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1 Winning by design: technology, product design and international competitiveness
Books and Publications
1 Winning by design: technology, product design and international competitiveness Vivien Walsh, Robin Roy, Margaret Bruce and Stephen Potter, Blackwell, Oxford (1992) 274 pp, £17.95, ISBN 0 631 18511 9 Way back in 1965, the Financial Times published a collection of articles under the title, 'Profit by design'. Now we have an important book, 'Winning by design', from the Design Innovation Group (DIG), a collaboration between academics at the Open University and at Manchester. The central messages are the same: successful firms make better use of design, communication between different functions is important and so on. A n important addition in 'Winning by design' is the international dimension. 'Winning' applies not just to successful firms in one industry but also to countries engaged in international competition. The international dimension allows for discussion of the fact that successful countries must allow some industrial activities to decline to be replaced by others. The second difference from thirty years ago is that Winning by design includes the results of research. People interested in research into the organizational environment of design will find a variety of research methods to contemplate. The results of one of the D I G studies are not included in the book. The data which show that firms who used design consultants increased their profits are published separately, this is unfortunate. Such data is needed in the battle to
230
convince engineers, managing directors, accountants etc. that design pays. Otherwise, we are still in 1965.
Winning by design is one of those very useful publications we have come to expect from the Open University tradition. It is both useful for teaching and of interest to researchers in the area. The O U Course P791, Managing Design, will use this book as will many others. The chapters end with 'Lessons and conclusions' which in effect are a set of notes capable of being learnt by people who have to pass exams. As claimed by the cover, it is a 'comprehensive text for students of management, design and marketing'. Whether it is also 'an essential guide for those involved in product development, marketing and business strategy' is more debatable. The book and the studies on which it is based are rather narrow in focus. Winning by design means successful new product development. 'New' means mainly 'a little bit new'. The lack of attention to other areas of design is justified by the claim that Britain is already good at them but product design is the field in which there is the greatest need for improvement. In practice, product design is mainly market-led design improvement and incremental innovation but the authors do claim that the most successful firms will also have a place for the higher risks of producing products ahead of market demand. The concept of market-led incremental innovation opens up a deep problem. Economists like
Design Studies Vol 15 No 2 April 1994
markets; management students like marketing; real companies seem to like marketing departments. But there is no market for something that does not exist. If design is dominated by something else called marketing how can design survive?
lem outside all previous human experience. This approach to design and design for the market are not the same thing. However, in terms of international competition, we might need more design for the market and Winning by design is helping to achieve that aim.
The book offers creative marketing as a way round this problem. This involves 'probing for complex motivational information to try to get to grips with the problem of understanding what customers and users want'.
John Langrish
Another way might be to concentrate on properties rather than products. People pay for desirable properties. Some properties are not really amenable to marketing. These include status, novelty and joy. One definition of design is planning affordable joy. There is not much joy in market-led incremental innovation. The growth of so-called joy-riding suggests that society is failing to provide opportunities for joy and forcing the growth of a noncontrolled (black?) market. None of the four authors is a designer. May be one day, designers will carry out this kind of research themselves. Then we will know more about what actually happens to design and to designers in a marketing dominated environment. This slight criticism should not detract from the value of Winning by design. It is an excellent summary of existing thought combined with the results of original research. It is itself designed for a market but we must not forget that some new things create a demand where none existed. This reviewer is left with an unmet need for a book like Papanek's 'Design for the real world' which is prepared to discuss the preposterous question of what constitutes a totally new prob-
Book reviews
2 Form, structure and mechanism Michael French, Macmillan Education Ltd., Basingstoke, UK (1992) £45.00, 226 pp, ISBN 0333 518 835 This is a book aimed at mechanical engineering students at undergraduate level. It is not a substitute for textbooks on mechanical engineering nor a presentation of case studies for students. It may best be read at the final stage of education. The examples show the application of a typical mixture of mathematics, static calculus and engineering, known as design engineering. The book offers a splendid elaboration on the sparsely taught main principles of engineering design and gives a clear demonstration of the many aspects to be considered. Examples of important principles included are: recurrent problems in design, pertinacity, principles for joint design, principles for nesting and stacking of functions, force paths, and in general the strength of abstraction of functions in the analysis of problems. After the preliminaries the book introduces some general design aids and principles. Discussed are 'what is the essence' to be tackled, alternative solutions to the problem, methods for systematic exploration of options, combination and separation of functions. The realistic settings of these subjects are of great value for the intended students. This will certainly keep
231
1 Winning by design: technology, product design and international competitiveness Vivien Walsh, Robin Roy, Margaret Bruce and Stephen Potter, Blackwell, Oxford (1992) 274 pp, £17.95, ISBN 0 631 18511 9 Way back in 1965, the Financial Times published a collection of articles under the title, 'Profit by design'. Now we have an important book, 'Winning by design', from the Design Innovation Group (DIG), a collaboration between academics at the Open University and at Manchester. The central messages are the same: successful firms make better use of design, communication between different functions is important and so on. A n important addition in 'Winning by design' is the international dimension. 'Winning' applies not just to successful firms in one industry but also to countries engaged in international competition. The international dimension allows for discussion of the fact that successful countries must allow some industrial activities to decline to be replaced by others. The second difference from thirty years ago is that Winning by design includes the results of research. People interested in research into the organizational environment of design will find a variety of research methods to contemplate. The results of one of the D I G studies are not included in the book. The data which show that firms who used design consultants increased their profits are published separately, this is unfortunate. Such data is needed in the battle to
230
convince engineers, managing directors, accountants etc. that design pays. Otherwise, we are still in 1965.
