:34:52] Steve Baty: Where I see design being positioned in the future in a way that we haven't seen yet is [00:35:00] in the boardroom, so not at that executive level, but at that board level in roles where the role of the board is to ensure that good questions are being asked, right?

[00:35:10] Steve Baty: So are we asking the right questions that allow us to assess risks that allow us to look towards the horizon and make sure that. We are giving ourselves time to not only take on opportunities, but to avoid risks along the way. Um, that I think is something that we will see more of with design, um, and that the role of design will start to be asking good questions at that exec, at that board level, and then.

[00:35:43] Steve Baty: Contributing to the way in which the executive and the management teams within the organization actually deliver on those answers and help the organization navigate that

[00:35:57] Steve Baty: complexity's. I love that. Go

[00:35:58] Martin Tomitsch: ahead, Steve. Martin, can [00:36:00] I, can I add just also, 'cause that's a great academic paper that talks about, um, the rise of strategic design and it. It compares it to strategic design and design thinking. And one, it's very aligned to what you're saying, Steve, about asking questions.

[00:36:11] Martin Tomitsch: One of the things it says is the paper. In the paper, the academic says that, um, design thinking is about problem solving. But strategic design is also about problem setting. Yes. And that's something connected to asking the right questions. Yeah. Yeah. And um, also interesting what you're saying, Steve, in terms of that it's not on the executive level because I think we have seen that during the era of design thinking where lots of big collaboration.

[00:36:38] Martin Tomitsch: Uh, created Chief Design Officer. Chief experience officer roles. Yeah. And I mean, in Australia I can think of at least three big organizations where recent, where recently that discontinued that role. Yes. So it's almost a bit of an experiment maybe in company and, and I understand why, and it's interesting to see how that shift.

[00:36:57] Steve Baty: Yeah, but if I, I, [00:37:00] why? Um, and, and I, and I know a few of those roles, right? Like I know a few of the organizations that we're talking about, which have that sort of chief experience officer, chief customer officer. But in most cases, that person does not have responsibility. For the experience. They get to talk about it, they get to measure it.

[00:37:20] Steve Baty: They get to, you know, collaborate with others, but they don't have a budget. They don't control the outcomes. They don't have the authority to make changes. For that experience. Um, and so they don't really have the means to impact it. So if I'm the organization and I'm looking at, you know, this sort of C-suite role, a, a Chief Experience officer who doesn't have.

[00:37:46] Steve Baty: Direct revenue raising capabilities who isn't directly responsible for reducing costs and who isn't on the hook or accountable for change and, and outcomes within, [00:38:00] like, you know, like it's all within somebody else's department. I'd get rid of them as well. Yeah, and I'm surprised a lot of them didn't quit in frustration anyway.

[00:38:13] Gerry Scullion: Yeah. So do you gonna say something there, Martin? No. You all good?

[00:38:19] Martin Tomitsch: No, just agreeing with that. On,

[00:38:21] Gerry Scullion: on, on that point. So like, just on on, on the, the topic of, of, of building on this, when it comes to those kind of the future of design within organizations, um, what are the steps we can get to ensure that that 1%.

[00:38:38] Gerry Scullion: Uh, change. I think you're like, how, how that can compound really over time because one, one of my, in my experience when I'm working with local governments and governments and even when I'm training them, um, it's very hard to, to visualize this impact across the organization. 'cause these organizations aren't made up of five or 10 people.

[00:38:59] Gerry Scullion: There's [00:39:00] thousands and thousands of people. And one of the big blockers that I'm seeing for executives in particular is. Being able to actually visualize what's actually happening and where they can strategically put their money and their investments. What advice do you give to those organizations who are struggling with that?

[00:39:19] Gerry Scullion: Well, what are the things that they can lean more into at this stage? So they set 'em up nicely for maybe a third horizon

[00:39:27] Steve Baty: to the, the biggest thing for me is to start mapping the system within which they operate. And include outside of their organization in that system map. And the reason why I say that is because it forces them to reassess.

[00:39:42] Gerry Scullion: Yeah, a hundred

[00:39:42] Steve Baty: percent. Where they draw their boundary in terms of their, their sphere of influence. It's not. Only within the walls of their organization. It's absolutely outside the walls of their organization. But the first step in actually recognizing that and then taking [00:40:00] responsibility for the decisions that impact further upstream and further downstream is that system map.

[00:40:06] Steve Baty: So once that's in place, the next step for me is to start moving away from this idea of first order direct impacts and start thinking about flow on effects, the ripple effects, the second or third order effects, and start asking yourself the question, might I, might I achieve? Longer lasting and more impactful results with a second order or indirect intervention in this system instead of trying to go hard at it with a first order and direct thing.

[00:40:41] Steve Baty: And once you start thinking in those sorts of terms, yeah, I'm gonna build up momentum bit by bit and come at it rather than trying to tackle this big thing. Right? Like if you, if you think about the impact of like, if I had. Let's say I had a pile of rocks and I was standing next [00:41:00] to a, um, a building and I was throwing rocks at that building.

