Design profession predictions for 2019

Happy New Year! My annual design industry observations are out — let me know what you agree or disagree with as we start to design 2019. You can also jump half-way down this post for a retrospective on my 2018 predictions.

2019 Predictions

Saturated design-thinking

Kind of obvious for many of you, but definitely this is the big one. Design-thinking is dead. Long live design.

These days, there are few organisations (be they big or small) that have either not heard of DT or embraced it in some form. Whereas previously I (and my cohort) created waves by introducing DT as a way to approach things differently, these days I’m more likely to meet a new client who tells me how their executive team have been through a DT course, or how their mid-managers are all design-thinkers; having collaborated with agencies and consultancies on the methods or picked up a certification or two as part of their L&D budgets.

Regardless of which flavour of DT we’re talking about (i.e. pure DT or bastardised DT), lots of people feel comfortable with the common components and attempt to use them ad-hoc. The trouble is, when you skip essential parts (like user/customer inclusion), the system breaks down and the blame is placed on DT itself as not being effective. Or when DT is used solely as a working process (which it is not), it is blamed for being lethargic — leading to shortcuts being sought to jump to conclusions (negating the DT ideology again).

Either way, the net result is DT is yesterday's news and 2019 will see a lot less chatter about taking a DT-led approach to a project. The propensity in this age of rapid innovation is towards silver-bullet answers. This will give opportunity to genuine creative thinkers still being highly valued as being able to add something new to a situation. There will also be more emphasis on ideation and direct implementation. Note that I didn’t say prototyping, as I feel the test-and-learn mantra is also being diluted in favour of simply getting to market.

There is some light at the end of the tunnel though, as I think we’ll see strong commitment and usage of concepts like Jobs To Be Done and value proposition design. Personally I’m happy with this as the focus remains on the user/customer and the outcome, whereas DT has been a pseudonym for a linear process that frankly has more in common with waterfall than it does with Agile working.

Democratisation of toolchains

Following on from design-thinking becoming accessible to the masses, it’s inevitable that the next frontier is the tooling of design. Way back when, the learning curve to use software like Photoshop and even Axure was high enough to prevent non-designers from getting hands on. Now however, we have a plethora of people with a pseudo-designers mindset and they need to get their ideas on paper/pixels.

We’ve all seen memes about the pains felt by designers being briefed and micro-managed by a client (or other manager), but this is set to swing the other way — where designers are bypassed altogether and low-fidelity tools are used by everybody to visualise, prototype and storytell. Many designers have spent the last few years distilling their process to democratise design-thinking (with mixed results) and the pressure is shifting to continue this trend of training non-designers to more practical methods.

Toolchains such as the InVision suite have really disrupted the workspace previously dominated by Adobe. Not to say the latter isn’t relevant or powerful; it still remains the best choice for crafting beautiful design in well-constructed formats and workflows. However, what the likes of InVision and Canva (and Sketch, Principle etc) have done is allow a high-quality level of output to be achievable without understanding design at the grass-roots level, using smart templates, drag and drop and even AI. Sure, there are swathes of teams made up of real designers working with these tools, but there is also an upsurge of non-designers using them regularly to expand their skillset beyond ideation and product management and into solution ownership.

Design ambassadors 2.0

A few years ago, we saw brands appoint celebrities as creative directors (Lady Gaga at Polaroid, Will.i.am at Intel etc). Most of these appointments were more of a PR stunt than a relevant design posting, but there was some interesting ideology in this that will see a refreshed approach in 2019 and into 2010.

We already know that design has been moving it’s way up the food chain; including corporate visibility, status, funding and executives. The emergence of the Chief Design Officer, Head of Design, Design Boards and other leadership platforms for design are increasingly taking shape at progressive organsations. Whilst we (hopefully) won’t get the ad-industry approach of appointing a pop-star to the corporate C-Suite, we will see the inclusion of high profile designers in leadership forums; as advisors, mentors and advocates.

There are a few models being tried to this, including:

• Engaging design rock-stars on an initiative/retainer to help on a specific issue or project.
• Forming a leadership forum that is either design-led or has designers appointed to craft the future.
• Elevating the voice of internal design leaders to help more of the leadership/organisation understand the design value and philosophy being taken in operations.

Desultancy

Designers fight back! As the wave of agency acquisitions by larger firms continues, designers are questioning with more ferocity their destiny in the consulting paradigm. Will they be forever relegated to pixel pushers for the ‘real’ consultants from b.school? Will they live in as an in-house boutique? Will they retreat back to the comfort of agency bean-bags? Will they achieve the same career highs, incomes and status as their MBA peer group by staying true to design? All of these questions and many more are increasingly becoming the existential topic of conversation in firms that have invested in external design talent.

In my own humble opinion, we are at an inflexion point on this. And from 2019 onwards we will see a resurgence of design authorities crafting the new operating models in and outside of consulting. I call this cohort desultants; in that they are a hybrid of designer|consultant and because they are de-constructing what that means in order to define a new path.

You can read more about desultancy in my introductory post: https://medium.com/@h6khn/2019-the-year-of-desultancy-9f7be62ef3b7

Look out also for some new projects and initiatives by me under the desultant moniker.

Dark Mode

Ending on a design trend/pattern that gained favour last year, we will see more apps, products and brands embrace dark tone, high contrast aesthetics as a way to align with digital technology, anti-privacy sentiment and move on from ‘me too’ white-space material design.