Winning by design is one of those very useful publications we have come to expect from the Open University tradition. It is both useful for teaching and of interest to researchers in the area. The O U Course P791, Managing Design, will use this book as will many others. The chapters end with 'Lessons and conclusions' which in effect are a set of notes capable of being learnt by people who have to pass exams. As claimed by the cover, it is a 'comprehensive text for students of management, design and marketing'. Whether it is also 'an essential guide for those involved in product development, marketing and business strategy' is more debatable. The book and the studies on which it is based are rather narrow in focus. Winning by design means successful new product development. 'New' means mainly 'a little bit new'. The lack of attention to other areas of design is justified by the claim that Britain is already good at them but product design is the field in which there is the greatest need for improvement. In practice, product design is mainly market-led design improvement and incremental innovation but the authors do claim that the most successful firms will also have a place for the higher risks of producing products ahead of market demand. The concept of market-led incremental innovation opens up a deep problem. Economists like
Design Studies Vol 15 No 2 April 1994
markets; management students like marketing; real companies seem to like marketing departments. But there is no market for something that does not exist. If design is dominated by something else called marketing how can design survive?
lem outside all previous human experience. This approach to design and design for the market are not the same thing. However, in terms of international competition, we might need more design for the market and Winning by design is helping to achieve that aim.
The book offers creative marketing as a way round this problem. This involves 'probing for complex motivational information to try to get to grips with the problem of understanding what customers and users want'.
John Langrish
Another way might be to concentrate on properties rather than products. People pay for desirable properties. Some properties are not really amenable to marketing. These include status, novelty and joy. One definition of design is planning affordable joy. There is not much joy in market-led incremental innovation. The growth of so-called joy-riding suggests that society is failing to provide opportunities for joy and forcing the growth of a noncontrolled (black?) market. None of the four authors is a designer. May be one day, designers will carry out this kind of research themselves. Then we will know more about what actually happens to design and to designers in a marketing dominated environment. This slight criticism should not detract from the value of Winning by design. It is an excellent summary of existing thought combined with the results of original research. It is itself designed for a market but we must not forget that some new things create a demand where none existed. This reviewer is left with an unmet need for a book like Papanek's 'Design for the real world' which is prepared to discuss the preposterous question of what constitutes a totally new prob-
Book reviews
2 Form, structure and mechanism Michael French, Macmillan Education Ltd., Basingstoke, UK (1992) £45.00, 226 pp, ISBN 0333 518 835 This is a book aimed at mechanical engineering students at undergraduate level. It is not a substitute for textbooks on mechanical engineering nor a presentation of case studies for students. It may best be read at the final stage of education. The examples show the application of a typical mixture of mathematics, static calculus and engineering, known as design engineering. The book offers a splendid elaboration on the sparsely taught main principles of engineering design and gives a clear demonstration of the many aspects to be considered. Examples of important principles included are: recurrent problems in design, pertinacity, principles for joint design, principles for nesting and stacking of functions, force paths, and in general the strength of abstraction of functions in the analysis of problems. After the preliminaries the book introduces some general design aids and principles. Discussed are 'what is the essence' to be tackled, alternative solutions to the problem, methods for systematic exploration of options, combination and separation of functions. The realistic settings of these subjects are of great value for the intended students. This will certainly keep
231