[00:41:04] Steve Baty: I tie myself out really, really quickly, right? But if I run up the hill. Start throwing rocks at the side of the hill and start an avalanche. I'll take that building out without any trouble whatsoever. And we need to think more like that. Yeah. Not necessarily about destruction of public property, but about the use of those compounding effects that come on a smart invention, a smart intervention that has a compounding effect like an avalanche does.

[00:41:36] Steve Baty: What is it we can do that's within our means that will build over time, such that the problem that we're trying to solve will be overwhelmed

[00:41:44] Gerry Scullion: up over time.

[00:41:49] Gerry Scullion: Yeah. And that, that's a really, really, organization enables to identify those opportunities, opportunities. Yeah. Yeah. No, absolutely. It's, it's, it's solid advice. [00:42:00] Now I've got, I, I've got one question on this point. Okay. And it's, it's kind of gonna wrap up where we're at in this conversation, and, and perhaps if you're open to it, we could come back for a second conversation on this because it's, it's fascinating to.

[00:42:12] Gerry Scullion: To talk so openly about these, these challenges when you're working in that space, and you mentioned there the CDO, you're surprised that some of them didn't resign or would've been so, you know, utterly frustrating and heartbreaking at times where you're up against that rock. Hmm. What is the role of academia and organizations to ensure that the resilience is maintained for designers when they're working in these spaces?

[00:42:37] Gerry Scullion: Because. You know, as you mentioned there, mark and the team at at UTS and. Other academia, uh, functions across the world can produce the world class best designers. They're super resilient, and then they go into these organizations and they're hitting their heads against the wall. We, we don't want them to leave.

[00:42:56] Gerry Scullion: We want them to sustain and remain and [00:43:00] fight the fight, so to speak, to ensure that that 1% is being adhered to and, and met. But that takes a lot of resilience building and that's something that might be missing in the academic model at the moment, and also the organizational duty of care. Yep. Do you have any advice to designers who are, who are currently going through so you can see what's happening in the US at the moment?

[00:43:20] Gerry Scullion: Designers are all being laid off in, in the US government and the digital services. This isn't a time for, um, you know, we need to think proactively about how we can actually ensure that their, their wellbeing is being met.

[00:43:33] Martin Tomitsch: I think, I mean, from my perspective, I think we have a responsibility as, uh, academic and academics and educators to not only, um, train students in, uh, in methods, techniques, um, uh, tools, uh, strategies, but to also prepare them for the, for the, um, future work environments or.

[00:43:56] Martin Tomitsch: Roles and organizations they're going into. So, [00:44:00] um, avoiding that to have that shock from where they leave university, where they, um, often maybe work on like fiction in, in, in some cases, work on fictional Braves and create an amazing portfolio, but then sort of a hit really hard by reality. So again, we are doing that by bringing industry in, but also by sending students out into doing internships.

[00:44:20] Martin Tomitsch: But I think we need to put more efforts on that. Um. Of course universities are not places where we, we are not just about skills and yeah, skills training, um, uh, but it's about, um, a certain, uh, being able to learn, essentially universities are helping, helping students to be lifelong learners in a way. And that's part of, was a resilience building.

[00:44:47] Martin Tomitsch: Um, and I.

[00:44:51] Martin Tomitsch: Another, I think another component in UN around resilience building is to, um. I wanna say, I'm not sure if it totally applies, but I wanna say, [00:45:00] uh, sort of throwing students into multiple challenges throughout the degree so that they, I mean, in, in many ways that builds resilience in, in that students are trained to be able to deal with uncertainty and complexity.

[00:45:13] Martin Tomitsch: I. Um, and we see that now where we have transdisciplinary, uh, transdisciplinary programs where students from across the university come together through specific, um, subjects with us. Yeah. And the science students are often the ones that really struggle with that because they really wanna know what they have to do.

[00:45:30] Martin Tomitsch: Exactly. Um, and they're being thrown into this environment where they have, uh. A, a, a badly defined challenge that is complex and really hard to understand and untangle. Mm-hmm. And don't know where to start. And so, I mean, I believe that's also building resilience. And maybe the third component from, from me, and I see that sort of really rising here in Sydney at the moment, is the role of.

[00:45:52] Martin Tomitsch: Community. And, uh, that's in the form, for example, of meetups. Uh mm-hmm. That I think play really important role to [00:46:00] help Absolutely. People build resilience because you realize you're not alone with your struggles. You're not alone with the challenges of that. It's finding a job or trying to convince your client about doing the right thing, and he can talk to each other on, in that community, uh, in the meetup for format.

[00:46:16] Steve Baty: Yeah. I love it. I'd, I'd go, I'd go further, Steve. Yeah. Yeah, I look, the, the thing that I would add, and I think that last point, um, Martin, that you were making is really, really critical. I think part of the challenge for us as an industry is that in a lot of ways we are trying to operate on our own, within our own organization, maybe with our own team, et cetera.

