About Brandon Schauer
Brandon Schauer is a Design Strategist for Adaptive Path. He speaks on, writes about, and practices design as a means to create value. He has a decade of experience developing new user experiences on the Web, desktops, and products. His passion for finding and understanding the unmet needs of customers has led him to diverse environments, from the homes of cancer patients to tunnels beneath Walt Disney World.
At the MX Conference in San Fransisco, Brandon Schauer from Adaptive Path discussed various aspects of systemic thinking in design with obvious references to the terrific Target RX bottle, jetBlue, Starbucks, Design Within Reach and Flickr, two of which are having difficulty at the moment; one with scaling, the other with competitors.
He references more brands that we’re all familiar with which allows us to better understand what a systemic approach to design is. He also stresses the importance of focus and divergence.
Brandon further asks some interesting questions:
- “Where does creating user value, increase economic value?”
- “How can you identify the business opportunities?”
- “How do you start to reach a good understanding of what’s going to work in the market?”
- “What’s it going to take and what kind of return will I get if I make this investment in design”
- “How do you become a better lead for design within your organization?…what can you do?” Are you part of the operations? Are you part of the transitional stage? Are you part of the transformative stage?” (Becoming part of the transformational is the most coveted prize for design consultants and the most protected by clients, for a range of reasons.)
The great take-away from this presentation is in understanding where the value of design really comes from, how to connect it to business value and ultimately how it can become powerful and compelling.
