Change By Design Book Summary Book Review Sample

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‘Change by Design’ seems to be the perfect title for Tim Brown’s book owing to the transformational ideas presented to bring about changes in the real world using a human approach to suit many fields of life and not just in the design field. Tim Brown is the CEO and President of the IDEO (Innovation, Design Engineering Organization). An industrial engineer by qualification, Brown is amongst those handful people of the new century who believe in design thinking and that innovation is the solution to human demands. He has carried out a list of seminars on many platforms repeatedly speaking on his design values as well as appearing on TED.com.
His book Change by Design: How Design Thinking Transforms Organizations and Inspires Innovation was published in September 2009 by Harper Business and has led the way to bringing a revolution in regard to innovation and what the human mind is capable of. He has briefly explained how the most extraordinary innovations come into existence through a process that is meticulous in nature and takes much deliberation before identifying the best possible solution to the problem at hand. He calls this method or methodology to be more accurate ‘design thinking’. The book centers on the idea of design thinking and has given many examples to justify his stance on the subject matter. Brown considers ‘design thinking’ to be an elaborative process grouping together a bunch of minds directed towards one general cause and how a solution is developed that is not only feasible to the entire project but also is practical in the real-world market. As stated above, it is basically a human approach to making certain that a need is turned into a demand using design thinking, and helping people and organizations become more creative which in turn gives a solution that is not only viable but also appealing to human existence. Brown also speaks about his firm and how IDEO has managed to tabulate the difference between design and art. He believes that if America has to function, has to produce solutions then why not be creative at it when we can. He says that design and art are the same as commerce and function and it’s high time that designers speak out to the corporate America and explain how it is the need of the hour to come up solutions that add a little color the world. The first part of the books largely discusses the two concepts of design, one being that the ‘design brief’ and its inherent constraints are responsible for finalizing a certain design and the next that claims that all designers are ‘human centered’ even if the client is unable to express his
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needs and concerns. Brown talks about companies in America are struggling to provide a comfortable and productive environment to their employees. His concern is elucidated by the problem that company ‘Mattel’ faced, he explains that Mattel was finding it difficult to create a little space for their employees to set back and take a break, the author is horrified to learn that if a toy company is having problems building a “fun” space then the rest of corporate America is certainly in hot waters. And this needs to be tackled, he says that the world understands that MFA is far more fun than MBA but MBA fuels the world and this needs to be taken care of if we want the economy to keep running. In the second half of the book, Brown talks about design thinking meets corporations. Whereby many heads together develop qualitative rather than quantitative methods and inviting people who vary in usage and are not the client of the subject matter can help you give you a better idea what might be the best solution. Here he explains using insights and inspiration to bring about a change. Brown also goes onto say that these methodologies are not only applicable and useful for designers but all organizations. He gives the examples of Kaiser Permanente and how it increased the quality of patient care by re−examining the ways that their nurses manage shift change‚ or Kraft to rethink supply chain management. He says that anyone who is anyone who is a creative leader can follow this approach and bring results that are far better for the world, business and society itself.