Personally I’m still awaiting (and experimenting) with UI patterns inspired by John Underkofflers work, but we’re not quite there yet (although some of my old design team will remember us playing with this for the Aevi design system back in 2013). Since then, we’ve seen it gain huge popularity within the Marvel Universe — particularly as an AI interface to JARVIS, Ironmans heads-up AR and more. I’m hoping that with black being the new black this season, combined with a massive focus of design for emerging technology, we’ll finally start to see UI kits, interaction styles and most importantly the tech to make this a reality.

2018 Predictions Revisited

I’m often disappointed by annual prediction lists, as they seem to forget about tracking past predictions. I’ll try not to fall into that trap.

Last year I highlighted some themes I felt were set to emerge and grow. I’ve given them a refresh below, but you can still read the full 2018 article here: https://medium.com/@h6khn/design-profession-predictions-for-2018-76ef6325b7bc

Systems Design & Systems Thinking

Whilst there is always activity, I didn’t feel that Systems Design came to the fore in 2018. It was disappointing to not hear as much hype and interest as I was expecting, but I think it’s because as a concept it is still ahead of its time. I predict that 2019 will also see slow, but steady growth in this arena and it’s still one of my big-bets as far as professional design evolution is concerned. Ultimately, this is a complex and mature state of professional design and the ecosystem dependencies remain the biggest barrier to realising the value of the practice. World Health will probably see the biggest upsurge of systems design work, followed by other NGO activity.

In commercial organisations, most work and team environments are still very ‘project-centric’ in their views and approach; constantly seeking short-term gain through discrete activity. This is true of both internal teams and consulting (where I hail from). Systems Design however, leans more towards open and cyclical work patterns that build a momentum of change and deliver value in more transformational and disruptive waves. The project-centric approach is definitely a factor slowing down adoption, as stakeholders either struggle to sponsor longer-term design and implementation or are yet to understand how it works.

There has been good progress made though. For obvious reasons, most of the systems design work I see and hear about is done within the confines of an organisations internal ecosystem, with less activity on multi-entity dynamics. However, this is the starting point of expanding the field of view wider than a single service/experience and it is increasing fast. Interdependence is definitely the issue of the day, as transformation programmes continue to highlight that value creation and realisation will come from multiple routes and not just a solution to a discrete problem.

The main outcome from 2018 is that organisations are realising the limitations of singular fields of view and therefore the skillsets available to deliver change differently. The saturation of design-thinking will evolve into experimentation with Systems Thinking and this will be the next tier of growth in this space over 2019. We’ll see this come to life through think-tanks, leadership forums, consortiums, JVs, PPP etc. The design and implementation side will continue to mature under the radar and the specialists will either be core employees/players within large organisations or in the gig economy; as agencies and consultancies prove to be too restrictive in the L&D and engagement opportunities to develop as a dedicated professional. However, this is also a challenge to the consulting world, as they remain best placed to lead the field. Expect some exciting and interesting boutique firms/teams/brands to pop-up in this space over the next 24 months as challengers to conventional project consultancies.

DesignOps & Design Systems

This one certainly came true and will continue to grow at pace in 2019. The ideology of Design Systems have inspired me a lot in the last 12 months.

During the second half of 2018, I shifted my role and focus to scaling design at EY beyond my own tribe in Dubai; part of our wider integration of consulting across Africa, India and MENA (AIM). This has involved reshaping the existing team, losing and hiring new people and most recently adding fantastic new talent like the folks at Fortune Cookie to the group through acquisition. Getting three regions, cultures and design communities working in unison is one of the bigger tests for DesignOps I’ve come across and we’re still defining, deploying and improving how we make this work. I’ll be sharing the insights and learnings from this journey at the first DesignOps Global Conference in Manchester in May. Thanks to my old friend, colleague and now event organiser Pete Fossick for the invitation to speak and share.

On the applied side of design systems, in my home region, we’re particularly proud of our work on Boubyan Rubix (credit: Moses Doss & April Salvador). We started within the mobile app redesign, but by introducing the design system from the start, we’ve been able to lay the foundations for the other channels (web, internet banking, ATM and even IVR). More importantly, the system has been handed back into the client team and their internal squads to own and grow. I was also introduced to the excellent work of Leo Ehrlich on Etisalat Compass, so it’s great to see prominent brands in the region take design systems seriously. No doubt their leadership will inspire others to industrialise design and we can expect more work, inspiration and quality in this domain for sure. Personally, I have put a design system at the centre of a handful of large project opportunities as a way to help squads deliver faster and with better quality — particularly when there are multiple channels in play. I’m really excited to get stuck into these projects and would love to hear more from the community about their adoption of Design Systems in the workplace.

Life Design

Another one that is taking longer to emerge than I predicted is life design, although this isn’t a bad thing. Shifting the usage of design thinking and application to peoples lives is not to be taken lightly and those interested in doing so are more likely to do it through non-commercial drivers; inner-purpose, obligation, compassion/empathy and personal growth will be the scorecard over income potential — at least for now.

As with executive coaching, there are certainly opportunities for lucrative service provision, but equally, this only comes from experience, quality and results. So it takes time for it to take hold and therefore in 2019 I think we will see more available services and at an accessible price point. From that, we will of course see some rock-star life designers start to emerge, but it will be a while before we have a new Tony Robbins.

In the meantime, I will take heart from the opening few paragraphs of Bill Gates 2018 retrospective, which talks about the emergence of conscious well-being as a trend. This is the undertone to which life design is a solution, so I’m excited that thought-leaders like Bill are increasingly aware of the need for services to help people in this arena (a lot of what he says resonates with Systems Design too).

https://www.gatesnotes.com/About-Bill-Gates/Year-in-Review-2018