[00:46:40] Steve Baty: So the community meetups are really, really important. But equally, if you are in an industry or a design related industry that has a union. Join the union. If you're in an industry that has an industry association. The Society of Industrial Design, the Institute of Architects, the [00:47:00] Australian, uh, graphic Design Association, and the equivalent in other parts of the world.

[00:47:05] Steve Baty: The Interaction Design Association used to be one as well, that, you know, like that's clearly a part of for, for quite some time. Those. Collective long term activities are really, really critical for exactly the reason that you just said, Martin. It helps us realize that we are not alone. It helps us realize that there are other people attempting to do the same things that we are.

[00:47:26] Steve Baty: Um, and equally those different organizations and those different collectives. Are able to put their weight behind public programs that say, actually as a community and as an industry, we are not happy with the way you're engaging in business. We are not happy with the profit motive. We are not happy with the way you're spoiling the environment.

[00:47:46] Steve Baty: We are not happy with these choices around consumption and waste and, and we want to see you do better. And I think that's where. Um, that resilience stops being an individual trait and starts being an [00:48:00] industry and a communal trade, and that's where the real strength comes.

[00:48:06] Gerry Scullion: Uh, excellent. One last thing. If you're listening and you're in an organization and you're like, I don't get any of this and I don't have to worry about it, it's not gonna affect me. What advice do you give to those people in getting started and what's the first step that they can do? Uh, and Steve, you're not allowed to say, hire, hire designers.

[00:48:31] Gerry Scullion: I want, I want them to take the first step themselves personally. What advice would you give them to help their organizations think about designing? Tomorrow.

[00:48:41] Steve Baty: So I think any, any individual within an organization can start thinking, um, of the system within which they operate. Um, I, I think that's important.

[00:48:51] Steve Baty: Yeah. I think the, the, the first thing I would encourage people to do, um, is go and learn for themselves what happens [00:49:00] to their product when it's finished. How do people get rid of it? How is it treated? Once it leaves your warehouse or your showroom, go and take a look. Go and ask people how long is it kept?

[00:49:10] Steve Baty: How is it treated? How is it disposed of? Go and find out. Go and find out how it's made. Go and find out how the materials are sourced. Go and find out how it's harvested or cut down, or where it's where it's produced from. Go and look at the conditions of the workers in those locations. See for yourself.

[00:49:29] Steve Baty: And then when you come back to the office, start asking questions around, am I comfortable with those situations? And what might I do differently instead? That'd be my starting point. I

[00:49:39] Gerry Scullion: love it. Excellent. I love that. Steve Martin, what, what would your take on that be? Anything else to add? I.

[00:49:48] Martin Tomitsch: Yeah, maybe, um, to have a close look at the KPIs and, um, whether the KPIs are measuring the right thing, um, and whether there are things that are being missed that need to be measured.[00:50:00]

[00:50:00] Martin Tomitsch: Mm-hmm. And one way to find that, to, to test it, um, is to. Um, use, uh, uh, like future thinking and, um, project into the future, what the organization might do and look like in say, 10 years, 20 years, 50 years, and what, how KPIs might be different at that point. And then sort of bringing that back to the now.

[00:50:22] Martin Tomitsch: And not all of them will be relevant in the now, but there might be some that can inspire that. And it's also a conversation, a method that can be used really easily, um, uh, in any kind of meeting. Um, sort of start looking at the future and working backwards is, so it's a method we call back casting. So working backwards from the, from the, from the future scenario.

[00:50:43] Martin Tomitsch: So really kind of like opening up their mind and trying to think differently about the organization.

[00:50:49] Gerry Scullion: Like a reverse engineer. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. Uh, I love it. So folks, I'm gonna give away a copy of the book. Um, I'm gonna, I'll purchase this myself and I'll, I'll ship it to [00:51:00] anywhere in the world. Uh, ideally if you're, if you win it and you're in somewhere like America or in Australia, we'll buy it locally so we can reduce the carbon emissions.

[00:51:08] Gerry Scullion: Um, great. Steve and Martin, I wrap up every conversation by thanking you for your vulnerability coming on the show. Let me go left, right. Um, up and down and sometimes backwards as well. Uh, so thank you for giving me your time and your energy. I know it's probably a little bit later in the evening for you as well, and I really, really appreciate it.

[00:51:27] Gerry Scullion: You're always welcome back in the show to talk about this stuff. I thorough enjoyed it. Wonderful. Pleasure, Jerry. Thank you. Thanks so much for giving me the opportunity. Thank

[00:51:34] Steve Baty: you so

[00:51:34] Gerry Scullion: much. Really great

[00:51:35] Martin Tomitsch: chatting to you. Great. Really enjoyed the conversation. Thank you. Thanks for having us.

[00:51:39] Gerry Scullion: Anytime.